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• The Works of Voltaire: the Dramatic Works of Voltaire Vol. Ix— Part I
• Alzire
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• Orestes
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• SÉmiramis
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• Catiline
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• Pandora
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• The Dramatic Works of Voltaire Vol. Ix—part Ii
• The Scotch Woman
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• Nanine
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• The Prude
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.
• Act II.
• Act III.
• Act IV.
• Act V.
• The Tatler
• Dramatis PersonÆ.
• Act I.

ACT II.

SCENE I.

orestes, pylades.

orestes.

• Whither, my Pylades, hath cruel fate
• Conducted us? alas! Orestes lives
• But to increase the sorrows of his friend:
• Our arms, our treasures, and our soldiers lost
• In the rude storm; here on this desert coast,
• No succor near, deserted and forlorn
• We wander on, and naught but hope remains.
• Where are we?

pylades.

• That I know not; but since fate
• Hath led us hither, let us not despair;
• It is enough for me, Orestes lives:
• Be confident; the barbarous Ægisthus
• In vain pursued thy life, which heaven preserved
• In Epidaurus, when thy arm subdued
• The gallant Plisthenes: let naught alarm
• Or terrify thy soul, but boldly urge
• Thy way, protected by that guardian God
• Who watches o’er the just, the great avenger,
• Who hath already to thy valor given
• The son, and promised that ere long the father
• Shall follow him.

orestes.

• Alas, my friend, that God
• In anger now withdraws his powerful aid,
• And frowns upon us, as thy cruel fate
• Too plainly shows; a terrible example!
• But say, within the rock didst thou conceal
• The urn, which to Mycenæ, horrid seat
• Of murder, by the gods command, we bear;
• That urn which holds the ashes of my foe,
• Of Plisthenes; with that we must deceive
• The tyrant.

pylades.

• I have done it.

orestes.

• Gracious heaven!
• When shall we reap the fruits of our obedience?
• When will the wished-for day of vengeance come?
• Shall I again behold my native soil,
• The dear, the dreadful place where first I saw
• The light of day? Where, shall I find my sister,
• The pride, the glory, of admiring Greece;
• That generous maid, whom all unite to praise,
• But none will dare to succor? She preserved
• My life; and, worthy of her noble father,
• Hath never bent beneath the oppressive hand
• Of power, but braved the fury of the storm.
• How many kings, how many heroes, fought
• For Menelaus! Agamemnon dies,
• And Greece forgets him, whilst his hapless son,
• Deserted, wanders o’er a faithless world,
• To seek some blest asylum for repose.
• Alas, without thy friendship I had been
• The most distressed, most abject of mankind:
• But heaven, in pity to my woes, hath sent
• My Pylades; it would not let me perish,
• But gave me to subdue my hated foe,
• And half avenge my father: say, my friend,
• What path will lead us to the tyrant’s court?

pylades.

• Behold that palace, and the towering height
• Of yon proud temple, the dark grove overgrown
• With cypress, and the tomb, rich images
• Of mournful splendor all: and see! this way
• Advancing, comes a venerable sage,
• Of mildest aspect, and whose years, no doubt,
• Have long experience of calamity;
• His soul will melt at thy disastrous fate.

orestes.

• Is every mortal born to suffer? hark!
• He groans, my Pylades.

SCENE II.

orestes, pylades, pammenes.

pylades.

• Whoe’er thou art,
• Stop, and inform us: we are strangers here.
• Two poor unhappy friends, long time the sport
• Of winds and waves, now on this unknown shore
• Cast helpless, canst thou tell us if this place
• Will be or fatal to us, or propitious?

pammenes.

• I am a simple, plain old man, and here
• Worship the gods, adore their justice, live
• In humble fear of them, and exercise
• The sacred rights of hospitality;
• Ye both are welcome to my little cottage,
• There to despise with me the pride of kings,
• Their pomp and riches; come, my friends, for such
• I ever hold the wretched.

orestes.

• Generous stranger,
• May gracious heaven inspire us with the means
• To recompense thy goodness! but inform us
• What place is this; who is your king?

pammenes.

• Ægisthus:
• I am his subject.

orestes.

• Terrors, crimes, and vengeance!
• O heaven, Ægisthus!

pylades.

• Soft: do not betray us;
• Be careful.

orestes.

