Then the Queen departed, and the old men spake again among themselves.  “Now are the sinners, the men of Troy, caught in the net of destruction!  Long since did Zeus bend the bow and make it ready against the transgressor, and now hath the arrow sped to the mark!  Evil was the day when Paris shamed the table of his host, stealing the wife of his bosom!  Evil the hour when she went, as one that goeth lightly and carelessly, through the gates of Troy, and brought with her the dowry of destruction and death.  Sorrow she left behind her in her home; the desolate couch and the empty hall, for here, the grace of the shapely statues mocked her husband’s grief with the stony stare of their loveless eyes, and there, but the empty joy remained that dwells in the dreams of the night.  Aye! and a sorrow she left that was greater than this.  For the heroes went forth from the land of Greece, valiant and wise and true; and lo! all that Ares, the changer, but not of money, sendeth back is a handful of ashes shut in an urn of brass!  Therefore there is wrath in the city against the sons of Atreus, the leaders of the host; nor does the vengeance of the Gods forget the shedder of blood.”

But while they talked thus among themselves, some yet doubting whether the thing were true, cried one of them, “Now shall we know the certainty of this matter, for here cometh a herald with leaves of olive on his head, and he hath dust on his garments and mire on his feet, as one who cometh from a journey.”

Then the herald, whose name was Talthybius, came to the place where they had assembled, and when he had saluted Zeus and Apollo, whom, having been an enemy at Troy, he would fain have as friend, and Hermes, who was the god of his heralds’ craft he said, “Know ye all that King Agamemnon hath come, having, by the help of Zeus, executed judgment to the full against Troy and her children, for the evil which they wrought against the Gods and against this land.”

Then he told the elders what things they had suffered, first on sea, being crowded together on shipboard; and then on land, having their lodging near to the walls of their enemies, and under the open canopy of heaven, being drenched with rains and dews, and frozen with snows from Mount Ida, and burnt with the sun in the windless days of summer.  “But now,” he said, “these things are past and gone.  And we will nail the spoils of Troy in the temples of the Gods, to be a memorial for them that shall come after.  But let the people rejoice, and praise their King and his captains.”

[Illustration:  The empty joy that dwells in the dreams of the night.]

Then came forth Queen Clytaemnestra, and said, “Mark ye who doubted, how that all things are even as I said.  And now, herald, go tell thy lord that I wait to receive him with all honour; wherefore let him come with what speed he may; so shall he find a faithful guardian in his house who hath kept true watch and ward over all that he left behind, for this is the boast I make, both true and well beseeming a noble dame.”