ishonor to me: he slew my daughter and his
own, wept over with many a tear; now slain in recompense he is gone to
Hell with nothing to boast over.--_Cho._ Whither escape from this House?
No longer drops, but fierce pelting storm of blood shakes it to its
basement.--_Cho._ Oh that earth had received me ere I saw this sad sight!
Who will perform funeral rites and chant the dirge? Wilt thou who hast
slain dare to mourn him?--_Clyt._ It is no care of thine: we will give
him burial; and for mourning--perhaps Iphigenia will greet him kindly by
the dark streams below.--_Cho._ Hard it is to judge; the hand of Zeus is
in all this; ever throughout this household we see the fixed law, the
spoiler still is spoiled. Who will drive out from this royal house this
brood of curses dark?--_Clyt._ Thou art right; but here let the demon
rest content; suffice it for me that my hand has freed the house from the
madness that sets each man's hand against each. [Observe: in this last
infatuated confidence and throughout Clytaemnestra's exultation in the
deed the dramatist is laying the foundation for the second play of the
Trilogy.] {1534}

_Enter Aegisthus by one of the two Inferior doors in front of the scene
[representing the inferior parts of the Palace in which he has been
concealed since the return of Agamemnon]._

_Aegisthus_ salutes the happy day of vengeance which shows him Agamemnon
paying penalty for the deeds of his father: he relates the quarrel
between this father Atreus and his own father Thyestes, how when the one
brother came as suppliant to the other Atreus spread before him the
horrid banquet of his own child's flesh, at the knowledge of which he
died. Aegisthus himself had suffered banishment at the hands of Atreus
while yet a child, and now has returned full grown to work vengeance on
the son of his wronger, to see the long contrived nemesis brought to full
conclusion.--_Chorus_ note that he confesses the deed, and he shall not
escape the righteous curse a people hurls with stones.--_Aeg._ Know your
place: you are oarsmen, we command the ship; prison and fasting are
admirable devices for helping old people to keep their tempers within
bounds. Defiances are interchanged: the _Chorus_ taunting him that he
had to get a woman to do the deed he dared not do himself,--_Aeg._
contemptuously says the working out of the fraud was the proper province
of a woman, especially as he was a known foe.--The Chorus threaten
vengeance