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 sack all Hellas with the sword, till these
  2. Doers of deeds shall know what suffering is.
HECTOR.
  1. By heaven, could I once see this peril rolled
  2. Past us, and live in Ilion as of old,
  3. Untrembling, I would thank my gods! To seek
  4. Argos and sack the cities of the Greek-
  5. ’Twere not such light work as thou fanciest.
RHESUS.
  1. These Greeks that face thee, are they not their best?[*](P. 26, l. 480. It may be remarked that the play here uses a fairly common Homeric phrase in a sense which the scholars of our tradition knew but rejected.)
HECTOR.
  1. We seek not better. These do all we need.
RHESUS.
  1. When these are beaten, then, we have done the deed.
HECTOR.
  1. Lose not thy path watching a distant view.
RHESUS.
  1. Thou seem’st content to suffer, not to do?
HECTOR.
  1. I have a kingdom large by mine own right ..
  2. What station will best please thee in this fight
  3. To ground the targe and stablish thine array?
  4. Right, left, or midmost in the allies? Say.
RHESUS.
  1. ’Twould please me best to fight these Greeks alone.
  2. Yet, if ’twould irk thine honour not to have thrown
  3. One firebrand on the ships with me, why, then
  4. Set us to face Achilles and his men.