208 EURIPIDES
The matron said : " though grave-ward bowed, she
breathed ; Nor knew her husband what the misery meant Before he felt it : hope of life was none : 205
The appointed day pressed hard ; the funeral pomp He had prepared too."
When the friends broke out : " Let her in dying know herself at least Sole wife, of all the wives 'neath the sun wide, For glory and for goodness ! " — " Ah, how else 210 Than best ? who controverts the claim ? " qiioth she : " What kind of creature should the woman prove That has surpassed Alkestis ? — surelier shown* Preference for her husband to herself Than by determining to die for him ? 215
But so much all our city knows indeed : Hear what she did indoors and wonder then ! For, when she felt the crowning day was come, She washed with river-waters her white skin, And, taking from the cedar closets forth 220
Vesture and ornament, bedecked herself Nobly, and stood before the hearth, and prayed : ' Mistress,^ because I now depart the world, Falling before thee the last time, I ask — Be mother to my orphans ! wed the one 225
To a kind wife, and make the other's mate Some princely person : nor, as I who bore My children perish, suffer that they too Die all untimely, but live, happy pair. Their full glad life out in the fatherland ! ' 230
And every altar through Admetos' house She visited and crowned and prayed before, Stripping the myrtle-foliage from the boughs,
^ Perhaps addressed to Persephone, goddess of the dead.
