Hecuba (1041-1065)

Hark! how he launches a bolt with weighty hand! Shall we force an entry? The crisis calls on us to aid Hecuba and the Trojan women.

Strike on, spare not, burst the doors!

you shall never replace bright vision in your eyes or see your children, whom I have slain, alive again.

What! have you foiled the Thracian stranger and is he in your power, mistress? Is all your threat now brought to pass?

A moment, and you shall see him before the tent,

blind, advancing with blind random step; and the bodies of his two children whom I with my brave women of Troy killed; he has paid me the penalty; here he comes from the tent, as you see. I will withdraw out of his path and stand aside

from the hot fury of the Thracian, my deadly foe.

Woe is me! where can I go, where halt, or turn? shall I crawl like a wild four-footed beast on their track, as my reward? Which path shall I take first,

this or that, eager as I am to clutch those Trojan murderesses that have destroyed me? You wretched, cursed daughters

of Phrygia! to what corner have you fled cowering before me? O sun-god, would you could heal, could heal my bleeding eyes, ridding me of my blindness!