Hecuba
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.
- just as I was starting from my home for the same purpose, your maid fell in with me, and gave me your message, which brought me here at once.
- Polymestor, I am held in such wretchedness that I blush to meet your eye;
- for my present evil case makes me ashamed to face you who saw me in happier days, and I could not look on you with unfaltering gaze. Do not then think it ill-will towards you, Polymestor; there is another cause as well,
- I mean the custom which forbids women to meet men’s gaze.
- No wonder, surely. But what need do you have of me? Why did you send for me to come here from my house?
- I wish to tell you and your children a private matter of my own; please bid
- your attendants withdraw from the tent.
- Retire; this desert spot is safe enough. The guards go out; to Hecuba You are my friend, and this Achaean army is well-disposed to me. But you must tell me how prosperity
- is to help its unlucky friends; for I am ready to do so.
- First tell me of the child Polydorus, whom you are keeping in your house, received from me and his father; is he alive? The rest I will ask you after that.
- Yes, you still have a share in fortune there.
- Well said, dear friend! how worthy of you!
- What next would you learn of me?
- has he any recollection of me his mother?
- Yes, he was longing to steal away here to you.
- Is the gold safe, which he brought with him from Troy?
- Safe under lock and key in my halls.
- Do save it, but do not desire your neighbor’s goods.
- Not I; may I benefit by what I have, lady!
- Do you know what I wish to say to you and your children?