HIPP.  Go thou too, and farewell, blessed virgin!  But thou easily quittest a long companionship.  But I give up all enmity against my father at thy request, for before also I was wont to obey thy words.  Ah! ah! darkness now covers me over mine eyes.  Take hold on me, my father, and lift up my body.

THES.  Ah me! my son, what dost thou, do to me unhappy?

HIPP.  I perish, and do indeed see the gates of hell.

THES.  What? leaving my mind uncleansed from thy blood?

HIPP.  No in sooth, since I free thee from this murder.

THES.  What sayest thou? dost thou remit me free from the guilt of blood?

HIPP.  I call to witness Dian that slays with the bow.

THES.  O most dear, how noble thou appearest to thy father!

HIPP.  O farewell thou too, take my best farewell, my father!

THES.  Oh me! for thy pious and brave soul!

HIPP.  Pray to have legitimate sons like me.

THES.  Do not, I prithee, leave me, my son, but be strong.

HIPP.  My time of strength is past; for I perish, my father:  but cover my face as quickly as possible with robes.

THES.  O famous realms of Athens and of Pallas, of what a man will ye have been bereaved!  Oh unhappy I!  What abundant reason, Venus, shall I have to remember thy ills!

CHOR.  This common grief to all the citizens hath come unexpectedly.  There will be a fast falling of many tears; for the mournful stories of great men rather obtain.

* * * * *

NOTES ON HIPPOLYTUS

* * * *

[1] The construction in the original furnishes a remarkable example of the “nominativus pendens.”

[2] Or, that posterity might know it.  TR.  Dindorf would omit these words.  B.

[3] Dindorf would omit these lines.  I think the difficulty in the structure may be removed by reading [Greek:  hostis] instead of [Greek:  hosois].  The enallage, [Greek:  hostis ... toutois], is by no means unusual.  B.

[4] Cf.  Soph.  Oed.  Col. 121, sqq.  B.

[5] Which at present you do not appear to have.

[6] Monk would join [Greek:  okeanou] with [Greek:  petra], as in the translation, but other commentators prefer, which is certainly more simple, to join it with [Greek:  hydor].  Then the difficulty occurs of sea-water being unfit for washing vests.  This difficulty Beck obviates, by saying that [Greek:  hydor okeanou] may be applied to fresh water, Ocean being the parent of all streams, the word [Greek:  okeanou] being here, in a manner, redundant.  TR.  Matthiae is very wrath with the “all on a washing day” manner in which the Chorus learned Phaedra’s indisposition.  The “Bothie of Toper na Fuosich” will furnish some similar simplicities, such as the meeting a lassie “digging potatoes.”  But we might as well object to the whole story of Nausicaa.  It must be recollected that the duties of the laundry were considered more aristocratic by the ancients, than in modern times.  B.