Aeschylus

“ Speak! for man is born to sorrow; yea, the proverb sayeth sooth!
'Tis the doom of mortal beings, if they live to see old age,
To suffer bale, by land and sea, through war and tempest's rage.
Atossa
O thou whose blissful fate on earth all mortal weal excelled—
Who, while the sunlight touched thine eyes, the lord of all wert held!
A god to Persian men thou wert, in bliss and pride and fame—
I hold thee blest too in thy death, or e'er the ruin came!
Alas, Darius! one brief word must tell thee all the tale—
The Persian power is in the dust, gone down in blood and bale! ”

“ For the sea-sorrow of our host!
The city mourns, and I must wail
With plashing tears our sorrow's tale,
Lamenting for the loved and lost!
Xerxes
Alas, the god of war, who sways
The scales of fight in diverse ways,
Gives glory to Ionia!
Ionian ships, in fenced array,
Have reaped their harvest in the bay,
A darkling harvest-field of Fate,
A sea, a shore, of doom and hate!
Chorus
Cry out, and learn the tale of woe! ”

“ Queen, it stands not with my purpose to abet these fears of thine,
Nor to speak with glozing comfort! nay, betake thee to the shrine!
If thy dream foretold disaster, sue to gods to bar its way,
And, for thyself, son, state, and friends, to bring fair fate to-day!
Next, unto Earth and to the Dead be due libation poured,
And by thee let Darius' soul be wistfully implored—
I saw thee, lord, in last night's dream, a phantom from the grave,
I pray thee, lord, from earth beneath come forth to help and save! ”

“ Hath she so great predominance, such legions in array?
Chorus
Ay—such a host as smote us sore upon an earlier day.
Atossa
And what hath she, besides her men? enow of wealth in store?
Chorus
A mine of treasure in the earth, a fount of silver ore!
Atossa
Is it in skill of bow and shaft that Athens' men excel?
Chorus
Nay, they bear bucklers in the fight, and thrust the spear-point well.
Atossa
And who is shepherd of their host and holds them in command?
Chorus
To no man do they bow as slaves, nor own a master's hand. ”

“ And Tolmus, greedy of the spear!
I stand bereft! not in thy train
Come they, as erst! ah, ne'er again
Shall they return unto our eyes,
Car-borne, 'neath silken canopies!
Xerxes
Yea, gone are they who mustered once the host!
Chorus
Yea, yea, forgotten, lost!
Xerxes
Alas, the woe and cost!
Chorus
Alas, ye heavenly powers!
Ye wrought a sorrow past belief,
⁠A woe, of woes the chief!
With aspect stern, upon us Ate lours!
Xerxes
Smitten are we—time tells no heavier blow!
Chorus
Smitten! the doom is plain!
Xerxes
Curse upon curse and pang on pang we know! ”

“ Yea, and all the Ionian tract, where the Greek-born inhabitants throng,
And the cities are teeming with gold—Darius was lord of them all,
And, great by his wisdom, he ruled, and ever there came to his call,
In stalwart array and unfailing, the warrior chiefs of our land,
And mingled allies from the tribes who bowed to his conquering hand!
But now there are none to gainsay that the gods are against us; we lie
Subdued in the havoc of wreck, and whelmed by the wrath of the sky! ”

“ Queen, among deep-girded Persian dames thou highest and most royal,
⁠Hoary mother, thou, of Xerxes, and Darius' wife of old!
To godlike sire, and godlike son, we bow us and are loyal—
⁠Unless, on us, an adverse tide of destiny has rolled! ”

“ As soon as sunlight warms the ground no more,
And gloom enwraps the sanctuary of sky,
Range we our fleet in triple serried lines
To bar the passage from the seething strait,
This way and that: let other ships surround
The isle of Ajax, with this warning word—
That if the Greeks their jeopardy should scape
By wary craft, and win their ships a road,
Each Persian captain shall his failure pay
By forfeit of his head. So spake the king,
Inspired at heart with over-confidence,
Unwitting of the gods' predestined will. ”

