But what has passed, the deeds that there were done,
My tale, in short discourse, would fail to tell.
Chor. Is he then dead, ill-starred one?
Mess. Think of him
As having closed his weary course of life.
Chor. How? Was it by God-given, painless death?
Mess. Yea, these are things we well may wonder at;
For how he went from hence, thou knowest well,
(Thyself being present) no friend guiding him,
But he himself still led the way for all;
And when he neared the threshold's broken slope,1590
With steps of bronze fast rooted in the soil,
He stopped on one of paths that intersect,[1]
Close to the hollow urn where still are kept
The pledges true of Perithos and Theseus;[2]
And stopping at mid distance between it,
And the Thorikian rock, and hollow pear,
And the stone sepulchre, he sat him down,
And then put off his garments travel-stained,
And then he called his girls, and bade them fetch
Clear water from the stream, and bring to him
For cleansing and libation. And they went,
Both of them, to yon hill we look upon,
Owned by Demeter of the fair green corn,1600
And quickly did his bidding, bathed his limbs,
And clothed him in the garment that is meet.
And when he had his will in all they did,
And not one wish continued unfulfilled,
- ↑ The indefiniteness of the description agrees with that of the local tradition, 1523.
- ↑ The pledges which the true heroes had given each other when they bound themselves to go down to Hades, were naturally kept near the spot from which they had descended. The Heroön dedicated to them stood at Colonos in the time of Pausanias, i. 18, 4.