• Gods, Ægisthus! he who murdered—

pammenes.

• The same.

orestes.

• And Clytemnæstra, lives she still
• After that fatal blow.

pammenes.

• She reigns with him;
• The rest is known too well.

orestes.

• That tomb before us,
• And yonder palace—

pammenes.

• Is inhabited
• Now by Ægisthus; built, I well remember,
• By worthier hands, and for a better use.
• The tomb thou seest, forgive me if I weep
• At the remembrance, is the tomb of him
• I loved, my lord, my king—of Agamemnon.

orestes.

• O ’tis too much! I sink beneath it.

pylades.

• Hide
• Thy tears, my friend.
• [To Orestes, who turns away from him.

pammenes.

• You seem much moved, and fain
• Would stop the tide of grief: O give it way,
• Indulge thy sorrows, and lament the son
• Of gods, the noble conqueror of Troy;
• Whilst they insult his sacred memory here,
• Strangers shall weep the fate of Agamemnon.

orestes.

• A stranger as I am, I cannot look
• With cold indifference on the noble race
• Of Atreus, ’tis a Grecian’s duty ever
• To weep the fate of heroes, and I ought—
• But doth Electra live in Argos still?

pammenes.

• She doth, she’s here.

orestes.

• I run, I fly to meet her.

pylades.

• Ha! whither wouldst thou go! What! brave the gods
• Hazard thy precious life! forbear, my lord.
• [To Pammenes.
• O, sir, conduct us to the neighboring temple,
• There will we lay our gifts before the altar
• In humble duty, and adore that God
• Who ruled the waves, and saved us from destruction.

orestes.

• Wilt thou conduct us to the sacred tomb
• Where lie the ashes of a murdered hero?
• There must I offer to his honored shade
• A secret sacrifice.

pammenes.

• O heavenly justice,
• Thou sacrifice to him! amidst his foes!
• O noble youth! my master had a son,
• Who, in Electra’s arms—but I forbear,
• Ægisthus comes: away; I’ll follow you.

orestes.

• Ægisthus! ha!

pylades.

• We must avoid his presence.

SCENE III.

ægisthus, clytemnæstra, pammenes.

ægisthus.

• [To Pammenes
• Who are those strangers? one of them methought
• Seemed, by his stately port and fair demeanor,
• Of noble birth, a gloom of melancholy
• Hangs on his brow: he struck me as he passed:
• Is he our subject? knowest thou whence he came?

pammenes.

• I only know they are unfortunate;
• Driven by the tempest on those rocks, they came
• For shelter here; as strangers I relieved them;
• It was my duty: if they tell me truth,
• Greece is their country.

ægisthus.

• Thou shalt answer for them
• On peril of thy life.

clytemnæstra.

• Alas! my lord,
• Can these poor objects raise suspicion?

ægisthus.

• Yes:
• The people murmur; everything alarms me.

clytemnæstra.

• Such for these fifteen years hath been our fate,
• To fear, and to be feared; the bitter poison
• To all my happiness.

ægisthus.

• Away, Pammenes;
• Let me know who and whence they are; why thus
• They come so near the palace; from what port
• Their vessel sailed, and wherefore on the seas
• Where I command: away, and bring me word.

SCENE IV.

ægisthus, clytemnæstra.

ægisthus.

• Well, madam, to remove thy idle fears,
• The interpreters of heaven it seems at length
• Have been consulted; but in vain: their silence
• Doubles thy grief, and heightens thy despair;
• For to thyself, thy restless spirit ne’er
• Will know repose; thou tremblest at the thought
• Of thy son’s death, yet fearest his dangerous life:
• Consult no more thy doubtful oracles,
• And hesitating priests, that brood in secret
• O’er the dark bosom of futurity;
• But hear Ægisthus, he shall give thee peace,
• And satisfy thy soul: this hand determines,
• This tongue pronounces Clytemnæstra’s fate:
• If thou wouldst live and reign, confide in me,
• And me alone, and let me hear no more
• Of your unworthy son; but for Electra,
• She’s to be feared, and we must think of her:
• Perhaps her marriage with my Plisthenes
• Might stop the mouth of faction, and appease
• The discontented people: thou wouldst wish
• To see the deadly hatred, that so long
• Hath raged between us, softened into peace;
• To see our interests and our hearts united:
• Let it be so. Go thou, and talk with her;
• But take good heed her pride refuses not
• The proffered boon, that were an insult soon
• She might repent of; but I hope with you,
• That slavery hath bowed down her haughty spirit,
• That this unhoped for, unexpected change
• From poverty and chains to rank and splendor,
• Joined to a mother’s kind authority,
• And above all, to Ambition, will persuade her
• To seize the golden minutes, and be wise:
• But if she spurns the happiness that courts her,
• Her insolence shall meet its due reward.
• Your foolish fondness, and her father’s name,
• Have fed her pride too long; but let her dread,
• If she submits not, a severer fate,
• Chains heavier far, and endless banishment.

