No More Learning

So a poor dove is faint with fear
For her weak nestlings, while anew
Glides on the snaky ravisher!
In troop and squadron, hand on hand,
They climb and throng, and hemmed we stand,
While on the warders of our town
The flinty shower comes hurtling down!

Gods born of Zeus! put forth your might
For Cadmus' city, realm, and right!
What nobler land shall e'er be yours,
If once ye give to hostile powers
The deep rich soil, and Dirce's wave,
The nursing stream, Poseidon gave
And Tethys' children? Up and save!
Cast on the ranks that hem us round
A deadly panic, make them fling
Their arms in terror on the ground,
And die in carnage! thence shall spring
High honour for our clan and king!
Come at our wailing cry, and stand
As throned sentries of our land!

For pity and sorrow it were
that this immemorial town
Should sink to be slave of the spear,
to dust and to ashes gone down,
By the gods of Achaean worship
and arms of Achaean might
Sacked and defiled and dishonoured,
its women the prize of the fight--
That, haled by the hair as a steed,
their mantles dishevelled and torn,
The maiden and matron alike
should pass to the wedlock of scorn!
I hear it arise from the city,
the manifold wail of despair--
_Woe, woe for the doom that shall be_--
as in grasp of the foeman they fare!
For a woe and a weeping it is,
if the maiden inviolate flower
Is plucked by the foe in his might,
not culled in the bridal bower!
Alas for the hate and the horror--
how say it? --less hateful by far
Is the doom to be slain by the sword,
hewn down in the carnage of war!
For wide, ah!
wide is the woe
when the foeman has mounted the wall;
There is havoc and terror and flame,
and the dark smoke broods over all,
And wild is the war-god's breath,
as in frenzy of conquest he springs,
And pollutes with the blast of his lips
the glory of holiest things!

Up to the citadel rise clash and din,
The war-net closes in,
The spear is in the heart: with blood imbrued
Young mothers wail aloud,
For children at their breast who scream and die!
And boys and maidens fly,
Yet scape not the pursuer, in his greed
To thrust and grasp and feed!
Robber with robber joins, each calls his mate
Unto the feast of hate--
_The banquet, lo! is spread--
seize, rend, and tear!
No need to choose or share_!
And all the wealth of earth to waste is poured--
A sight by all abhorred!
The grieving housewives eye it;
heaped and blent,
Earth's boons are spoiled and spent,
And waste to nothingness; and O alas,
Young maids, forlorn ye pass--
Fresh horror at your hearts--beneath the power
Of those who crop the flower!
Ye own the ruffian ravisher for lord,
And night brings rites abhorred!
Woe, woe for you! upon your grief and pain
There comes a fouler stain.
[_Enter, on one side_, THE SPY;
_on the other_, ETEOCLES
_and the_ SIX CHAMPIONS.

SEMI-CHORUS

Look, friends! methinks the scout, who parted hence
To spy upon the foemen, comes with news,
His feet as swift as wafting chariot-wheels.

SEMI-CHORUS

Ay, and our king, the son of Oedipus,
Comes prompt to time, to learn the spy's report--
His heart is fainter than his foot is fast!

THE SPY

Well have I scanned the foe, and well can say
Unto which chief, by lot, each gate is given.