Collected Works (Vol. III)

196 ORPHEUS TISIPHONE. Tear wide apart The jaws ! MEGARA., Force fear against the inmost heart ! PERSEPHONE. Mercy! I plead, sweet sisters! ORPHEUS. And I plead Vengeance, and help in my extremest need. Pile up the torture! Had he not the power, And silence mocked me? MEGARA. Urge us hour by hour, Thou couldst not add one particle of pain. ALECTO. He speaks not! Bid his torture speak again ! TISIPHONE. Speak, murderer ! MEG-ERA. Hades! answer us! ALECTO. Expel These torments from thy being, us from [lel], Or Zeus from Heaven ! TISIPHONE. Or else obey ! MEG-ERA. Obey ! ALECTO. Obey ! HADEs. O throne of Hell! Onight! Oday Of anguish exquisite beyond control, Fibre and substance of my inmost soul ! There is a power not mine, and yet in me Burning its cold and cruel agony O pain ! With icy flames, its cutting poison fangs Striking my being with detested pangs. Alas ! of me and not to be expelled, Conjured, assuaged, averted. Grey as eld The juice of blood that stagnates in my veins Appals their current with avenging pains :— O pitiful and hateful sense Of agony and grief and impotence ! O misery of the day when Orpheus bore First his loud lyre across the Stygian shore ! Hath Hell no warders? Is the threefold gate Brazen in vain against the foot of Fate? Now is but little choice—abase my pride, Or sink for ever to the gloomy tide Of fire beneath the utmost reach and span Of Stygian deeps and walls Tartarean. Yet I abide. MEGZERA. Fall! Fall ! ALECTO. Descend the abyss ! TISIPHONE. Link the lewd fiend with your incestuous kiss ! MEG-ERA. Hither ! ALECTO, O hither ! HADES. Steams a newer shape Of threefold terror. TISIPHONE. Shall the god escape The monstrous wedlock? ALECTO Let him. turn again His horrid passion to the Nysian plain ! MEGAERA. Echidna !