XERXES
Smite, smite thy bosom, groan aloud for my calamity!
Smite, smite thy bosom, groan aloud for my calamity!
Aeschylus
CHORUS
Alas, alas!
XERXES
Yea, thrice alas!
CHORUS
For all have perished, all!
XERXES
Ah woe to us, ah joy to them who stood against our pride!
CHORUS
And all our strength is minished and sundered from our side!
XERXES
No escort have I!
CHORUS
Nay, thy friends are whelmed beneath the tide!
XERXES
Wail, wail the miserable doom, and to the palace hie!
CHORUS
Alas, alas, and woe again!
XERXES
Shriek, smite the breast, as I!
CHORUS
An evil gift, a sad exchange, of tears poured out in vain!
XERXES
Shrill out your simultaneous wail!
CHORUS
Alas the woe and pain!
XERXES
O, bitter is this adverse fate!
CHORUS
I voice the moan with thee!
XERXES
Smite, smite thy bosom, groan aloud for my calamity!
CHORUS
I mourn and am dissolved in tears!
XERXES
Cry, beat thy breast amain!
CHORUS
O king, my heart is in thy woe!
XERXES
Shriek, wail, and shriek again!
CHORUS
O agony!
XERXES
A blackening blow--
CHORUS
A grievous stripe shall fall!
XERXES
Yea, beat anew thy breast, ring out the doleful Mysian call!
CHORUS
An agony, an agony!
XERXES
Pluck out thy whitening beard!
CHORUS
By handfuls, ay, by handfuls, with dismal tear-drops smeared!
XERXES
Sob out thine aching sorrow!
CHORUS
I will thine best obey.
XERXES
With thine hands rend thy mantle's fold--
CHORUS
Alas, woe worth the day!
XERXES
With thine own fingers tear thy locks, bewail the army's weird!
CHORUS
By handfuls, yea, by handfuls, with tears of dole besmeared!
