Of our dead kings, that we may chapel them,
And of thy boundless goodness take some note
That for our crowned heads we have no roof
Save this, which is the lion's and the bear's,
And vault for everything."
Through the mediation of Æthra, mother of Theseus, king of Athens, the Suppliants are enabled to bring their wrongs before him. Theseus at first is unwilling to espouse their cause: to do so will embroil Athens in a war with Thebes. He is by no means a cheerful giver of aid: revolving in his soul "the various turns of chance below," he expatiates on the uncertainty of human greatness, and hints that Adrastus himself is an instance of the folly of interfering with other people's business. But Æthra, whose woman's nature is deeply moved by the tears of the widowed queens, will hear of no denial; and Theseus at last, though reluctantly, promises to take up their cause. Just as he is despatching a herald to Creon to demand the bodies of the slain, a Theban messenger comes with a peremptory mandate from Creon that Adrastus and his companions be delivered up. It must be owned that, at this juncture, Theseus is rather a proser. Forgetting the urgency of the case—that dogs and vultures may already be preying on the dead—he discourses on the comparative merits of aristocratic and popular government, and on the sin of refusing burial even to enemies. Theseus in the end consents to do what, to be done well, ought to be done quickly. He sends back the Theban herald, after rating him soundly, with a stem response to his master. He follows at