“ Alack, full many a Persian dame
⁠Is left forlorn and husbandless!
Atossa
Mute have I been awhile, and overwrought
At this great sorrow, for it passeth speech,
And passeth all desire to ask of it.
Yet if the gods send evils, men must bear.
⁠ (To the Messenger)
Unroll the record! stand composed and tell,
Although thy heart be groaning inwardly,
Who hath escaped, and, of our leaders, whom
Have we to weep? what chieftains in the van
Stood, sank, and died and left us leaderless?
Messenger
Xerxes himself survives and sees the day. ”

“ With joy he reached the bridge that spanned the Hellespontine main.
Ghost of Darius
How? is he safe, in Persian land? speak soothly, yea or nay!
Atossa
Clear and more clear the rumour comes, for no man to gainsay.
Ghost of Darius
Woe for the oracle fulfilled, the presage of the war
Launched on my son, by will of Zeus! I deemed our doom afar
In lap of time; but, if a king push forward to his fate,
The god himself allures to death that man infatuate!
So now the very fount of woe streams out on those I loved,
And mine own son, unwisely bold, the truth hereof hath proved! ”

“ Where the waters are wide and in stress of the wind the billows roll hoary to lee!
And their trust is in cable and cordage, too weak in the power of the blast,
And frail are the links of the bridge whereby unto Hellas they passed.
Therefore my gloom-wrapped heart is rent with sorrow
⁠For what may hap to-morrow!
Alack, for all the Persian armament—
⁠Alack, lest there be sent
Dread news of desolation, Susa's land
⁠Bereft, forlorn, unmanned—
Lest the grey Kissian fortress echo back
⁠The wail, Alack, Alack!
The sound of women's shriek, who wail and mourn,
⁠With fine-spun raiment torn! ”

“ And guide across the passage broad his manifold array!
Ah, folly void of counsel! he deemed that mortal wight
Could thwart the will of Heaven itself and curb Poseidon's might!
Was it not madness? much I fear lest all my wealth and store
Pass from my treasure-house, to be the snatcher's prize once more!
Atossa
Such is the lesson, ah, too late! to eager Xerxes taught—
Trusting random counsellors and hare-brained men of nought,
Who said Darius mighty wealth and fame to us did bring,
But thou art nought, a blunted spear, a palace-keeping king! ”

“ For husbands gone to death, for childless agony!
⁠Alas the aged men, who mourn to-day
⁠The ruinous sorrows that the gods ordain!
⁠O'er the wide Asian land, the Persian sway
Can force no tribute now, and can no rule sustain.
⁠Yea, men will crouch no more to fallen power
⁠And kingship overthrown! the whole land o'er,
⁠Men speak the thing they will, and from this hour
The folk whom Xerxes ruled obey his word no more. ”

“ Friends, whosoe'er is versed in human ills,
Knoweth right well that when a wave of woe
Comes on a man, he sees in all things fear;
While, in flood-tide of fortune, 'tis his mood
To take that fortune as unchangeable,
Wafting him ever forward. Mark me now—
The gods' thwart purpose doth confront mine eyes,
And all is terror to me; in mine ears
There sounds a cry, but not of triumph now—
So am I scared at heart by woe so great. ”

“ Ere now they have passed o'er the sea, the manifold host of the king—
They have gone forth to sack and to burn; ashore on the Westland they spring!
With cordage and rope they have bridged the sea-way of Helle, to pass
O'er the strait that is named by thy name, O daughter of Athamas! ”

“ Or Xerxes, in his numbers confident?
Messenger
O queen, our whole disaster thus befell,
Through intervention of some fiend or fate—
1 know not what—that had ill will to us.
From the Athenian host some Greek came o'er,
To thy son Xerxes whispering this tale—
Once let the gloom of night have gathered in,
The Greeks will tarry not, but swiftly spring
Each to his galley-bench, in furtive flight,
Softly contriving safety for their life. ”

“ How meanest thou? by what defensive power?
Ghost of Darius
She wastes by famine a too countless foe.
Chorus
But we will bring a host more skilled than huge.
Ghost of Darius
Why, e'en that army, camped in Hellas still,
Shall never win again to home and weal!
Chorus
How say'st thou? will not all the Asian host
Pass back from Europe over Helle's ford? ”

“ Some by the way of the waves, and some o'er the planking have pressed.
For the king is a lord and a god: he was born of the golden seed
That erst upon Danae fell—his captains are strong at the need! ”