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Ꭼ Ꮮ Ꭼ Ꮯ Ꭲ ᎡᎪ

DRAMATIS PERSONE.

ATTENDANT.

ORESTES.

ELECTRA.

CHORUS.

CHRYSOTHEMIS.

CLYTEMNESTRA.

ÆGISTHUS.

ELECTRA.

ATTENDANT.

O SON of Agamemnon that once commanded the army at Troy, now mayest thou here present behold those [places] for which thou wert ever eagerly longing. For this is the ancient "Argos, which thou didst desire, this the grove of the phrenzy-stricken daughter of Inachus, and this, Orestes, the Lycæan forum of the wolf-slaying God; but this on the left, the renowned temple of Juno; and for the place whither we are arrived, assure thyself thou seest the all-opulent Mycenæ and this the habitation of the Pelopidæ teeming with murders, whence I formerly, having received thee from thy full-sister's hand, bore and res

Argos is here applied to the country.

b Io, whose story is told in the Prometheus of Æschylus, from which play the word oirτgórλng is borrowed. The temple of Juno was, according to Strabo, fifteen stades to the left of the town: she was the patroness of Argos.

с

cued thee from thy father's bloody fate, and nourished thee thus far onwards to thy youth, as an avenger of his murder to thy sire. Now therefore, Orestes, and thou, Pylades, dearest of foreign friends, what it is needful to do you must quickly determine, since already the brilliant light of the sun wakes the clear morning carols of the birds, and the dark and starry night has disappeared. Ere therefore any of the inhabitants walk forth from his roof, we must confer in counsel, since we are come to that point where there is no longer any season for delay, but the crisis of

action.

ORESTES.

O most beloved of serving men, how evident are the proofs thou shewest to me of thy natural integrity towards us; for even as a generous horse, although he be aged, in dangers has not lost his spirit, but pricks his ears upright, even so thou both urgest us forward and art among the first to follow us. Wherefore my determinations will I unfold, and do thou, lending an alert attention to my words, if in aught I miss of the

• Pylades was son of Strophius, a Phocian prince, by a sister of Agamemnon, and being educated with his cousin Orestes, formed with him a friendship that has become proverbial.

d Commentators disagree on the interpretation of this place. The Scholiast suggests two constructions, an antiptosis, μελαίνης νυκτὸς τὰ ἄστρα ἐκλέλοιπεν, which has been followed by Brunck, and ἐκλέλοιπε τῶν ἄστρων ἡ μέλαινα εὐφρόνη. Musgrave translates ἐκλέλοιπεν excessit, and understands orga to mean the whole heavens, as in Virgil. Æn.

III. 567.

"Ter spumam elisam et rorantia vidimus astra."

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