Epeisodion 4
Messenger
You sons of Danaus, before you are torn to pieces by their attack, why delay to fall upon the gates with all your might, light-armed and cavalry and charioteers? No loitering then, soon as they heard that call; and many fell with bloody head,
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and many of us you could have seen thrown to the earth like tumblers before the walls, breathing their last, bedewing the dry ground with streams of blood.
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Then Atalanta’s son, who was not an Argive but an Arcadian, hurling himself like a hurricane at the gates, called for
fire and picks to raze the town; but Periclymenus, son of the ocean-god, stayed his wild career, heaving on his head a wagon-load of stone, the coping from the battlements; and it shattered his head with yellow hair and
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crashed through the seams of the skull, dabbling with blood his fresh cheek; and he will never go back alive to his mother with her lovely bow, the maid of Maenalus.
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Your son then, seeing these gates secure, went on to the next, and I followed him.
I saw Tydeus and his thick rows of targeteers hurling their Aetolian spears into the opening at the top of the turrets, so that our men fled and left the battlements; but your son rallied them once more, as a huntsman cheers his hounds,
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and stationed them at the towers again. And then we hastened to other gates, after stopping the affliction there. As for the madness of Capaneus, how can I describe it? He was going about with a long scaling-ladder, and boasting
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that even the holy fire of Zeus would not hold him back from giving the city to utter destruction. And even as he spoke, he climbed up beneath the hail of stones, crouched under the shelter of his shield, rung by smooth rung going up the ladder.
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But, just as he was scaling the parapet of the wall, Zeus smote him with a thunderbolt; the earth re-echoed, and fear seized everyone; for from the ladder his limbs were slung far apart, his head toward Olympus, his blood toward earth,
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while his legs and arms went spinning round like Ixion’s wheel he was hurled, spinnning; his burning corpse fell to the ground.
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But when Adrastus saw that Zeus was hostile to his army, he drew the Argive troops outside the trench. Meanwhile our armed cavalry, seeing the lucky omen of Zeus before us,
were driving forth their chariots, and the armed men charged with spears into the middle of the Argives, and all troubles happened at once: men were dying, hurled headlong from chariots, wheels flew off, axles crashed together,
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while the dead were heaped up on the dead. So for to-day we have prevented destruction of the towers of our land; but if this land will be fortunate for the future, that rests with the gods; for even now it owes its safety to some deity.
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Chorus Leader
Victory is fair; and if the gods are growing kinder, it would be well with me.
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Jocasta
The gods and fortune have treated us well; for my sons are alive and my land has escaped ruin. But Creon seems to have had bitter enjoyment
from my marriage with Oedipus, by losing his son to his sorrow, a public success, a private grief. But please, come back to your tale again and say what my two sons intend to do next.
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Messenger
Let the rest be; all is well with you so far.
Jocasta
Your words rouse my suspicions; I cannot let it be.
1210
Messenger
Have you any further wish than your sons’ safety?
Jocasta
Yes, to hear if I shall fare well in the future.
Messenger
Let me go; your son is left without his squire.
Jocasta
There is some evil you are hiding, veiling it in darkness.
Messenger
I would not add ill news to the good you have heard.
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Jocasta
You must, unless you take wings and fly away.
Messenger
Ah! Why did you not let me go after my good news, instead of forcing me to disclose evil? Those two sons of yours are resolved on
deeds of shameful recklessness, a single combat apart from the army; they addressed to Argives and Thebans alike words I would they had never uttered. Eteocles, taking his stand on a lofty tower, after ordering silence to be proclaimed to the army, began:
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and said: O captains of Hellas, chieftains of Argos here assembled, and you people of Cadmus, do not barter your lives for Polyneices or for me! For I myself excuse you from this risk,
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and will engage my brother in single combat; and if I slay him, I will possess my house alone, but if I am conquered I will hand down the city to him alone. You men of Argos, give up the struggle and return to your land, do not lose your lives here;
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there are enough of the Sown-men who lie dead.
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