Utterly foolish and senseless children! Are you weary of your lives, or is there no wit inborn in you, that you do not see how you stand not on the brink, but in the very midst of immense danger? Had I not long kept watch at these doors, your doings would have been in the house before your bodies. But as it was, I put myself the task of averting that. Be done now with your long speeches and this insatiable shouting for joy, and go inside. In dealings of this sort delay is harmful, but the time is ripe for being done.
Orestes Then how will things inside stand when I enter?
Paedagogus All is well. The fact is that no one will know you.
Orestes You have reported me as dead, I presume?
Paedagogus Know that here you are a man numbered with the shades.
Orestes Do they rejoice, then, at the news? Or what do they say?
Paedagogus I will tell when all is completed. Meanwhile, all is favorable for us on their part, even that which is not favorable.
Electra Who is this, brother? By the gods, tell me.
Orestes Do you not know who he is?
Electra No, nor can I imagine.
Orestes Do you not know the man to whose hands you gave me once?
Electra What man? What do you mean?
Orestes I mean him, by whose hands and through your forethought I was secretly conveyed away to Phocian soil.
Electra Is this he in whom alone out of many I once found a true ally at the time of our father's murder?
Orestes This is he; question me no further.
Electra O joyous day! O sole preserver of Agamemnon's house, how did you come here? Are you indeed the man who saved my brother and myself from many sorrows? O dearest hands, O messenger whose feet were kindly servants! How could you be with me so long and remain unknown, without giving a ray of illumination, but instead afflicting me with stories, while possessed of sweetest reality? Welcome, Father, for it is a father that I seem to behold! Welcome, and know that in one day I have hated you and loved you as no man ever before!
Paedagogus That is enough, I think. As for the recounting of intervening events, many are the circling nights and an equal number of days which will reveal them to you clearly, Electra.
To Orestes and Pylades.
And this is my advice to you two, since you stand there: now is your opportunity to act, now Clytaemnestra is alone, now no man is inside. But if you pause, consider that you will have to fight both those inside and others mightier and better skilled.
Orestes Pylades, in no way does our task call any longer for many words, but rather demands that we enter the house immediately, after first adoring the shrines of my father's gods, the keepers of these gates. Orestes and Pylades enter the house, followed by the Paedagogus. Electra remains outside.
Electra King Apollo! Hear them with favor, and hear me besides, who so often have come before your altar with hands rich in such gifts as I could obtain! And now, O Lycean Apollo, with what means I have I pray to you, I supplicate you, I implore you, be our ready champion in these designs, and show what rewards the gods bestow on humans in return for their impiety! Exit Electra, into the house.
Chorus Behold how Ares stalks onward, breathing bloody vengeance that is hard to oppose. Just now have the hunters of wicked crimes passed beneath that roof there, the hounds which none may flee. And so not long shall the vision of my soul hang in suspense.
Chorus The champion of the spirits infernal is ushered on guileful feet into the house, the rich, ancestral palace of his father, and he bears keen-edged death in his hands. Maia 's son Hermes, who has shrouded the guile in darkness, leads him right to his goal and delays no longer.
Enter Electra from the house.
Electra My dearest friends, in a moment the men will do the deed. But wait in silence.
Chorus How do they fare? What are they doing now?
Electra She is decking the urn for burial; the two of them stand close to her.
Chorus And why have you hurried out?
Electra To guard against Aegisthus entering before we are aware.
Clytaemnestra Within.
Oh! Oh! Our house is empty of friends and filled with murderers!
Electra Someone shouts inside. Do you not hear, friends?
Chorus I heard, ah, me, sounds unfit to be heard, and I shudder!
Clytaemnestra Within.
Ah, misery! Aegisthus, where, where are you?
Electra Look, once more someone cries out!
Clytaemnestra Within.
My son, my son, have pity on your mother!
Electra Why? You had none for him, nor for the father that begot him.
Chorus Wretched city, wretched race, now the fate that has held you day by day perishes—it perishes!
Clytaemnestra Within.
Oh, I am wounded!
Electra Stab her doubly, if you can!
Clytaemnestra Within.
Ah, wounded again!
Electra Would that Aegisthus, too, were wounded!
Chorus The curses bring fulfillment: those who are buried live. For men long dead are draining their killers' blood in a stream of requital.
Enter Orestes and Pylades from the house.
Chorus And now they are here! The red hand drips with sacrifice to Ares, and I cannot blame the deed.
