Rhesus

Euripides

Euripides. The Rhesus of Euripides. Translated into English rhyming verse with explanatory notes by Gilbert Murray. Murray, Gilbert, translator. London: George Allen and Company, Ltd., 1913.

  1. And hearth-stone, were well frighted, through the mute
  2. And wolfish thickets thus to hear him break.
  3. A great and rushing noise those Thracians make,
  4. Marching. We, all astonied, ran to drive
  5. Our sheep to the upmost heights. ’Twas some Argive,
  6. We thought, who came to sweep the mountain clear
  7. And waste thy folds; till suddenly our ear
  8. Caught at their speech, and knew ’twas nothing Greek.
  9. Then all our terror fled. I ran to seek
  10. Some scout or pioneer who led the van
  11. And called in Thracian: Ho, what child of man
  12. Doth lead you? From what nation do ye bring
  13. This host with aid to Ilion and her king?
  14. He told me what I sought, and there I stood
  15. Watching; and saw one gleaming like a God,
  16. Tall in the darkness on a Thracian car.
  17. A plate of red gold mated, like a bar,
  18. His coursers’ necks, white, white as fallen snow.
  19. A carven targe, with golden shapes aglow,
  20. Hung o’er his back. Before each courser’s head