When Loxias, throned on the tripod of Themis, decreed
The death of my mother, a foul unnatural deed!
Chorus.
See'st thou?—he stirreth beneath his cloak!
Electra.
Woe unto thee! it was thy voice broke
The bands of his sleep by thy wild outcry—
Chorus.
Nay, but I deemed that he yet slept on.
Electra.
Wilt thou not hence, from the house to be gone?170
Ah, turn thee again, and backward hie
With the sound of thy voice, with the jar of thy tread!
Chorus.
Yet doth he slumber on.
Electra.
Sooth said.
(Sings low.)[1]
Queen, Majesty of Night,
To travail-burdened mortals giver of sleep,
Float up from Erebus! With wide wings' sweep
Come, come, on Agamemnon's mansion light!
Fordone with anguish, whelmed in woeful plight,180
We are sinking—sinking deep.
- ↑ Some editors assign to the chorus the six lines which follow.
