sought that one should come, my queen.
Know'st thou, is this of whom he speaks the same?

JO. What matter who? Regard not, nor desire
Even vainly to remember aught he saith.

OED. When I have found such tokens of my birth,
I must disclose it.

JO. As you love your life,
By heaven I beg you, search no further here!
The sickness in my bosom is enough.

OED. Nay, never fear! Were I proved thrice a slave
And waif of bondwomen, you still are noble.

JO. Yet hearken, I implore you: do not so.

OED. I cannot hear you. I must know this through.

JO. With clear perception I advise the best.

OED. Thy 'best' is still my torment.

JO. Wretched one,
Never may'st thou discover who thou art!

OED. Will some one go and bring the herdman hither?
Leave her to revel in her lordly line!

JO. O horrible! O lost one! This alone
I speak to thee, and no word more for ever. [_Exit_

CH. Oedipus, wherefore is Jocasta gone,
Driven madly by wild grief? I needs must fear
Lest from this silence she make sorrow spring.

OED. Leave her to raise what storm she will. But I
Will persevere to know mine origin,
Though from an humble seed. Her woman's pride
Is shamed, it may be, by my lowliness.
But I, whilst I account myself the son
Of prospering Fortune, ne'er will be disgraced.
For she is my true mother: and the months,
Coheirs with me of the same father, Time,
Have marked my lowness and mine exaltation.
So born, so nurtured, I can fear no change,
That I need shrink to probe this to the root.
[OEDIPUS _remains, and gazes towards the country,
while the_ CHORUS _sing_

CHORUS.
If I wield a prophet's might, 1
Or have sense to search aright,
Cithaeron, when all night the moon rides high,
Loud thy praise shall be confessed,
How upon thy rugged breast,
Thou, mighty mother, nursed'st tenderly
Great Oedipus, and gav'st his being room
Within thy spacious home.
Yea, we will dance and sing
Thy glory for thy kindness to our king.
Phoebus, unto thee we cry,
Be this pleasing in thine eye!

Who, dear sovereign, gave thee birth, 2
Of the long lived nymphs of earth?
Say, was she clasped by mountain roving Pan?
Or beguiled she one sweet hour
With Apollo in her bower,