Eksodos
Servant
Forthwith the son, vouchsafed by oracles, bared his arm by casting off his cloak and stretched it out across the board
crying Who was it strove to slay me? Proclaim it, old sirrah, for thine was the officious zeal and thine the hand from which I took the cup. With that he caught the grey-beard by the arm and set to searching him that he might take the old man red-handed in the act.
1210
So was he detected, and under strong constraint declared Creusa’s daring deed and all the trick of the poisoned draught. Forth rushed the young man, whom the oracle of Loxias to his sire assigned, taking with him the banqueters, and standing mid the Delphic nobles made harangue,
1215
O! hallowed soil, a stranger woman, daughter of Erechtheus, seeks to poison me. And the lords of Delphi decreed by general vote that my mistress should be hurled from the rock to die, because she strove to slay the priest and compass his death in the temple.
1220
So now is the whole city seeking her, who hath to her sorrow sped a hapless journey; for, coming to crave the boon of offspring from Phoebus, she hath lost her life and children too.
1225
