Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1896) v2.djvu/325

But I—I am whelmed in many miseries:
First, an ill name, though I am clean of sin; 270
And worse is this than suffering for just cause,
To bear the burden of sins that are not ours.
Then, from my home-land the Gods banished me
To alien customs, and, bereft of friends,
A slave am I, the daughter of free sires; 275
For midst barbarians slaves are all save one.
And—the one anchor that stayed up my fortunes,
That yet my lord would come, and end my woes—
He hath died: who was mine anchor is no more.
Dead is my mother, and her murderer I,— 280
Unjustly, yet the injustice cleaves to me.
And she, erewhile mine house's pride and mine,
My child, a virgin groweth grey unwed;
And the Twin Brethren, named the Sons of Zeus,
Are not. But, though I have nought but misery, 285
Me hath ill-faring, not ill-doing, slain.
And, worst of all, if I should reach mine home,
Men would in dungeon chain me, as the Helen
For whom to Ilium Menelaus went.
For, if mine husband lived, by tokens known 290
To none beside, might recognition be.
This cannot now be: no, he cannot 'scape.
Why then do I live on?—what fortune waits me?
Shall I choose marriage for escape from ills,
Dwell with a lord barbarian, at his board 295
Seated mid pomp? Nay, if a husband loathed
Dwell with a woman, her own self she loathes.
To die were best. How then with honour die?
Unseemly is the noose 'twixt earth and heaven:
Even of thralls 'tis held a death of shame. 300
Noble the dagger is and honourable,