OEDIPUS

Courage! At least, if I be thrice a slave,

Born so three-deep, it cannot injure you!

JOCASTA

But I beseech you, hearken! Do not do it!

OEDIPUS

I will not hearken—not to know the whole.

JOCASTA

I mean well; and I tell you for the best!

OEDIPUS

What you call best is an old sore of mine.

JOCASTA

Wretch, what thou art O might’st thou never know!

OEDIPUS

Will some one go and fetch the herdsman hither?

She is welcome to her gilded lineage!

JOCASTA

O

Woe, woe, unhappy! This is all I have

To say to thee, and no word more, for ever!

[Exit.

1 SENATOR

Why has the woman vanished, Oedipus,

Driven so wild with grief? I am afraid

Out of her silence will break forth some trouble.

OEDIPUS

Break out what will, I shall not hesitate,

Low though it be, to trace the source of me.

But she, perhaps, being, as a woman, proud,

Of my unfit extraction is ashamed.

—I deem myself the child of Fortune! I

Shall not be shamed of her, who favours me;

Seeing I have her for mother; and for kin

The limitary Moons, that found me small,

That fashioned me for great! Parented thus,

How could I ever in the issue prove

Other—that I should leave my birth unknown?

Chorus

1.

If I am a true seer,

My mind from error clear,

Tomorrows moon shall not pass over us,

Ere, O Cithaeron, we

Shall magnify in thee

The land, the lap, the womb of Oedipus;

And we shall hymn thy praises, for good things

Of thy bestowing, done unto our kings.

Yea, Phoebus, if thou wilt, amen, so might it be!

2.

Who bare thee? Which, O child,

Over the mountain-wild

Sought to by Pan of the immortal Maids?

Or Loxias—was he

The sire who fathered thee?

For dear to him are all the upland glades.

Was it Cyllene’s lord* acquired a son,

Or Bacchus, dweller on the heights, from one

Of those he liefest loves, Oreads** of Helicon?

Enter Attendants with an Old Man, a Shepherd.

OEDIPUS

If I may guess, who never met with him,

I think I see that herdsman, Senators,

We have long been seeking; for his ripe old age

Harmoniously accords with this man’s measure;

Besides, I recognize the men who bring him

As of my household; but in certainty

You can perhaps exceed me, who beheld

The herdsman formerly.

1 SENATOR

Why, to be sure,

I recognize him; for he was a man

Trusty as any Laius ever had

About his pastures.

OEDIPUS

You I ask the first,

The Corinthian stranger; do you speak of him?

MESSENGER

Yes, him you see.

OEDIPUS

Sirrah, old man, look here;

Answer my questions. Were you Laius’ man?

OLD MAN

Truly his thrall; not bought, but bred at home.

OEDIPUS

Minding what work, or in what character?

OLD MAN

Most of my time I went after the flocks.

OEDIPUS

In what directions, chiefly, were your folds?

OLD MAN