OEDIPUS
It needs no god to tell what's plain to sense.

ISMENE
Therefore they fain would have thee close at hand,
Not where thou wouldst be master of thyself.

OEDIPUS
Mean they to shroud my bones in Theban dust?

ISMENE
Nay, father, guilt of kinsman's blood forbids.

OEDIPUS
Then never shall they be my masters, never!

ISMENE
Thebes, thou shalt rue this bitterly some day!

OEDIPUS
When what conjunction comes to pass, my child?

ISMENE
Thy angry wraith, when at thy tomb they stand. [6]

OEDIPUS
And who hath told thee what thou tell'st me, child?

ISMENE
Envoys who visited the Delphic hearth.

OEDIPUS
Hath Phoebus spoken thus concerning me?

ISMENE
So say the envoys who returned to Thebes.

OEDIPUS
And can a son of mine have heard of this?

ISMENE
Yea, both alike, and know its import well.

OEDIPUS
They knew it, yet the ignoble greed of rule
Outweighed all longing for their sire's return.

ISMENE
Grievous thy words, yet I must own them true.

OEDIPUS
Then may the gods ne'er quench their fatal feud,
And mine be the arbitrament of the fight,
For which they now are arming, spear to spear;
That neither he who holds the scepter now
May keep this throne, nor he who fled the realm
Return again. _They_ never raised a hand,
When I their sire was thrust from hearth and home,
When I was banned and banished, what recked they?
Say you 'twas done at my desire, a grace
Which the state, yielding to my wish, allowed?
Not so; for, mark you, on that very day
When in the tempest of my soul I craved
Death, even death by stoning, none appeared
To further that wild longing, but anon,
When time had numbed my anguish and I felt
My wrath had all outrun those errors past,
Then, then it was the city went about
By force to oust me, respited for years;
And then my sons, who should as sons have helped,
Did nothing: and, one little word from them
Was all I needed, and they spoke no word,
But let me wander on for evermore,
A banished man, a beggar. These two maids
Their sisters, girls, gave all their sex could give,
Food and safe harborage and filial care;
While their two brethren sacrificed their sire
For lust of power and sceptred sovereignty.
No! me they ne'er shall win for an ally,
Nor will this Theban kingship bring them gain;
That know I from this maiden's oracles,
And those old prophecies concerning me,
Which Phoebus now at length has brought to pass.
Come Creon then, come all the mightiest
In Th