from this house?

CHOR. By no means; but he is gone to the Argive people, to undergo the
trial proposed regarding life, by which you must either live or die.

ELEC. Alas me! what thing has he done? but who persuaded him?

CHOR. Pylades.--But this messenger seems soon about to inform us of what
has passed there concerning thy brother.

MESSENGER, ELECTRA, CHORUS.

MESS. O wretched hapless daughter of the chief Agamemnon, revered Electra,
hear the unfortunate words which I am come to bring.

ELEC. Alas! alas! we are undone; this thou signifiest by thy speech. For
thou comest, as it seems, a messenger of woes.

MESS. It has been carried by the vote of the Pelasgians, that thy brother
and thou must die this day.

ELEC. Ah me! the expected event has come, which long since fearing, I pined
away with lamentations on account of what was in prospect.--But what was
the debate? What arguments among the Argives condemned us, and confirmed
our sentence of death? Tell me, old man, whether by the hand raised to
stone me, or by the sword must I breathe out my soul, having this calamity
in common with my brother?

MESS. I chanced indeed to be entering the gates from the country, anxious
to hear both what regarded thee, and what regarded Orestes; for at all
times I had a favorable inclination toward thy father: and thy house fed
me, poor indeed, but noble in my conduct toward friends. But I see the
crowd going and sitting down on an eminence; where they say Danaus first
collected the people to a common council, when he suffered punishment at
the hands of AEgyptus. But seeing this concourse, I asked one of the
citizens, "What new thing is stirring in Argos? Has any message from
hostile powers roused the city of the Danaids?" But he said, "Seest thou
not this Orestes walking near us, who is about to run in the contest of
life and death?" But I see an unexpected sight, which oh that I had never
seen! Pylades and thy brother walking together, the one indeed broken with
sickness, but the other, like a brother, sympathizing with his friend,
tending his weakened state with fostering care. But when the assembly of
the Argives was full, a herald stood forth and said, "Who wishes to speak
_on the question_, whether it is right that Orestes, who has killed his
mother, should die, or not?" And on this Talthybius rises, who, in
conjunction with thy father, laid waste the Phrygians. But he spoke words
of divided import, being the constant sla