Well hast thou said;on cheerful then,and faint not.
TUTOR
I have the will,but o'er constraint no power.
CREUSA
Ye females,on my richly-broider'd works Faithful attendants,say,respecting children,For which we came,what fortune hath my lord Borne hence?if good,declare it:you shall find That to no thankless masters you give joy.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
O fortune!
CREUSA
To thy speech this is a proem Not tuned to happiness.
LEADER
Unhappy fortune!
But why distress me for the oracle Given to our lords?Be that as fate requires In things which threaten death,what shall we do?
CREUSA
What means this strain of woe?Whence are these fears?
LEADER
What!shall we speak,or bury this in silence?
CREUSA
Speak,though thy words bring wretchedness to me.
LEADER
It shall be spoken,were I twice to die.
To thee,my queen,it is not given to clasp In thy fond arms a child,or at thy breast To hold it.
TUTOR
O my child,would I were dead!
CREUSA
Yes,this is wretchedness indeed,a grief That makes life joyless.
TUTOR
This is ruin to us.
CREUSA
Unhappy me!this is a piercing grief,That rends my heart with anguish.
TUTOR
Groan not yet.
CREUSA
Yet is the affliction present.
TUTOR
Till we learn-
CREUSA
To me what tidings?
TUTOR
If a common fate Await our lord,partaker of thy griefs,Or thou alone art thus unfortunate.
LEADER
To him,old man,the god hath given a son,And happiness is his unknown to her.
CREUSA
To ill this adds the deepest ill,a grief For me to mourn.
TUTOR
Born of some other woman Is this child yet to come,or did the god Declare one now in being?
LEADER
One advanced To manhood's prime he gave him:I was present.
CREUSA
What hast thou said?Thy words denounce to me Sorrows past speech,past utterance.
TUTOR
And to me.
CREUSA
How was this oracle accomplish'd?Tell me With clearest circumstance:who is this youth?
LEADER
Him as a son Apollo gave,whom first,Departing from the god,thy lord should meet.
CREUSA
O my unhappy fate!I then am left Childless to pass my life,childless,alone,Amid my lonely house!Who was declared?
Whom did the husband of this wretch first meet?
How meet him?Where behold him?Tell me all.
LEADER
Dost thou,my honoured mistress,call to mind The youth that swept the temple?This is he.
CREUSA
O,through the liquid air that I could fly,Far from the land of Greece,ev'n to the stars Fix'd in the western sky!Ah me,what grief,What piercing grief is mine ITUTOR
Say,by what name Did he address his son,if thou hast heard it?
Or does it rest in silence,yet unknown?
LEADER
Ion,for that he first advanced to meet him.
TUTOR
And of what mother?
LEADER
That I could not learn:
Abrupt was his departure (to inform the Of all I know,old man)to sacrifice,With hospitable rites,a birthday feast;And in the hallow'd cave,from her apart,With his new son to share the common banquet.
TUTOR
Lady,we by thy husband are betrayed,For I with thee am grieved,with contrived fraud Insulted,from thy father's house cast forth.
I speak not this in hatred to thy lord,But that I love thee more:a stranger he Came to the city and thy royal house,And wedded thee,all thy inheritance Receiving,by some other woman now Discover'd to have children privately:
How privately I'll tell thee:when he saw Thou hadst no child,it pleased him not to bear A fate like thine;but by some favourite slave,His paramour by stealth,he hath a son.
Him to some Delphian gave he,distant far,To educate;who to this sacred house Consign'd,as secret here,received his nurture.
He knowing this,and that his son advanced To manhood,urged thee to attend him hither,Pleading thy childless state.Nor hath the god Deceived thee:he deceived thee,and long since Contrived this wily plan to rear his son,That,if convicted,he might charge the god,Himself excusing:should the fraud succeed,He would observe the times when he might safely Consign to him the empire of thy land.
And this new name was at his leisure form'd,Ion,for that he came by chance to meet him.
I hate those ill-designing men,that form Plans of injustice,and then gild them over With artificial ornament:to me Far dearer is the honest simple friend,Than one whose quicker wit is train'd to ill.
And to complete this fraud,thou shalt be urged To take into thy house,to lord it there,This low-born youth,this offspring of a slave.
Though ill,it had been open,had he pleaded Thy want of children,and,thy leave obtain'd,Brought to thy house a son that could have boasted His mother noble;or,if that displeased thee,He might have sought a wife from Aeolus.
Behooves thee then to act a woman's part,Or grasp the sword,or drug the poison'd bowl,Or plan some deep design to kill thy husband,And this his son,before thou find thy death From them:if thou delay,thy life is lost:
For when beneath one roof two foes are met,The one must perish.I with ready zeal Will aid thee in this work,and kill the youth,Entering the grot where he prepares the feast;Indifferent in my choice,so that I pay What to my lords I owe,to live or die.
If there is aught that causes slaves to blush,It is the name;in all else than the free The slave is nothing worse,if he be virtuous.
I too,my honour'd queen,with cheerful mind Will share thy fate,or die,or live with honour.
CREUSA (chanting)
How,o my soul,shall I be silent,how Disclose this secret?Can I bid farewell To modesty?What else restrains my tongue?
To how severe a trial am I brought!
Hath not my husband wrong'd me?Of my house I am deprived,deprived of children;hope Is vanish'd,which my heart could not resign,With many an honest wish this furtive bed Concealing,this lamented bed concealing.
But by the star-bespangled throne of Jove,And by the goddess high above my rocks Enshrined,by the moist banks that bend around The hallow'd lake by Triton form'd,no longer Will I conceal this bed,but ease my breast,The oppressive load discharged.Mine eyes drop tears,My soul is rent,to wretchedness ensnared By men,by gods,whom I will now disclose,Unkind betrayers of the beds they forced.
