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Libation Bearers (774-848)

urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0085.tlg006.perseus-eng2:774-848
Refs {'start': {'reference': '774', 'human_reference': 'Line 774'}, 'end': {'reference': '848', 'human_reference': 'Line 848'}}
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What! Are you gladdened at heart by the present news?
Chorus
Why not, if Zeus at last may cause our ill wind to change?
Nurse
But how can that be? Orestes, the hope of our house, is gone.
Chorus
Not yet; he would be a poor prophet who would so interpret.
Nurse
What are you saying? Do you know something beyond what has been told?
Chorus
Go, deliver your message! Do what you are asked to do!
The gods take care of what they take care of.
Nurse
Well, I will go and do your bidding. With the gods’ blessing may everything turn out for the best! Exit
783
Chorus
Now at my supplication, O Zeus, father of the Olympian gods, grant that the fortunes of our house be firmly established,
so that those who rightly desire the rule of order may behold it. Every word of mine has been uttered in justice. O Zeus, may you safeguard it!
789
Chorus
O Zeus, set him who is within the palace before his foes;
since, if you exalt him, he will gladly pay you with double and triple recompense.
794
Chorus
Know that the orphaned colt of a loved one is harnessed to the chariot of distress.
And by setting bounds to his course may you grant that we see him keep a steady pace through this race and win the goal in the straining stride of a gallop.[*]
800
Chorus
And you who within the house inhabit the inner chamber that exults in its wealth, hear me, you gods, that feel with us! By a fresh award redeem the blood of deeds done long ago.
May aged Murder cease begetting offspring in our house!
806
Chorus
And you who occupy the mighty, gorgeously built cavern,[*] grant that the man’s house may lift up its eyes again in joy, and that with glad
eyes it may behold from under its veil of gloom the radiant light of freedom.
811
Chorus
May Maia’s son,[*] as he rightfully should, lend his aid, for no one can better sail a deed on a favoring course, when he would do so.[*]
But by his mysterious utterance he brings darkness over men’s eyes by night, and by day he is no more clear at all.
819
Chorus
And then at last with a loud voice we shall sing a song of the deliverance of our house,
the song that women raise when the wind sits fair, and not the shrill strain of those who mourn: The ship goes well. This grows to profit for me, for me, and calamity holds off from those I love.
827
Chorus
But may you with good courage, when the part of action comes, cry out loud the name Father when she exclaims Son,
and accomplish the baneful but irreproachable deed.
831
Chorus
Raise up Perseus’ spirit within my breast. And for those dear to you below the earth, and for those above, exact satisfaction for their dire wrath
by working bloody ruin in our house and obliterating the guilt of murder.[*]
838
Enter Aegisthus
Aegisthus
I have come not unasked but summoned by a messenger. I heard startling news told by some strangers who have arrived, tidings far from welcome:
—that Orestes is dead. To lay this too upon our house would be a fearful burden when it is still festering and galled by the wound inflicted by an earlier murder. How can I believe this tale is the living truth? Or is it merely a panic-stricken report spread by women
which leaps up to die away in nothingness? What can you tell me of this to make it plain to my mind?
Chorus
We heard the tale, it is true. But go inside and inquire of the strangers. The certainty of a messenger’s report

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