Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1896) v2.djvu/227
Chorus.
Speak the word through thy lips that is panting to pass.
Hecuba.
For nought the Gods took thought, save woes to me 1240
And Troy, above all cities loathed of them.
In vain we sacrificed! Yet, had not God
O'erthrown us so, and whelmed beneath the earth,[1]
We had faded fameless, never had been hymned
In lays, nor given song-themes to the after-time. 1245
Pass on, lay ye in a wretched tomb the corpse;
For now it hath the garlands, dues of death.
Yet little profit have the dead, I trow,
That gain magnificence of obsequies.
'Tis but the living friends' vaingloriousness. 1250
[The corpse is carried to burial.
Chorus.
Ah me! ah me!
Ah hapless mother, what goal she hath won[2]
Of all the proud hopes builded on thee!
O thou who wert born to exceeding bliss,
Thou hero's son,
What awful death for thy dying is this! 1255
What ho! what ho!
Whom see I on Ilium's tower-crowned wall,