Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1896) v2.djvu/215

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THE DAUGHTERS OF TROY.
159

Nor battle-crushed, nor 'neath a despot bowed.
But I by Hellas' good-hap was undone, 935
Sold for my beauty; and I am reproached
For that for which[1] I should have earned a crown!
But, thou wilt say, I shun the issue still—
For what cause I by stealth forsook thine home.
He came, with no mean Goddess at his side; 940
He came, mine evil genius,—be his name
Paris or Alexander, which thou wilt,—
Whom, wittol thou, thou leftest in thine halls,
Sailing from Sparta to the Cretan land!
Not thee, but mine own heart, I question next— 945
What impulse stirred me from thine halls to follow
That guest, forsaking fatherland and home.
Punish the Goddess; be thou mightier
Than Zeus, who ruleth all the Gods beside,
Yet is her slave!—so, pardon is my due. 950
But,—since thou mightest here find specious plea,—
When Alexander dead to Hades passed,
I, of whose couch the Gods were careless now,
Ought from his halls to have fled to the Argive ships.
Even this did I essay: my witnesses 955
Gate-warders are, and watchmen of the walls,
Who found me ofttimes from the battlements
By cords to earth down-climbing privily.
Yea, my new lord—yon corpse Deiphobus,—
Kept in the Phrygians' despite his bride. 960
How then, O husband, should I justly die
By thine hand, since by force he wedded me,
And my hfe there no victor's triumph was,[2]

  1. ↑ Al. "By those from whom."
  2. ↑ Or, according to Paley—"And mine own gifts no victor's triumph brought."
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