Euripides' HERACLES Complete

Translated by E. Coleridge.

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63 pages - You are on Page 14

(strophe 3)

Then he went through the waves of heaving Euxine against the mounted
host of Amazons dwelling round Maeotis, the lake that is fed by many
a stream, having gathered to his standard all his friends from Hellas,
to fetch the gold-embroidered raiment of the warrior queen, a deadly
quest for a girdle. And Hellas won those glorious spoils of the barbarian
maid, and safe in Mycenae are they now. On Lerna's murderous hound,
the many-headed hydra, he set his branding-iron, and smeared its venom
on his darts, wherewith he slew the shepherd of Erytheia, a monster
with three bodies;

(antistrophe 3)

And many another glorious achievement he brought to a happy issue;
to Hades' house of tears hath he now sailed, the goal of his labours,
where he is ending his career of toil, nor cometh he thence again.
Now is thy house left without a friend, and Charon's boat awaits thy
children to bear them on that journey out of life, whence is no returning,
contrary to God's law and man's justice; and it is to thy prowess
that thy house is looking although thou art not here. Had I been strong
and lusty, able to brandish the spear in battle's onset, my Theban
compeers too, I would have stood by thy children to champion them;
but now my happy youth is gone and I am left.

But lo! I see the children of Heracles who was erst so great, clad
in the vesture of the grave, and his loving wife dragging her babes
along at her side, and that hero's aged sire. Ah! woe is me! no longer
can I stem the flood of tears that spring to my old eyes. (Megara,
Amphitryon, and the children enter from the palace.)

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