Andromache
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.
- Embrace thy master’s knees, my child, and pray to him.
- Spare, O spare my life, kind master!
- Mine eyes are wet with tears, which trickle down my cheeks, as doth a sunless spring from a smooth rock. Ah me!
- What remedy, alas! can I provide me ’gainst my ills?
- Why fall at my knees in supplication? hard as the rock and deaf as the wave am I. My own friends have I helped,
- but for thee have I no tie of affection; for verily it cost me a great part of my life to capture Troy and thy mother; so thou shalt reap the fruit thereof and into Hades’ halls descend.
- Behold! I see Peleus drawing nigh; with aged step he hasteth hither.
- calling out as he comes in sight. What means this? I ask you and your executioner; why is the palace in an uproar? give a reason; what mean your lawless machinations?
- Menelaus, hold thy hand. Seek not to outrun justice. To his attendant. Forward! faster, faster! for this matter, methinks, admits of no delay; now if ever would I fain[*](Herwerden conjectures μενοινῶ for μ᾽ ἐπαινῶ, which is certainly a strange expression.) resume the vigour of my youth. First however
- will I breathe new life into this captive, being to her as the breeze that blows a ship before the wind. Tell me, by what right have they pinioned thine arms and are dragging thee and thy child away? like a ewe with her lamb art thou led to the slaughter, while I and thy lord were far away.
- Behold them that are haling me and my child to death,
- e’en as thou seest, aged prince. Why should I tell thee? For not by one urgent summons alone but by countless messengers have I sent for thee. No doubt thou knowest by hearsay of the strife in this house with this man’s daughter, and the reason of my ruin.
- So now they have torn and are dragging me from the altar of Thetis, the goddess of thy chiefest adoration and the mother of thy gallant son, without any proper trial, yea, and without waiting for my absent master; because, forsooth, they knew my defencelessness
- and my child’s, whom they mean to slay with me his hapless mother, though he has done no harm. But to thee, O sire, I make my supplication, prostrate at thy knees, though my hand cannot touch thy friendly beard; save me, I adjure thee, reverend sir,
- or to thy shame and my sorrow shall we be slain.
- Loose her bonds, I say, ere some one rue it; untie her folded hands.
- I forbid it, for besides[*](Reading τάλλα τ᾽ with Nauck for γ᾽ ἄλλος.) being a match for thee,
- I have a far better right to her.
- What! art thou come hither to set my house in order? Art not content with ruling thy Spartans?
- She is my captive; I took her from Troy.