Medea

The Scene represents the front of Medea's House in Corinth. A road to the right leads towards the royal castle, one on the left to the harbour. The Nurse is discovered alone.

Nurse.

Would God no Argo e'er had winged the seas   To Colchis through the blue Symplêgades:   No shaft of riven pine in Pêlion's glen   Shaped that first oar-blade in the hands of men   Valiant, who won, to save King Pelias' vow,   The fleece All-golden! Never then, I trow,   Mine own princess, her spirit wounded sore   With love of Jason, to the encastled shore   Had sailed of old Iôlcos: never wrought   The daughters of King Pelias, knowing not,   To spill their father's life: nor fled in fear,   Hunted for that fierce sin, to Corinth here   With Jason and her babes. This folk at need   Stood friend to her, and she in word and deed   Served alway Jason. Surely this doth bind,   Through all ill days, the hurts of humankind,   When man and woman in one music move.       But now, the world is angry, and true love   Sick as with poison. Jason doth forsake   My mistress and his own two sons, to make   His couch in a king's chamber. He must wed:   Wed with this Creon's child, who now is head   And chief of Corinth. Wherefore sore betrayed   Medea calleth up the oath they made,   They two, and wakes the claspèd hands again,   The troth surpassing speech, and cries amain   On God in heaven to mark the end, and how   Jason hath paid his debt. All fasting now   And cold, her body yielded up to pain,   Her days a waste of weeping, she hath lain,   Since first she knew that he was false. Her eyes   Are lifted not; and all her visage lies   In the dust.

[During the last words Medea has come out from the house.

Medea.

Women of Corinth, I am come to show My face, lest ye despise me. For I know Some heads stand high and fail not, even at night Alone—far less like this, in all men's sight: And we, who study not our wayfarings But feel and cry—Oh we are drifting things, And evil! For what truth is in men's eyes, Which search no heart, but in a flash despise A strange face, shuddering back from one that ne'er Hath wronged them? . . . Sure, far-comers anywhere, I know, must bow them and be gentle. Nay, A Greek himself men praise not, who alway Should seek his own will recking not. . . . But I— This thing undreamed of, sudden from on high, Hath sapped my soul: I dazzle where I stand, The cup of all life shattered in my hand, Longing to die—O friends! He, even he, Whom to know well was all the world to me, The man I loved, hath proved most evil.—Oh, Of all things upon earth that bleed and grow, A herb most bruised is woman. We must pay Our store of gold, hoarded for that one day, To buy us some man's love; and lo, they bring A master of our flesh! There comes the sting Of the whole shame. And then the jeopardy, For good or ill, what shall that master be; Reject she cannot: and if he but stays His suit, 'tis shame on all that woman's days.

Enter from the right Creon, the King, with armed Attendants.

Creon.

Thou woman sullen-eyed and hot with hate Against thy lord, Medea, I here command That thou and thy two children from this land Go forth to banishment. Make no delay: Seeing ourselves, the King, are come this day To see our charge fulfilled; nor shall again Look homeward ere we have led thy children twain And thee beyond our realm's last boundary.

Medea.

Lost! Lost! Mine haters at the helm with sail flung free Pursuing; and for us no beach nor shore In the endless waters! . . . Yet, though stricken sore, I still will ask thee, for what crime, what thing Unlawful, wilt thou cast me out, O King?

Creon.

What crime? I fear thee, woman—little need To cloak my reasons—lest thou work some deed Of darkness on my child. And in that fear Reasons enough have part. Thou comest here A wise-woman confessed, and full of lore In unknown ways of evil. Thou art sore In heart, being parted from thy lover's arms. And more, thou hast made menace . . . so the alarms But now have reached mine ear . . . on bride and groom, And him who gave the bride, to work thy doom Of vengeance. Which, ere yet it be too late, I sweep aside. I choose to earn thine hate Of set will now, not palter with the mood Of mercy, and hereafter weep in blood.

Medea.

Defeat on every side; what else?—But Oh, Not here the end is: think it not! I know For bride and groom one battle yet untried, And goodly pains for him that gave the bride. Dost dream I would have grovelled to this man, Save that I won mine end, and shaped my plan For merry deeds? My lips had never deigned Speak word with him: my flesh been never stained With touching. . . . Fool, Oh, triple fool! It lay So plain for him to kill my whole essay By exile swift: and, lo, he sets me free This one long day: wherein mine haters three Shall lie here dead, the father and the bride And husband—mine, not hers! Oh, I have tried So many thoughts of murder to my turn, I know not which best likes me. Shall I burn Their house with fire? Or stealing past unseen To Jason's bed—I have a blade made keen For that—stab, breast to breast, that wedded pair? Good, but for one thing. When I am taken there, And killed, they will laugh loud who hate me. . . . Nay, I love the old way best, the simple way Of poison, where we too are strong as men. Ah me! And they being dead—what place shall hold me then? What friend shall rise, with land inviolate And trusty doors, to shelter from their hate This flesh? . . . None anywhere! . . . A little more I needs must wait: and, if there ope some door Of refuge, some strong tower to shield me, good: In craft and darkness I will hunt this blood.

Evil, most evil! . . . since thou grantest me That comfort, the worst weapon left me now To smite a coward. . . . Thou comest to me, thou, Mine enemy! (Turning to the Chorus.) Oh, say, how call ye this, To face, and smile, the comrade whom his kiss Betrayed? Scorn? Insult? Courage? None of these: 'Tis but of all man's inward sicknesses The vilest, that he knoweth not of shame Nor pity! Yet I praise him that he came . . . To me it shall bring comfort, once to clear My heart on thee, and thou shalt wince to hear.     I will begin with that, 'twixt me and thee, That first befell. I saved thee. I saved thee— Let thine own Greeks be witness, every one That sailed on Argo—saved thee, sent alone To yoke with yokes the bulls of fiery breath, And sow that Acre of the Lords of Death; And mine own ancient Serpent, who did keep The Golden Fleece, the eyes that knew not sleep, And shining coils, him also did I smite Dead for thy sake, and lifted up the light That bade thee live. Myself, uncounsellèd, Stole forth from father and from home, and fled Where dark Iôlcos under Pelion lies, With thee—Oh, single-hearted more than wise! I murdered Pelias, yea, in agony, By his own daughters' hands, for sake of thee; I swept their house like War.—And hast thou then Accepted all—O evil yet again!— And cast me off and taken thee for bride Another? And with children at thy side! One could forgive a childless man. But no: I have borne thee children . . .                                      Is sworn faith so low And weak a thing? I understand it not. Are the old gods dead? Are the old laws forgot, And new laws made?