to Troy; and having proffered his right hand', he has taken and detains my bow and arrows, arms sacred to Jove-born Hercules, and wills to display them to the Greeks. As if he had captured a strong man, he carries me off by force, and knows not that he slayeth a corpse, and the shadow of a vapour, an empty phantom. For never could he have taken me at least while possessed of strength, since he had not even thus conditioned, except by treachery. But now I wretched have been deceived. What can I do? But give them back, and now, even yet, be thine own self?? What sayest thou? Thou art silent. Unhappy me! I am no more. O form of the rock with double front, again I return back into thee unarmed, bereft of the means of sustenance; thus forlorn in this cavern shall I wither away, striking down nor winged bird nor mountain-prowling beast with these mine arrows: but I myself, unhappy man, being dead shall furnish a banquet to those whereon I fed3, and what I made my prey will make me theirs now, and I miserable shall make atonement with death a ransom for death, at the hand of one that seemeth to know no guile. Mayest thou not yet be accursed, ere I have learnt if yet again thou wilt transfer thy opinion; but if not, an evil death be thine. CH. What shall we do? before On thee now rests both our sailing, O king, and our acceding to these his words. NE. On me indeed a powerful pity for this man hath fallen, not now first, but long ago. PH. My son, by the gods, pity me, and permit not mortals' reproach against thyself, having deceived me. NE. Ah me! what shall I do? O had I never left Scyros! so grieved am I at this present matter. PH. Thou art not wicked, but thou seemest to come with bad instructions from the wicked. But now, having given them to others, to whom it is fair, sail hence, having given me up my arms. 1 "Struve hanc vocem cum xe jungendum censet, ut sensus sit, porro palam nunc tenet, dextra extensa, arcum et sagittas meas, sacras illas Herculis, Jovis filii, quæ olim erant. Admodum dure! προτιθέναι Xepa, id. q. suprâ v. 813. ¿μßáλλεv xɛîpa.” Barby. 2 Vid. Aristoph. Vesp. 642, púow is understood. 3This is a strange remark of Philoctetes. So he really expected to be the food of those he had already devoured!" Burges. Wunder would read ag' v, and take ¿pɛpßóμŋv in the middle, not the passive sense. B. NE. What are we to do, my mates? UL. O most vile of men', what doest thou? Wilt thou not return, having left these weapons to me? PH. Аh me! what man is this? Ulysses? Do I indeed then hear UL. Ulysses, be assured, in me at least on whom thou lookest. PH. Alas! I am bought and sold, I am undone. It was then of course he that ensnared me, and despoiled me of my arms. UL. "Twas 12, be well assured, and none other; I confess all this. PH. Restore, let go, my son, mine archer-arms. UL. This indeed shall he never do, even though he would; but thou too must go with them, or these will convey theeby force. PH. Me, thou vilest of the vile, and most audacious, shall these take by force. UL. Unless thou crawl hence voluntarily. PH. O Lemnian land, and thou blaze of all-swaying fire Vulcan-framed, is this then to be borne, that he from thy realms shall carry me off by force? UL. Jove it is, that thou mayest know it, Jove, the ruler of this land, Jove who hath determined this; but I am his minister. 1 As Neoptolemus is in the act of giving back the arms to Philoctetes, Ulysses rushes on the stage. Ulysses, knowing the enmity which Philoctetes bore to him, and returning it with equal resentment, thinks his triumph incomplete unless he tells him that he did it. See Arist. Rhet. B. II. c. 3, and the Oxford translator's Note, p. 119. 3 46 Jovem in insulâ Lemno natum, ibi deum patrium fuisse satis notum est." Barby. Man has never altered; and when the heathen crew of Olympus could no longer protect craft or vice, the superstition of a succeeding age made itself gods of all the host of heaven. On this there are some forcible remarks in Lear; "This is the excellent foppery of the world! that, when we are sick in fortune (often the surfeit of our behaviour) we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on.' Act I. sc. 2. PH. Thou abhorrence, what lies dost thou coin to utter! Thou alleging gods in pretence, makest those gods liars. UL. Not so, but true. The journey, however, must be taken. PH. I say it shall not. UL. I say it shall. Thou must obey in this. PH. Unhappy me! my father then clearly begat me as a slave, and not free. UL. Not so, but on a par with the mightiest, with whom thou needs must capture Troy, and by violence raze it to the ground. PH. No, never, not even were I doomed to suffer every evil, while I have this steep foundation of the island. UL. What then dost thou purpose to do? PH. This mine head forthwith will I bathe in blood, having leapt from a rock above on one below. UL. Lay hold on him, whatever ye do, nor be this in his power. PH. O hands, what sufferings are yours in the lack of your loved bowstring, entrammeled by this man! O thou that thinkest nothing sound or liberal, how hast thou stolen upon me, how hast thou hunted me down! having used as thy stalking-horse this boy unknown to me, unworthy of thee, but of me most worthy, who knew nothing but to execute what had been enjoined him. Nay, even now he shows that he bears sorrowfully the deeds whereby he erred and whereby I suffered. But 'twas thine evil spirit ever looking forth from its lair, that well foretaught him, however by nature indisposed as by inclination, to be shrewd in