Lines 1139–1308

EURIPIDES.
And this beside his murdered father’s grave
Orestes speaks?

AESCHYLUS.
I say not otherwise.

EURIPIDES.
Then does he mean that when his father fell
By craft and violence at a woman’s hand,
The god of craft was witnessing the deed?

AESCHYLUS.
It was not he: it was the Helper Hermes
He called the grave: and this he showed by adding
It was his sire’s prerogative he held.

EURIPIDES.
Why this is worse than all. If from his father
He held this office grave, why then—

DIONYSUS.
He was
A graveyard rifler on his father’s side.

AESCHYLUS.
Bacchus, the wine you drink is stale and fusty.

DIONYSUS.
Give him another: (to Eur.) you, look out for faults.

AESCHYLUS.
Be thou my saviour and mine aid to-day,
For here I come, and hither I return.

EURIPIDES.
The same thing twice says clever Aeschylus.

DIONYSUS.
How twice?

EURIPIDES.
Why, just consider: I’ll explain.
“I come,” says he; and “I return,” says he:
It’s the same thing, to “come” and to “return.”

DIONYSUS.
Aye, just as if you said, “Good fellow, lend me
A kneading trough: likewise, a trough to knead in.”

AESCHYLUS.
It is not so, you everlasting talker,
They’re not the same, the words are right enough.

DIONYSUS.
How so? inform me how you use the words.

AESCHYLUS.
A man, not banished from his home, may “come”
To any land, with no especial chance.
A home-bound exile both “returns” and “comes.”

DIONYSUS.
O good, by Apollo!
What do you say, Euripides, to that?

EURIPIDES.
I say Orestes never did “return.”
He came in secret: nobody recalled him.

DIONYSUS.
O good, by Hermes!
(Aside) I’ve not the least suspicion what he means.

EURIPIDES.
Repeat another line.

DIONYSUS.
Ay, Aeschylus,
Repeat one instantly: you, mark what’s wrong.

AESCHYLUS.
Now on this funeral mound I call my father
To hear, to hearken.

EURIPIDES.
There he is again.
To “hear,” to “hearken”; the same thing, exactly.

DIONYSUS.
Aye, but he’s speaking to the dead, you knave,
Who cannot hear us though we call them thrice.

AESCHYLUS.
And how do you make your prologues?

EURIPIDES.
You shall hear;
And if you find one single thing said twice,
Or any useless padding, spit upon me.

DIONYSUS.
Well, fire away: I’m all agog to hear
Your very accurate and faultless prologues.

EURIPIDES.
A happy man was Oedipus at first—

AESCHYLUS.
Not so, by Zeus; a most unhappy man.
Who, not yet born nor yet conceived, Apollo
Foretold would be his father’s murderer.
How could he be a happy man at first?

EURIPIDES.
Then he became the wretchedest of men.

AESCHYLUS.
Not so, by Zeus; he never ceased to be.
No sooner born, than they exposed the babe,
(And that in winter), in an earthen crock,
Lest he should grow a man, and slay his father.
Then with both ankles pierced and swoln, he limped
Away to Polybus: still young, he married
An ancient crone, and her his mother too.
Then scratched out both his eyes.

DIONYSUS.
Happy indeed
Had he been Erasinides’s colleague!

EURIPIDES.
Nonsense; I say my prologues are firstrate.

AESCHYLUS.
Nay then, by Zeus, no longer line by line
I’ll maul your phrases: but with heaven to aid
I’ll smash your prologues with a bottle of oil.

EURIPIDES.
You mine with a bottle of oil?

AESCHYLUS.
With only one.
You frame your prologues so that each and all
Fit in with a “bottle of oil,” or “coverlet-skin,”
Or “reticule-bag.” I’ll prove it here, and now.

EURIPIDES.
You’ll prove it? You?

AESCHYLUS.
I will.

DIONYSUS.
Well then, begin.

EURIPIDES.
Aegyptus, sailing with his fifty sons,
As ancient legends mostly tell the tale,
Touching at Argos

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

EURIPIDES.
Hang it, what’s that? Confound that bottle of oil!

DIONYSUS.
Give him another: let him try again.

EURIPIDES.
Bacchus, who, clad in fawnskins, leaps and bounds
With torch and thyrsus in the choral dance
Along Parnassus

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

DIONYSUS.
Ah me, we are stricken—with that bottle again!

EURIPIDES.
Pooh, pooh, that’s nothing. I’ve a prologue here,
He’ll never tack his bottle of oil to this:
No man is blest in every single thing.
One is of noble birth, but lacking means.
Another, baseborn,

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

DIONYSUS.
Euripides!

EURIPIDES.
Well?