Electra Orestes, what happened?
Orestes All is well within the house, if Apollo's oracle spoke well.
Electra The miserable woman is dead?
Orestes Have no more fear that your haughty mother will ever again trample on your rights.
Chorus Quiet! For I see Aegisthus in plain sight.
Electra You, young men, get back inside!
Orestes Where do you see the man?
Electra He is at our mercy walking from the suburb, full of joy.
Chorus Go with all speed to the vestibule, so that, just as your first task prospered, so this one again may prosper now.
Orestes Have courage. We will accomplish it.
Electra Hurry, then, to wherever you wish.
Orestes See, I am gone.
Electra Things here will be my concern. Exeunt Orestes and Pylades, into the house.
Chorus It would be well to whisper into this man's ear some few words of seeming gentleness, so that he may rush blindly upon his trial before Justice.
Enter Aegisthus.
Aegisthus Which of you can tell me where those Phocian strangers are, who are said to have brought report for us that Orestes passed away amidst the shipwrecked chariots? You, you I ask, yes, you, who were in former days so bold. It seems to me that this concerns you most, so you must know best, and can best tell me.
Electra I do know. How could I not? Otherwise I would be an alien to the fortune of my nearest kinsmen.
Aegisthus Where, then, may the strangers be? Tell me.
Electra Inside. They have found a way to the heart of their hostess.
Aegisthus Have they in fact reported him truly dead?
Electra No, not reported only. They have shown him.
Aegisthus Then I can identify the corpse myself?
Electra You can, indeed, though it is no enviable sight.
Aegisthus You have indeed given me a joyful greeting, beyond your custom.
Electra May joy be yours, if joy is what you find in these things.
Aegisthus Silence, I say, and throw wide the gates for all Mycenaeans and Argives to see, so that, if any one of them were once buoyed by empty hopes in this man, now by seeing his corpse, he may welcome my bit in his mouth, instead of waiting until my punishment makes him grow wits by force!
Electra All will be done on my part. Time has given me the sense to comply with the stronger.
A shrouded corpse is disclosed.Orestes and Pylades stand near it.
Aegisthus O Zeus, I see an image which could not have fallen without divine spite—but, if Nemesis attend what I say, let it be unsaid! To Orestes. Undo the coverings from his eyes, so that our kinship, at least, may receive due mourning from me also.
Orestes Lift the veil yourself. It is not for me, but for you to look upon these remains and greet them kindly.
Aegisthus You advise well, and I will obey you. To Electra. But you, call Clytaemnestra for me, if she is at home.
Orestes She is near you; do not look elsewhere.
Aegisthus Aegisthus removes the cloth from the face of the corpse.
O, what sight is this!
Orestes Why so scared? Is the face so strange?
Aegisthus Who are the men into whose nets I have miserably fallen?
Orestes Do you not perceive how you have long been addressing the living in terms suited to the dead?
Aegisthus Ah, I read the riddle! It cannot be that this is not Orestes who speaks to me!
Orestes And, though so good a prophet, were you deceived so long?
Aegisthus Oh, I am destroyed, undone! Yet allow me to speak just a little.
Electra By the gods, brother, do not allow him to speak any more or to plead at length! When mortals are embroiled in misfortunes, how can one who is to die benefit from lapse of time? No, kill him as quickly as you can, and throw his corpse to the creatures from whom his kind should have burial, throw it far from our sight! For in my eyes this alone can bring us release from the misery of the past.
Orestes To Aegisthus. Go in, and quickly. Words are not at stake here, but your life.
Aegisthus Why take me into the house? If this deed is just, what need is there of darkness? Why is your hand not quick to strike?
Orestes Do not give orders, but go to where you struck down my father, so that in that very place you may die.
Aegisthus Is this dwelling doomed to see all the sufferings of us descendants of Pelops, both now and in time to come?
Orestes Yours, at least. I am for you a consummate prophet in these matters.
Aegisthus The skill you boast about did not belong to your father.
Orestes You bandy words, and our going is delayed. Move forward!
Aegisthus You lead.
Orestes You must go first.
Aegisthus Lest I escape you?
Orestes No, lest you die in a manner which pleases you. I must be sure that your death is bitter for you. This just penalty ought to come straightaway upon all who would break the laws: the penalty of death. Then wrongdoing would not abound.
Chorus O seed of Atreus, through how many sufferings have you sprouted up at last in freedom, fulfilled by this day's enterprise!