Elytra

“ He asked me about the Forest and you children. And he said that Eric sometime would surely want to go back to humans, and when he did he would help him. He understands boys. It is to him you had better go, Eric, and when you are really ready I will tell you how, and start you on your way."
Eric sighed with contentment, and leaned his head against Helma's shoulder.
But Ivra stayed at her mother's other side, as still and silent as a shadow. Soon the fireflies began their nightly dance in the garden. But Ivra did not go darting after them as usual to make their dance the swifter. ”

“ Far off; there might be pity for thy son?
Clytemnestra.
I dare not! . . . Yes, I fear him. 'Tis mine own
Life, and not his, comes first. And rumour saith
His heart yet burneth for his father's death.
Electra.
Why dost thou keep thine husband ever hot
Against me?
Clytemnestra.
⁠'Tis his mood. And thou art not
So gentle, child!
Electra.
⁠My spirit is too sore!
Howbeit, from this day I will no more
Hate him.
Clytemnestra (with a flash of hope) .
⁠O daughter!—Then, indeed, shall he,
I promise, never more be harsh to thee!
Electra. ”

“ And Elisha said: "I know it; but hold your peace."
And so it went on till they reached Jericho, and here again the sons of the prophets came to Elisha with their question: "Do you know that the Lord will take your master from your head to-day?"
And again Elisha sorrowfully answered: "Yes, I know it; hold ye your peace."
Then Elijah said to him: "Stay here, I pray thee; for the Lord hath sent me to Jordan."
But Elisha gave the same answer to him as he had given before, that he would not on any account leave him. So they went on together. ”

“ If ever a man looked as if he was struck with death, it's you, this very night as here is."
"Nonsense, Lyddy," said Esther, angrily. "Go to bed when my father desires it. I will stay with him."
Lyddy was electrified by surprise at this new behaviour of Miss Esther's. She took her candle silently and went.
"Go you too, my dear," said Mr Lyon, tenderly, giving his hand to Esther, when Lyddy was gone. "It is your wont to go early. Why are you up?" ”

“ Of the friends of Argos whom
Durst I have sought, to aid me to the doom
I craved?—Speak if thou wouldst, and fear not me,
If yet thou deemst him slain unrighteously.
Leader.
Thy words be just, yet shame their justice brings;
A woman true of heart should bear all things
From him she loves. And she who feels it not,
I cannot reason of her, nor speak aught.
Electra.
Remember, mother, thy last word of grace,
Bidding me speak, and fear not, to thy face.
Clytemnestra. ”

“ Electra.
God love thee for the sweetness of thy word!
Orestes.
God love the twain of us, both thee and me.
Electra.
He lives! Poor brother! In what land weareth he
His exile?
Orestes.
⁠Not one region nor one lot
His wasted life hath trod.
Electra.
⁠He lacketh not
For bread?
Orestes.
⁠Bread hath he; but a man is weak
In exile.
Electra.
⁠What charge laid he on thee? Speak.
Orestes.
To learn if thou still live, and how the storm,
Living, hath struck thee.
Electra.
⁠That thou seest; this form
Wasted . . .
Orestes. ”

“ Little Ellie sits alone,
And the smile she softly uses
Fills the silence like a speech
While she thinks what shall be done,
And the sweetest pleasure chooses
For her future within reach.
Little Ellie in her smile
Chooses—"I will have a lover,
Riding on a steed of steeds:
He shall love me without guile,
And to him I will discover
The swan's nest among the reeds.
"And the steed shall be red-roan,
And the lover shall be noble,
With an eye that takes the breath:
And the lute he plays upon
Shall strike ladies into trouble,
As his sword strikes men to death. ”

“ The disordered grey hair—the haggard face—the reddened eyelids under which the tears seemed to be coming again with pain, pierced Esther to the heart. A passionate desire to soothe this suffering woman came over her. She clung round her again, and kissed her poor quivering lips and eyelids, and laid her young cheek against the pale and haggard one. Words could not be quick or strong enough to utter her yearning. ”

