dless I go down
Alive, O horror! to the vaults of the dead.
For what transgression of Heaven's ordinance?
Alas! how can I look to Heaven? on whom
Call to befriend me? seeing that I have earned,
By piety, the meed of impious?--
Oh! if this act be what the Gods approve,
In death I may repent me of my deed;
But if they sin who judge me, be their doom
No heavier than they wrongly wreak on me!

CH. With unchanged fury beats the storm of soul
That shakes this maiden.

CR. Then for that, be sure
Her warders shall lament their tardiness.

ANT. Alas! I hear Death's footfall in that sound.

CR. I may not reassure thee.--'Tis most true.

ANT. O land of Thebe, city of my sires,
Ye too, ancestral Gods! I go--I go!
Even now they lead me to mine end. Behold!
Founders of Thebes, the only scion left
Of Cadmus' issue, how unworthily,
By what mean instruments I am oppressed,
For reverencing the dues of piety. [_Exit guarded_

CHORUS.
Even Danae's beauty left the lightsome day. I 1
Closed in her strong and brass-bound tower she lay
In tomb-like deep confine.
Yet she was gendered, O my child!
From sires of noblest line,
And treasured for the Highest the golden rain.
Fated misfortune hath a power so fell:
Not wealth, nor warfare wild,
Nor dark spray-dashing coursers of the main
Against great Destiny may once rebel.

He too in darksome durance was compressed, I 2
King of Edonians, Dryas' hasty son[5],
In eyeless vault of stone
Immured by Dionysus' hest,
All for a wrathful jest.
Fierce madness issueth in such fatal flower.
He found 'twas mad to taunt the Heavenly Power,
Chilling the Maenad breast
Kindled with Bacchic fire, and with annoy
Angering the Muse that in the flute hath joy.

And near twin rocks that guard the Colchian sea, II 1
Bosporian cliffs 'fore Salmydessus rise,
Where neighbouring Ares from his shrine beheld
Phineus' two sons[6] by female fury quelled.
With cursed wounding of their sight-reft eyes,
That cried to Heaven to 'venge the iniquity.
The shuttle's sharpness in a cruel hand
Dealt the dire blow, not struck with martial brand.

But chiefly for her piteous lot they pined, II 2
Who was the source of their rejected birth.
She touched the lineage of Erechtheus old;
Whence in far caves her life did erst unfold,
Cradled 'mid storms, daughter