Parodos
[Episode]
Ha! What dost thou at this house? why is it thou art ranging here,
Death
Phoebus? Once again thou wrongest me, circumscribing and limiting the honours of the nether world. Wert thou not content to hinder the death of Admetus, by thy knavish cunning baulking Destiny? but now again
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hast thou armed thee with thy bow and art keeping guard o’er her, this daughter of Pelias, who undertook, of her free will, to die for her lord and set him free.
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Apollo
Never fear; I have, be sure, justice and fair pleas to urge.
Death
What has that bow to do, if thou hast justice on thy side?
Apollo
’Tis my habit ever to carry it.
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Death
Ay, and to help this house more than is right.
Apollo
The reason is, I cannot bear a friend’s distress.
Death
Wilt rob me of this second corpse likewise?
Apollo
Come! I did not take the other from thee by violence.
Death
Then how is it he lives above the earth and not beneath?
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Apollo
He gave his wife instead, her whom now thou art come to fetch.
Death
Yea, and I will bear her hence to the nether world.
Apollo
Take her and go, for I do not suppose I can persuade thee.
Death
To slay my rightful victim? Why, that is my appointed task.
Apollo
Nay, but to lay thy deadly hand on those who soon would die.
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Death
I see thy drift, thy eager plea.
Apollo
Is it then possible that Alcestis should attain old age?
Death
It is not possible; I too, methinks, find a pleasure in my rights.
Apollo
Thou canst not anyhow take more than one life.
Death
When young lives die I reap a higher honour.
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Apollo
Should she die old, a sumptuous funeral will she have.
Death
Phoebus, the law thou layest down is all in favour of the rich.
Apollo
What mean’st thou? art so wise, and I never knew it?
Death
Those who have wealth would buy the chance of their dying old.
Apollo
It seems then thou wilt not grant me this favour.
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Death
Not I; my customs well thou knowest.
Apollo
That I do, customs men detest and gods abhor.
Death
Thou canst not realise every lawless wish.
Apollo
Mark me, thou shalt have a check for all thy excessive fierceness;
such a hero shall there come to Pheres’ halls, by Eurystheus sent to fetch a team of steeds from the wintry world of Thrace; he, a guest awhile in these halls of Admetus, will wrest this woman from thee by sheer force.
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So wilt thou get no thanks from me but yet wilt do this all the same, and earn my hatred too.Dindorf rejects these two lines.
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Death
Thou wilt not gain thy purpose any the more for all thy many words; that woman shall to Hades’ halls go down, I tell thee.
Lo! I am going for her, that with the sword I may begin my rites, for he whose hair this sword doth hallow is sacred to the gods below.
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[Choral]
WhatIn the arrangement of the following dialogue between the divided chorus I have mainly been guided by Paley, though I believe the last three lines assigned to him a Semichorus are said as the two bands are re-uniting preparatory to chanting their ode. means this silence in front of the palace? why is the house of Admetus stricken dumb?
Second Semichorus
Not one friend near
to say if we must mourn our queen as dead, or if she liveth yet and sees the sun, Alcestis, daughter of Pelias, by me and all esteemed the best of wives
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[Choral 1]
Doth any of you hear a groan, or sound of hands that smite together, or the voice of lamentation, telling all is over and done? Yet is there no servant
First Semichorus
stationed about the gate, no, not one. O come, thou saving god, to smooth the swelling waves of woe!μετακύμιος. Liddell and Scott between two waves of misery, i.e. causing a short lull.
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[Choral]
Surely, were she dead, they would not be so still.
First Semichorus
Maybe her corpse is not yet from the house borne forth.
Second Semichorus
Whence that inference? I am not so sanguine. What gives thee confidence?
95
First Semichorus
How could Admetus let his noble wife go unattended to the grave?
[Choral 1]
Before the gates I see no lustral water from the spring, as custom doth ordain should be
Second Semichorus
at the gates of the dead, no shorn lock lies on the threshold, which, as thou knowest, falls in mourning for the dead, no choir of maidens smites its youthfulDindorf restores νεαλὴς for νεολαία, a doubtful word, apparently not used as an adjective. Cf. Liddell and Scott. palms together.
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[Choral]
And yet this is the appointed day.
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Second Semichorus
What meanest thou by this?
First Semichorus
The day appointed for the journey to the world below.
Second Semichorus
Thou hast touched me to the heart, e’en to the soul.
Chorus
Whoso from his youth up has been accounted virtuous,
needs must weep to see the good suddenly cut off.
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[Choral 2]
’Tis done; no single spot in all the world remains whither one might steer a course, either to LyciaTo a shrine of Apollo.
Chorus
or to the parched abodesThe temple of Zeus Ammon in the deserts of Libya. of Ammon to release the hapless lady’s soul; on comes death with step abrupt,
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nor know I to whom I should go of all who at the gods’ altars offer sacrifice.
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Only the son of Phoebus,Asclepius, who had been slain by Zeus, for raising the dead to life. if he yet saw this light of day—
Ah! then then might she have left the dark abode and gates of Hades and have come again, for he would raise the dead to life, till that the thunderbolt’s forked flame, hurled by Zeus, smote him.
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But now what further hope of life can I welcome to me?
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[Choral]
Our lords have ere this done all they could; on every altar streams the blood of abundant sacrifice;
Chorus
yet our sorrows find no cure.
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