“ That sense of the inevitable which had the Greek dramatists wholly, which had George Eliot sufficiently, that rhythmical progression of events, rhythm and inevitableness (two words for one and the same thing) is not there. Elly's golden head, the back-ground of austere French Protestants, is sketched with a flowing water-colour brush, I do not know if it is true, but true or false in reality, it is true in art. But the jarring dissonance of her marriage is inadmissible; it cannot be led up to by chords no matter how ingenious, the passage, the attempts from one key to the other, is impossible ”

“ Orestes.
⁠Thy mother stays
Unmoved 'mid all thy wrong?
Electra.
⁠A lover weighs
More than a child in any woman's heart.
Orestes.
But what end seeks Aegisthus, by such art
Of shame?
Electra.
⁠To make mine unborn children low
And weak, even as my husband.
Orestes.
⁠Lest there grow
From thee the avenger?
Electra.
⁠Such his purpose is:
For which may I requite him!
Orestes.
⁠And of this
Thy virgin life—Aegisthus knows it?
Electra.
⁠Nay,
We speak it not. It cometh not his way.
Orestes.
These women hear us. Are they friends to thee?
Electra. ”

“ Ivra makes me think of a brown, blown leaf, and now here will be two of them! You can blow together all over the forest."
Eric's eyes swam in sudden, happy tears, but he only said, "Nora wore red."
"Oh, she's not one of us," laughed Helma. "But she's lived close to us so long, she is able to see us. We aren't afraid of her. She's a good neighbor."
But why might they be afraid of such a nice old woman, Eric wondered. He was to learn sometime, and much beside, for this was the beginning of new things for him, and his mother, Helma, and Ivra were strange people. ”

“ Eliot, insisting that his disciples should have but one wife, was asked, “If an Indian have two wives, the first without, the second with children, which of them shall he put away? If he renounces the first, then he wrongs the one who has the strongest claim upon him. If he discards the second, then he breaks a living tie, and makes his children bastards.” “If one man sins knowingly and another ignorantly, will God punish both alike?” ”

“ She spoke coldly. “I don’t believe you want them in your boarding-house. They are not always desirable, I believe!” Elvira’s eyes were fastened on the floor.
Archibald paced to and fro in the parlor. “Confound her odd New England conscience!” he muttered to himself. Seizing her hands, he cried, passionately, “I, too, must confess. Elvira, I loved you that first day you came. I loved you! Therefore I let you think—it was a boarding house.” ”

“ She had no covering on her head, but, like Eva, her wealth of luxuriant tresses, as fine as the golden floss on the ripening corn, flowed down and over her shapely shoulders.
"We are in the hands of God," said her father, reverently, as he drew his elbow closer to his side, so as to press the hand of his daughter with it; "I waited as long as I dared, and had I not made the pledge I would have gone forward to Fred's assistance." ”

“ Electra returns to Stage, her whole manner changed: as if the prayer had already begun to be fulfilled, she has found the mysterious locks which, she bit by bit lets out, must be those of Orestes—the Chorus, like sailors in a storm, can only invoke the gods: if the day has come, from a small seed a mighty trunk may grow—Electra then discovers foot-prints [as if leading from the Side Stage-door to the Orchestra-staircase] of two travellers; one foot-print agrees with her brother's: {203}
Orestes and Pylades come forward: recognition and joy, Electra hardly believing. ”

“ He had turned his face to the wall as he had said, and nothing but a long-drawn, occasional sigh told that he was awake. 'I think he is not worse—in body,' she said. 'He has borne it far better than we could have thought possible. But how am I to tell him the way it happened, and how am I to tell him about Ellermore?' She wept with a prostration and self-abandonment which alarmed me; but she stopped my remonstrances and entreaties with a motion of her hand. 'Oh, let me cry! It is the only ease I have,' she said. ”

“ She eagerly insists that Orestes is come; shows the lock and describes the libations that no other would pour on that tomb. Bit by bit Electra checks her joy, and informs her of the news. They mourn together, till Electra breaks out with proposal, that since their friends are snatched from them, and they two are left alone, they shall themselves work their revenge; that will be the safest and will bring glory: 'the sisters twain who saved their father's house.'—Chor. This requires consideration.—Chry. Will you never learn that you are a woman and not a man? ”

