. When Ajax, having disgraced himself by slaughtering a
flock of sheep and cattle in the mad delusion that they were his
enemies, wishes he might die, Tecmessa, his concubine, declares, "Then
pray for my death, too, for why should I live if you are dead?" She
has, however, plenty of egotistic reasons for dreading his death, for
she knows that her fate will be slavery. Moreover, instead of being
edified by her expression of attachment, we are repelled when we bear
in mind that Ajax slew her father when he made her his concubine. The
Greeks were too indelicate in their ideas about concubines to be
disturbed by such a reflection. Nor were they affected disagreeably by
the utter indifference toward his concubine which Ajax displays. He
tells her to attend to her own affairs and remember that silence is a
woman's greatest charm, and before committing suicide he utters a
monologue in which he says farewell to his parents and to his country,
but has no last message for Tecmessa. She was only a woman, forsooth.

Only a woman, too, was Deianira, the heroine of the _Trachiniae_, and
though of exalted rank she fully realized this fact. When Hercules
first took her to Tiryns, he was still sufficiently interested in her
to shoot a hydra-poisoned arrow into the centaur Nessus, who attempted
to assault her while carrying her across the river Evenus. But after
she had borne him several children he neglected her, going off on
adventures to capture other women. She weeps because of his absence,
complaining that for fifteen months she has had no message from him.
At last information is brought to her that Hercules, inflamed with
violent love for the Princess Iole, had demanded her for a secret
union, and when the king refused, had ravaged his city and carried off
Iole, to be unto him more than a slave, as the messenger gives her to
understand distinctly. On receiving this message; Deianira is at first
greatly agitated, but soon remembers what the duty of a Greek wife is.
"I am well aware," she says in substance, "that we cannot expect a man
to be always content with one woman. To antagonize the god of love, or
to blame my husband for succumbing to him, would be foolish. After
all, what does it amount to? Has not Hercules done this sort of thing
many times before? Have I ever been angry with him for so often
succumbing to this malady? His concubines, too, have never received an
unkind word from me, nor shall Iole; for I freely confess, rese