the second.

Oedipus. Ha, ha! why should one shape one's course of life
After oracular voices, or regard

The birds that clang above us? They decreed
That I should slay my father-but he lies
Already dead-and I am here in Thebes
Raising no arm against him--but forsooth
He may have died for grief at loss of me-
And thus I may have killed him! Well, he lies
Low, and the oracles are with him gone.

Jocasta. Told I not thee as much, when this begun?
Oedipus. Thou didst : but I was borne away by fear.
Jocasta. Think then no more of oracles henceforth.

Disclosure There is but one thorn in this garland of pleasure-and that is derived from the very superstition which Edipus has been just deriding. His mother, (as he thinks) Merope, yet lives

-the oracle denounced that he should commit incest with her-he cannot go to Corinth. If that be all,' says the messenger, 'I can free you from that fear.' 'Do it,' says the king, and thou shalt be rewarded.'

'

How soon an airy fabric of pleasure and hope is crushed down by one word-one surmise-one dash of a pen! even so is it with Edipus. The messenger frees him from his fear-THEY WERE NOT THY PARENTS !! 'How was it then?' Now the blackness is gathering. The tale is told at the hands of this very messenger did the king of Corinth receive the helpless infant Edipus. He refers him to his pierced feet for confirmation of his story. One link alone is wanting-the shepherd who took the babe must be sent for. He has been sent for-it is the same as the surviving servant of Laïus.

Blindness-ther name) to enquire no further?

mental.

But who shall tell the unutterable woes of the horrorstricken queen ? who shall paint her wild agony, as she conjures her husband (now, alas! combining with that anoBut BLINDNESS-the very reproach which he cast on the prophet, has happened to the wretched king-he still, even still, misapprehends the whole matter. He answers the queen :

Be of good courage-if I shall turn out

A slave by three descents, thou art no worse.

He thinks it is only the nobility and genuineness of his birth which are at question, and attributes Jocasta's fear to her unwillingness to be found wedded to one of low descent.

Jocasta. Oh, I beseech thee-stir this thing no further!
Oedipus. Nought shall persuade me not to search it out.
Jocasta. 'Tis thy best interests that I have at heart.
Oedipus. Ah, this expedience long has been my bane.

Jocasta. Oh wretched man, may'st thou ne'er know thy birth?
Oedipus. Will some one bring this shepherd here to me?

Let her alone, to boast her noble blood.

Jocasta. Oh wretch, wretch, wretch! this is my latest word-
For I shall speak to thee no more for ever!

[She rushes out in an agony of grief and terror.]

Chorus. Whither hath fled the queen, by her wild grief
Hurried away? I fear me much, O king,

Lest from her silence some great harm break forth.
Oedipus. Break forth what will; but as for me, my birth,
Be it but common, I am bent to find.

It seems that she (for she hath lofty thoughts)
Blushes to own my lowly pedigree.

"Tis no dishonour-I avow myself

The child of Fortune-she hath given me much-
She is my mother-and the months, my nurses,

Have portioned out my lot for weal or woe.

Such being born, I cannot be so low

That I should shrink from searching out my race.

Alas, poor king! the cloud is already over him, and his

chambers are darkening with its gloom.

choric song, which heightens that gloom. sportive-the white butterfly which flutters

There follows a

It is joyous and before the black

ness and makes one feel it more intensely. It is not the Chorus of which we spoke above, but it is short, so we will give it.

Y

If I might a claim advance
To the keen prophetic glance,
I would prophesy, that soon,
Ere the wane of yonder moon,

the third and last.

Thou, Citharon,* shalt be famed

In the dance and in the song

Thou, the royal birthplace named

Thou, who didst our sovereign rear, thy woods and rocks among.

Such, O Phoebus, be thy care:

Thou heavenly archer, grant our prayer.

Who of nymphs thy life began?
By the mountain rover, Pan,

Wooed to love, or the bright Power
Phoebus, who knows every bower,

And each mountain pasture fine:
Or perchance Cyllene's king,+
Or the god of rosy wine,

On the hill tops revelling,

Thee, a foundling child, did raise,

Dropt by the nymphs with whom he plays.