wickedness. And now, wretch, thou thinkest to bind and carry me from this shore, on which thou didst expose me, friendless, forlorn, homeless, among the living a corpse. Ah! mayest thou perish; and on thee have I often imprecated this, but in vain, for the gods allot me nought of pleasure. Thou livest in exultation; while I on the contrary have this to grieve me, that I miserable live consorted with many woes, scoffed at by thee and the two generals the sons of Atreus, for whom thou trucklest to this office. And yet thou bound by stratagem and compulsion' sailedst with them; while me, all-unhappy me, that 1 Although it was by the advice of Ulysses that Tyndarus had imposed the celebrated oath to defend Helen on her suitors, yet he himself was so with my seven' ships under my command was a willing voyager, they cast away unhonoured, as thou assertest, while they charge thee. And now why take ye me? Why carry me away? For what cause? Me, that am as nothing, and long since have been dead to you? How, O most hated of the gods, am I not now lame and noisome to thee? How is it possible, with me on board, to burn sacrifices to the gods? How any longer to make libations? for this was thy pretence to cast me out. Destruction on ye! And destruction shall, for that ye have injured me, if the gods care for justice. And I am sure at least that they do care; since ye had never sailed on this expedition for such a wretch as I am, had not a heaven-sent poignancy of need for me urged you forwards. But O my father-land, and ye gods that look upon us, avenge, at least one day after a time, avenge me on all of them, if ye have any pity for me: since piteously do I live, yet could I but see them destroyed, I should think I had escaped my disease. CH. Stern is the stranger, and stern is this his speech that he hath uttered, Ulysses, not at all yielding to his sorrows3. UL. Much could I say in answer to this man's words, would time permit; but now I am strong in this one argument. Where there is need of plans such as these, such am I; and where the decision is of just and upright characters, you could not meet with any one more pious than myself. I unwilling to abide by that oath, that he pretended to be insane, and ploughed the sea-shore, sowing it with salt. This artifice was discovered by Palamedes, who placed the infant Telemachus before the plough, and Ulysses turned it immediately from the furrow. What requital the unfortunate son of Belus got for this is told in the second book of Virgil. It is to Ulysses' feigned madness, however, that Philoctetes here alludes. 1 Brunck and Erfurdt have improperly inserted a stop before έπτά, as if Philoctetes boasted in the number of his vessels, which would have been an absurdity in him on this occasion, his rival Ulysses having sailed with twelve. Herm. This is not quite convincing: Philoctetes might naturally look for more consideration as commander of a squadron, than as an adventurer who went single-handed, without meaning to institute this comparison between himself and Ulysses; and the former might be indicated by Brunck's punctuation as well as the latter. 2 Burges would read σύ, i. e., ὡς δὲ ἔφασαν κεῖνοι, σὺ ἔβαλες. Β. 3 Cf. Antig. 471. δηλοῖ τὸ γέννημ ̓ ἐμὸν ἐξ ὠμοῦ πατρὸς Τῆς παιδός, εἴκειν δ ̓ οὐκ ἐπίσταται κακοῖς. Β. 4 See note on v. 81. am naturally desirous to prevail at least, in every point, except against thee; but now to thee at least I will willingly concede. Yes, let him go, nor hold him any longer; leave him to stay. We have no additional need of thee, at least while we possess these arms, since we have Teucer with us, aċquainted with this science, and me, who think that I could master these, and aim them aright with mine hand in no wise worse than thou. What want we then of thee? Adieu, and pace Lemnos3: but let us be gone; and haply thy prize may win me that honour which thou shouldst have had. Pн. Аh me, what shall I do, ill-fated? Shalt thou, adorned with my arms, present thyself to the Greeks? UL. Make me no reply, not a word, since I am now going. PH. Seed of Achilles, and shall I no longer be addressed by thy voice either, but wilt thou thus be gone? UL. Go thou, nor look on him, though thou art generous, that thou ruin not our fortune. Pн. And shall I now, my guests, be thus forlorn abandoned by you, and will ye not pity me? CH. This youth is our vessel's commander; whatsoever he shall say to thee, that do we also speak to thee. NE. I shall indeed hear myself reproached by this man with being by nature over-pitiful"; yet tarry, if he wish it, thus much time, until the mariners shall have got ready that which was brought ashore, and we shall have prayed to the gods. And he meanwhile may haply adopt sentiments more 1 Construendum potius, ëøvv vɩkäv xpýlwv, soleo ego vincere, ubi volo. Herm. 2 In the Odyssey, however, Ulysses confesses his inferiority, though he claims praise for this science : Alone superior in the field of Troy B. VIII. v. 251. Hermann points out the modesty with which Ulysses here speaks of himself after Teucer. The change of the negative he considers to mark a doubt, and yet an affirmative: neque hercle iis collineaturus. 3 Or this may be rendered, "stalk in Lemnos and welcome." 4 Σοῦ φωνῆς here is governed by ἀπό understood. 5 Πλέως πλέων, whence πλείων, Attic for πλέος πλείος : in the same dialect shortly after λφω for λώονα a λώίων, and νώ for νῶι. 6 Such was uniformly the Greek custom: Ἐπειδὴ δὲ αἱ νῆες πλήρεις ἦσαν, καὶ ἐσέκειτο ἤδη ὅσα ἔμελλον ἀνάξεσθαι, τῇ μὲν σάλπιγγι σιωπὴ |