ling my arms round his dearest neck, after so long a time a
wretched exile. How splendid is he, O old man, in his golden armor,
glittering like the morning rays of the sun.

TUT. He will come to this house confiding in the truce, so as to fill thee
with joy.

ANT. But who, O aged man, is this, who guides his milk-white steeds seated
in his chariot?

TUT. The prophet Amphiaraus this, O my mistress, and with him the victims,
the libations of the earth delighting in blood.

AST. O thou daughter of the brightly girded sun, thou moon, golden-circled
light, applying what quiet and temperate blows to his steeds does he direct
his chariot! But where is he who utters such dreadful insults against this
city, Capaneus?

TUT. He is scanning the approach to the towers, measuring the walls both
from their foundation to the top.

ANT. O vengeance, and ye loud-roaring thunders of Jove, and thou blasting
fire of the lightning, do thou quell this more-than-mortal arrogance. This
is he who will with his spear give to Mycenae, and to the streams of Lernaean
Triaena,[13] and to the Amymonian[14] waters of Neptune, the Theban women,
having invested them with slavery. Sever, O awful Goddess, never, O
daughter of Jove, with golden clusters of ringlets, Diana, may I endure
servitude.

TUT. My child, enter the palace, and at home remain in thy virgin chambers,
since thou hast arrived at the indulgement of thy desire, as to what you
were anxious to behold. For, since confusion has entered the city, a crowd
of women is advancing to the royal palace. The race of women is prone to
complaint, and if they find but small occasion for words, they add more,
and it is a sort of pleasure to women, to speak nothing well-advised one of
another.[15]

CHORUS.

I have come, having left the Tyrian wave, the first-fruits of Loxias, from
the sea-washed Phoenicia, a slave for the shrine of Apollo, that I might
dwell under the snowy brows of Parnassus, having sped my way over the
Ionian flood by the oar, the west wind with its blasts riding over the
barren plains of waters[16] which flow round Sicily, the sweetest murmur in
the heavens. Chosen out from my city the fairest present to Apollo, I came
to the land of the Cadmeans, the illustrious descendants of Agenor, sent
hither to these kindred towers of Laius. And I am made the slave of Apollo
in like manner with the golden-framed images. Moreover the water of
Castalia awaits me, to lave the virgin pride o