JASON.  Thou dost know.

MEDEA.  I guess thy will, but all thy secret thoughts
             I know not.

JASON.  Be contented with the first,
             For they are what decide.

MEDEA.  Then I must go?

JASON.  Go!

MEDEA.  And today?

JASON.  Today!

MEDEA.  And thou canst stand
             So calm before me and speak such a word,
             Nor drop thine eyes for shame, nor even blush?

JASON.  I must needs blush, if I should say aught else!

MEDEA.  Ha!  Good!  Well done!  Speak ever words like these
             When thou wouldst clear thyself in others’ eyes,
             But leave such idle feigning when thou speak’st
             With me!

JASON.  Dost call my dread of horrid deeds
             Which thou hast done, a sham, and idle, too? 
             Thou art condemned by men; the very gods
             Have damned thee!  And I give thee up to them
             And to their judgment!  ’Tis a fate, in sooth,
             Thou richly hast deserved!

MEDEA.  Who is this man,
             This pious, virtuous man with whom I speak? 
             Is it not Jason?  Strives he to seem mild? 
             O, mild and gentle one, didst thou not come
             To Colchis’ strand, and win in bloody fight
             The daughter of its king?  O, gentle, mild,
             Didst thou not slay my brother, was it not
             At thine own hands mine aged father fell,
             Thou gentle, pious man?  And now thou wouldst
             Desert the wife whom thou didst steal away! 
             Mild?  No, say rather hateful, monstrous man!

JASON.  Such wild abuse I will not stay to hear. 
             Thou knowest now what thou must do.  Farewell!

MEDEA.  Nay, nay, I know not!  Stay until I learn! 
             Stay, and I will be quiet even as thou.—­
             So, I am banished, then?  But what of thee? 
             Methinks the Herald’s sentence named thee, too.

JASON.  When it is known that I am innocent
             Of all these horrid deeds, and had no hand
             In murdering mine uncle, then the ban
             Will be removed from me.

MEDEA.  And thou wilt live
             Peaceful and happy, for long years to come?

JASON.  I shall live quietly, as doth become
             Unhappy men like me.

MEDEA.  And what of me?

JASON.  Thou dost but reap the harvest thine own hands
             Have sown.

MEDEA.  My hands?  Hadst thou no part therein?

JASON.  Nay, none.

MEDEA.  Didst never pray thine uncle’s death
             Might speedily be compassed?