“ Ellerey felt the magic of her influence, and his eyes looked unflinchingly into hers for a moment; the woman in her understood what manner of man he was in whom she trusted. "If I read you aright, Captain Ellerey," she said, with a radiant smile, "it is not your nature to be frivolous, to catch pleasure as it flies and play with it while the bubble lasts; yet must you school yourself to do so. The light-hearted cavalier and careless lover will not be suspected of any deep design, and it would be well that that should seem your character at Court. ”

“ He said very bluntly to her, one day, at dinner:
“So I hear your niece is a great actress.”
Miss Perkins gave him a quick, sharp glance.
“She has acted,” she replied. “But Elvira Price had too much conscience to act long.”
He gave a sigh of relief.
“She acted in Boston, because she was bound to try it. She wanted to try everything—everything that would keep her father out of the poor-house and educate the family. But acting, Mr. Archibald, is a dreadful business! As soon as 162Elvira saw into it a little she quit. The air wasn’t pure enough, somehow, for her. Elvira, she needs awful pure air!” ”

“ Elvira and Alaric were led among a strong body of men, and everything [168] was being prepared for burning the lovers, when Elvira’s old tutor presented himself before Wamba, and said—
“Know, O king, that thy daughter fears not death, for her comfort is on the Cross, and not on the Crescent. If any one be to blame, I am he, for I instructed her. Let me, then, be burned in her stead.”
Wamba gazed fiercely at the old man, and, raising his massive olive staff surmounted by a gold crown, exclaimed—
“Thou shalt also die, but not before thou hast witnessed her sufferings. ”

“ Wherefore? what win I from the gods by prayer?
Orestes:
This, that thine eyes behold thy heart's desire.
Electra:
On whom of mortals know'st thou that I call?
Orestes:
I know thy yearning for Orestes deep.
Electra:
Say then, wherein event hath crowned my prayer?
Orestes:
I, I am he; seek not one more akin.
Electra:
Some fraud, O stranger, weavest thou for me?
Orestes:
Against myself I weave it, if I weave.
Electra:
Ah, thou hast mind to mock me in my woel
Orestes:
'Tis at mine own I mock then, mocking thine.
Electra:
Speak I with thee then as Orestes' self? ”

“ Lyddy had said, "Miss, you look sadly; if you can't take a walk, go and lie down." She had never seen the curls in such disorder, and she reflected that there had been a death from typhus recently. But the obstinate Miss only shook her head.
Esther was waiting for the sake of—not a probability, but—a mere possibility, which made the brothy odours endurable. ”

“ When the urn containing, as she believes, the dust of her brother, is placed in the hands of Electra, we can well overleap time and space, and see before us the great actor who brought the relics of his own son upon the stage, and shed no mimic sorrows [366] —we can well picture the emotions that circle round the vast audience—pity itself being mingled with the consciousness to which the audience alone are admitted, that lamentation will soon be replaced by joy, and that the living Orestes is before his sister. ”

“ Eldris murmured with stiff lips. She was dropping to sleep again through sheer exhaustion in spite of pain, when Sada returned with a tray which held a bowl, smoking hot, an ampulla of wine, and a cheap brass cup. Between them the women roused Eldris and fed her carefully. As her strength began to return, she looked about her with quickening interest. But the room told her nothing. It was small and bare, furnished with but the bed on which she lay, a copper brazier of charcoal, and a couple of wooden stools. The women, over her head, talked in low voices. ”

“ The vision of Elvira's pale beauty and his quick intuition of the dangers she has run in forcing her way to him produce a sudden revulsion of feeling towards her, a flood of passionate reconciliation; he is at her feet once more; he feels that she is true, that she is his. She, in a frenzy of fear, cannot succeed for all her efforts in dimming his ecstasy of joy or in awakening him to the necessity of flight, and at last he even resents her terror for him, her entreaties that he will forget her and escape. ”

“ They would jeer and scoff at men for their struggles, lying, and treachery. Yet though they were so good they worshipped none, unless you might say they were worshippers of Truth.
After a time Elidore began to long to see boys and men of his own size, and he begged permission to go and visit his mother. So the King gave him permission: so the little men led him along the passage, and guided him through the forest, till he came near his mother's cottage, and when he entered, was not she rejoiced to see her dear son again? ”