Disclosure The fatal interview now arrives-the storm is ready to burst. The old servant enters. He is unwilling to speak: but the importunity and threats of the king at length extort from him the whole how he received the child at the palace, and from the queen's own hands, with command to kill it how he pitied it, and gave it to the Corinthian shepherd.

:

Oedipus. Alas! alas! then it must all be true!

Thou light of heaven, farewell! I look on thee
Now for the last time-I, who have been proved
Of an unnatural birth-unnatural

In my foul marriage—and the perpetrator

Of an unnatural, parricidal murder.

[Exit.

The mirth of the Chorus is turned into mourning.

Race of mortals on the earth

How I count ye nothing worth?

Who has more of human bliss

Than enough to think it his?

And before the dream is past

It declines, and will not last.

:

* The mountain on which Edipus was exposed when an infant.

+ Hermes, or Mercury

It is now the reign of woe.

Another messenger enters

'The queen is dead! her own hands have done it.' And the

wretched Edipus?

corporeal.

Behold him once more. *The eyes which have served Blindnesshim so ill, which have seen without discerning what it was most important for him to know, have been for ever extinguished. And in this condition, most wretched, most helpless, he enters once more, to exhibit a perfect contrast to his appearance in the opening scene, and thus to reverse that irony of which we have hitherto seen but one side. While he saw the light of day, he had been ignorant, infatuated, incapable of distinguishing truth from falsehood, friend from foe. Now he clearly perceives all that concerns him he is conscious of the difference between his own shrewdness and the divine intelligence: he is cured of his rash presumption, of his hasty suspicions, of his doubts and cares: he has now a sure test of Creon's sincerity, and he finds that it will stand the trial.'

:

With the speech of the Chorus, which concludes the play, we will conclude our notice of it:

Behold ye men of Thebes, this ŒŒdipus

Who solved the famous riddle, and was high
Above us all in power, and envied none
His fortunes, nor his ease-into what depth

Of dark adversity he now hath fallen.

Call then no mortal happy on this side

Of his departure hence: not till his life

Hath reached its end, free from all misery.

It is reported, we hope not truly, that Sophocles had evil and unthankful sons who, when grey hairs were upon him, represented to the magistrates that he was imbecile and unable to manage his property. In his defence, he recited the play on which we are about to enter, and which he had

* We quote from a masterly article, by the Bishop of St. David's, in the Philological Museum, vol. ii. pp. 483-537, 'On the Irony of Sophocles.'

Opening of the play.

just then finished composing. He was covered with praises, and his sons with shame. Listen then, gentle reader, with the more interest.

It was in the high and palmy state of Athens. Theseus (duk Theseus himself—the Theseus of the Canterbury Tales, and the Midsummer Night's Dream) held the sway. He was the friend of the oppressed, the foe of the oppressor. Athens was good government and order.

All in

Two miles from the city rose the hillock and grove of Colonos-one of those sweet dreaming places for the lover and the poet, which weave their way into our hearts, and which we determine to celebrate in song- -one of nature's own lecture-rooms, where by the leaves and the flowers, the gnarled boles and feathery mosses, the song of birds and the hum of bees, she speaks deep and lasting lessons in the ear of her scholar. It was besides a sacred grove. What nature lavished on it, religion hallowed. If we know the heart of a poet, it was very dear to Sophocles-he owed to it many a tender thought, many a gentle dream, many a sweet union of words, revealed to him he knew not how, and worked in afterwards in immortal verse.

Place yourself in imagination beside this same grove for there our drama opens. Enter not; the ground is too holy. The venerable goddesses-the Furies-called by way of propitiation the Gracious Ones, have claimed it as their own. Two persons are approaching. An old man, blind and feeble, is guided and supported by a light and slender girl. Their garb is poor; the very rags of beggary hang about them. But their bearing is that of no common beings. Listen-he speaks :

Child of a blind old man, Antigone,

Whither have we arrived? what men are they
That own this city? who will now relieve
The wanderer Edipus, with scanty gifts
Sufficient for the day? Little he asks,
Receiving less, but still enough for me.