No More Learning

Aye, mine she is:
But never yet these arms--the Cyprian knows
My truth! --have clasped her body, and she goes
A virgin still. Myself would hold it shame
To abase this daughter of a royal name.
I am too lowly to love violence. Yea,
Orestes too doth move me, far away,
Mine unknown brother! Will he ever now
Come back and see his sister bowed so low?

Doth any deem me fool, to hold a fair
Maid in my room and seek no joy, but spare
Her maidenhood? If any such there be,
Let him but look within. The fool is he
In gentle things, weighing the more and less
Of love by his own heart's untenderness.

[_As he ceases_ ELECTRA _comes out of the hut. She is in mourning garb,
and carries a large pitcher on her head. She speaks without observing the_
PEASANT'S _presence_.

ELECTRA.

Dark shepherdess of many a golden star,
Dost see me, Mother Night? And how this jar
Hath worn my earth-bowed head, as forth and fro
For water to the hillward springs I go?
Not for mere stress of need, but purpose set,
That never day nor night God may forget
Aegisthus' sin: aye, and perchance a cry
Cast forth to the waste shining of the sky
May find my father's ear. . . . The woman bred
Of Tyndareus, my mother--on her head
Be curses! --from my house hath outcast me;
She hath borne children to our enemy;
She hath made me naught, she hath made Orestes naught. . . .

[_As the bitterness of her tone increases, the_ PEASANT _comes forward. _

PEASANT.

What wouldst thou now, my sad one, ever fraught
With toil to lighten my toil? And so soft
Thy nurture was! Have I not chid thee oft,
And thou wilt cease not, serving without end?

ELECTRA (_turning to him with impulsive affection_).

O friend, my friend, as God might be my friend,
Thou only hast not trampled on my tears.