ves, I accept both gift and vow.

ALCESTIS.
Thou, in my place, must be their mother now.

ADMETUS.
Else were they motherless--I needs must try.

ALCESTIS.
My babes, I ought to live, and lo, I die.

ADMETUS.
And how can I, forlorn of thee, live on?

ALCESTIS.
Time healeth; and the dead are dead and gone.

ADMETUS.
Oh, take me with thee to the dark below,
Me also!

ALCESTIS.
'Tis enough that one should go.

ADMETUS.
O Fate, to have cheated me of one so true!

ALCESTIS (_her strength failing_).
There comes a darkness: a great burden, too.

ADMETUS.
I am lost if thou wilt leave me.... Wife! Mine own!

ALCESTIS.
I am not thy wife; I am nothing. All is gone.

ADMETUS.
Thy babes! Thou wilt not leave them.--Raise thine eye.

ALCESTIS.
I am sorry.... But good-bye, children; good-bye.

ADMETUS.
Look at them! Wake and look at them!

ALCESTIS.
I must go.

ADMETUS.
What? Dying!

ALCESTIS.
Farewell, husband! [_She dies._]

ADMETUS (_with a cry_).
Ah!... Woe, woe!

LEADER.
Admetus' Queen is dead!

[_While_ ADMETUS _is weeping silently, and the_ CHORUS _veil
their faces, the_ LITTLE BOY _runs up to his dead Mother_.]

LITTLE BOY.
Oh, what has happened? Mummy has gone away,
And left me and will not come back any more!
Father, I shall be lonely all the day....
Look! Look! Her eyes ... and her arms not like before,
How they lie ...
Mother! Oh, speak a word!
Answer me, answer me, Mother! It is I.
I am touching your face. It is I, your little bird.

ADMETUS (_recovering himself and going to the Child_).
She hears us not, she sees us not. We lie
Under a heavy grief, child, thou and I.

LITTLE BOY.
I am so little, Father, and lonely and cold
Here without Mother. It is too hard.... And you,
Poor little sister, too.
Oh, Father!
Such a little time we had her. She might have stayed
On till we all were old....
Everything is spoiled when Mother is dead.

[_The_ LITTLE BOY _is taken away, with his Sister, sobbing_.]

LEADER.
My King, thou needs must gird thee to the worst.
Thou shalt not be the last, nor yet the first,
To lose a noble wife. Be brave, and know
To die is but a debt that all men owe.

ADMETUS.
I know. It came not without doubts and fears,
This thing. The thought hath poisoned all my years.
Howbeit, I now will make the burial due
To this dead Queen.