DIONYSUS.
Lower your sails, my boy;
This bottle of oil is going to blow a gale.

EURIPIDES.
O, by Demeter, I don’t care one bit;
Now from his hands I’ll strike that bottle of oil.

DIONYSUS.
Go on then, go: but ware the bottle of oil.

EURIPIDES.
Once Cadmus, quitting the Sidonian town,
Agenor’s offspring

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

DIONYSUS.
O pray, my man, buy off that bottle of oil,
Or else he’ll smash our prologues all to bits.

EURIPIDES.
I buy of him?

DIONYSUS.
If my advice you’ll take.

EURIPIDES.
No, no, I’ve many a prologue yet to say,
To which he can’t tack on his bottle of oil.
Pelops, the son of Tantalus, while driving
His mares to Pisa

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

DIONYSUS.
There! he tacked on the bottle of oil again.
O for heaven’s sake, pay him its price, dear boy;
You’ll get it for an obol, spick and span.

EURIPIDES.
Not yet, by Zeus; I’ve plenty of prologues left.
Oeneus once reaping

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

EURIPIDES.
Pray let me finish one entire line first.
Oeneus once reaping an abundant harvest,
Offering the firstfruits

AESCHYLUS.
Lost his bottle of oil.

DIONYSUS.
What, in the act of offering? Fie! Who stole it?

EURIPIDES.
O don’t keep bothering! Let him try with this!
Zeus, as by Truth’s own voice the tale is told,

DIONYSUS.
No, he’ll cut in with “Lost his bottle of oil!”
Those bottles of oil on all your prologues seem
To gather and grow, like styes upon the eye.
Turn to his melodies now for goodness’ sake.

EURIPIDES.
O I can easily show that he’s a poor
Melody-maker; makes them all alike.

CHORUS.
What, O what will be done!
Strange to think that he dare
Blame the bard who has won,
More than all in our days,
Fame and praise for his lays,
Lays so many and fair.
Much I marvel to hear
What the charge he will bring
’Gainst our tragedy king;
Yea for himself do I fear.

EURIPIDES.
Wonderful lays! O yes, you’ll see directly.
I’ll cut down all his metrical strains to one.

DIONYSUS.
And I, I’ll take some pebbles, and keep count.

(A slight pause, during which the music of a flute is heard. The music continues to the end of line 1277 as an accompaniment to the recitative.)

EURIPIDES.
Lord of Phthia, Achilles, why hearing the voice of the hero-dividing
Hah! smiting! approachest thou not to the rescue?
We, by the lake who abide, are adoring our ancestor Hermes.
Hah! smiting! approachest thou not to the rescue?

DIONYSUS.
O Aeschylus, twice art thou smitten!

EURIPIDES.
Hearken to me, great king; yea, hearken Atreides, thou noblest of all the Achaeans.
Hah! smiting! approachest thou not to the rescue?

DIONYSUS.
Thrice, Aeschylus, thrice art thou smitten!

EURIPIDES.
Hush! the bee-wardens are here: they will quickly the Temple of Artemis open.
Hah! smiting! approachest thou not to the rescue?
I will expound (for I know it) the omen the chieftains encountered.
Hah! smiting! approachest thou not to the rescue?

DIONYSUS.
O Zeus and King, the terrible lot of smitings!
I’ll to the bath: I’m very sure my kidneys
Are quite inflamed and swoln with all these smitings.

EURIPIDES.
Wait till you’ve heard another batch of lays
Culled from his lyre-accompanied melodies.

DIONYSUS.
Go on then, go: but no more smitings, please.

EURIPIDES.
How the twin-throned powers of Achaea, the lords of the mighty Hellenes.
O phlattothrattophlattothrat!
Sendeth the Sphinx, the unchancy, the chieftainness bloodhound.
O phlattothrattophlattothrat!
Launcheth fierce with brand and hand the avengers the terrible eagle.
O phlattothrattophlattothrat!
So for the swift-winged hounds of the air he provided a booty.
O phlattothrattophlattothrat!
The throng down-bearing on Aias.
O phlattothrattophlattothrat!

DIONYSUS.
Whence comes that phlattothrat? From Marathon, or
Where picked you up these cable-twister’s strains?

AESCHYLUS.
From noblest source for noblest ends I brought them,
Unwilling in the Muses’ holy field
The self-same flowers as Phrynichus to cull.
But he from all things rotten draws his lays,
From Carian flutings, catches of Meletus,
Dance-music, dirges. You shall hear directly.
Bring me the lyre. Yet wherefore need a lyre
For songs like these? Where’s she that bangs and jangles
Her castanets? Euripides’s Muse,
Present yourself: fit goddess for fit verse.

DIONYSUS.
The Muse herself can’t be a wanton? No!