Aga.  And how shall the victory over men be to women?

Hec.  Numbers are powerful, with stratagem invincible.

Aga.  Powerful, I grant; I mistrust however the race of women.

Hec.  And why?  Did not women slay the sons of AEgyptus,[16] and utterly extirpated the race of men from Lemnos?[17] But thus let it be.  Give up this discussion.  But grant this woman to pass in safety through the army.  And do thou go to the Thracian host and tell him, “Hecuba, once queen of Troy, sends for you on business of no less importance to yourself than to her, and your sons likewise, since it is of consequence that your children also should hear her words.”—­And do thou, O Agamemnon, as yet forbear to raise the tomb over the newly-sacrificed Polyxena, that these two, the brother and the sister, the divided care of their mother, may, when reduced to ashes by one and the same flame, be interred side by side.

Aga.  Thus shall it be.  And yet, if the army could sail, I should not have it in my power to grant thy request:  but now, for the deity breathes not prosperous gales, we must wait, watching for a calm voyage.  But may things turn out well some way or other:  for this is a general principle among all, both individuals in private and states, That the wicked man should feel vengeance, but the good man enjoy prosperity.

Chorus.

O thou, my country of Troy, no longer shall thou be called the city of the invincible, such a cloud of Grecians envelops thee, with the spear, with the spear having destroyed thee.  And thou hast been shorn of thy crown of turrets, and thou hast been discolored by the dismal blackness of smoke; hapless city, no longer shall I tread my steps in thee.

In the midnight hour I perished, when after the feast sweet sleep is scattered over the eyes.  And my husband, from the song and cheerful sacrifice retired, was sleeping peacefully in my bed, his spear on its peg, no more dreaming to behold the naval host of the Greeks treading the streets of Troy.  But I was binding my braided hair with fillets fastened on the top of mine head, looking into the round polished surface of the golden mirror, that I might get into my bed prepared for me.  On a sudden a tumultuous cry penetrated the city; and this shout of exhortation was heard in the streets of Troy, “When indeed, ye sons of Grecians, when, if not now, will ye return to your homes having overthrown the proud citadel of Ilium!” And having left my dear bed, in a single robe, like a Spartan virgin, flying for aid to the venerable shrine of Diana, I hapless fled in vain.  And I am dragged, after having seen my husband slain, to the ocean waves; and casting a distant look back upon my city, after the vessel had begun her way in her return to Greece, and divided me from the land of Troy, I wretched fainted through anguish.  And consigning to curses Helen, the sister of the Twin Brothers, and the Idean shepherd, the ruthless Paris, since his marriage, no marriage, but some Fury’s hate hath utterly destroyed me far from my native land, and hath driven me from my home.  Whom may the ocean refuse ever to bear back again; and may she never reach again her paternal home.