Cyclops
Euripides
Euripides. The Plays of Euripides, Translated into English Prose from the Text of Paley. Vol. II. Coleridge, Edward P., translator. London: George Bell and Sons, 1891.
- Stranger, take the skin thyself and be my cup-bearer.
- Well, at any rate the grape is no stranger to my hand.
- Come, pour it in.
- In it goes! keep silence, that is all.
- A difficult task when a man is deep in his cups.
- Here, take and drink it off; leave none.
- ---[*](Paley supposes a line to have been lost here in which the Cyclops asked And how must I drink this?)
- Thou must be silent[*](σιγῶντα, but many editors follow Casaubon in reading δὲ σπῶντα drink it off.) and only give in when the liquor does.
- God wot! it is a clever stock that bears the grape.
- Aye, and if thou but swallow plenty of it after a plentiful meal, moistening thy belly till its thirst is gone, it will throw thee into slumber;
- but if thou leave aught behind, the Bacchic god will parch thee for it.
- Ha! ha! what a trouble it was getting out! This is pleasure unalloyed; earth and sky seem whirling round together; I see the throne of Zeus
- and all the godhead’s majesty. Kiss thee! no! There are the Graces trying to tempt me. I shall rest well enough with my Ganymede here; yea, by the Graces, right fairly.
- What! Cyclops, am I Ganymede, Zeus’s minion?
- (attempting to carry him into the cave.) To be sure, Ganymede whom I am carrying off from the halls of Dardanus.
- I am undone, my children; outrageous treatment waits me.
- Dost find fault with thy lover? dost scorn him in his cups?
- Woe is me! most bitter shall I find the wine ere long. [Exit Silenus, dragged away by Cyclops.
- Up now, children of Dionysus, sons of a noble sire, soon will yon creature in the cave, relaxed in slumber as ye see him, spew from his shameless maw the meat. Already the brand inside his lair is vomiting a cloud of smoke; and the only reason we prepared it was to burn
- the Cyclops’ eye; so mind thou quit thee like a man.