SCENE V.

clytemnæstra, electra.

clytemnæstra.

• Come near, my daughter, and with milder looks
• Behold thy mother: I have mourned in secret,
• And wept with thee thy hard and cruel bondage,
• Though not unmerited; for sure thy hatred
• Was most unjust, Electra: as a queen,
• I was offended; as a mother, grieved;
• But I have gained your pardon, and your rights
• Are all restored.

electra.

• O madam, at your feet—

clytemnæstra.

• But I would still do more.

electra.

• What more?

clytemnæstra.

• Support
• Your race, restore the honored name of Pelops,
• And re-unite his long-divided children.

electra.

• Ha! talkest thou of Orestes? speak, go on.

clytemnæstra.

• I speak of thee, and hope at last Electra
• Will be Electra’s friend: I know thy soul
• Aspires to empire, be thyself again,
• And let thy hopes transport thee to the throne
• Of Argos and Mycenæ; rise from chains
• And ignominious slavery to the throne
• Of thy great ancestors: Ægisthus yields
• To my entreaties, as a daughter yet
• He would embrace thee, to his Plisthenes
• Would join Electra; every hour the youth
• From Epidaurus is expected here;
• When he returns he weds you: look, my daughter,
• Towards the bright prospect of thy future glory,
• And bury all the past in deep oblivion.

electra.

• Can I forget the past, or look with joy
• On that which is to come? O cruel fate,
• This is the worst indignity that e’er
• Electra bore: remember whence I sprang,
• Remember, I am Agamemnon’s daughter,
• And wouldst thou bind me to his murderer’s son?
• Give me my chains again, oppress my soul
• With all the horrors of base servitude;
• All that the tyrant e’er inflicted on me,
• Shame and reproach suit with my sad condition;
• I have supported them, and looked on death
• Without a fear: a thousand times Ægisthus
• Hath threatened me with death, but this is worse;
• Thou art more cruel far to ask my vows,
• My love, my honor; but I see your aim,
• I know your purpose; poor Orestes slain,
• His murderer trembles at a sister’s claim,
• And dreads my title to a father’s throne:
• The tyrant wants my hand to second him,
• To seal his poor precarious rights with mine,
• And make me an accomplice in his guilt:
• O, if I have a right Ægisthus fears,
• Let him erase my title in my blood,
• And tear it from me: if another arm
• Be needful to his purpose, lend him thine;
• Strike here, and join Electra to her brother;
• Strike here, and I shall know ’tis Clytemnæstra.

clytemnæstra.

• It is too much: ungrateful as thou art,
• I pitied thee; but all my hopes are past:
• What have I done, what would I do, to bend
• Thy stubborn heart? tears, menaces, reproaches,
• And love and tenderness, the throne itself,
• Which but for me thou never couldst have hoped,
• Prayers, punishment, and pardon, naught availed,
• And now I yield thee to thy fate: farewell!
• Thou sayest that thou shalt know me for thy mother,
• For Clytemnæstra, by my cruelty:
• I am thy mother, and I am thy queen,
• Remember that; to Agamemnon’s race
• Naught do I owe but hatred and revenge;
• I will not warm a serpent in my breast
• To sting me: henceforth storm, complain, and weep,
• I shall not heed the clamors of a slave:
• I loved thee once, with grief I own I loved thee;
• But from this hour remember Clytemnæstra
• Is not thy mother, but Ægisthus’ wife;
• The bonds are broken that united us,
• Electra broke them; nature hath disclaimed,
• And I abjure them.

SCENE VI.

electra.

• [Alone.
• Gracious heaven! is this
• A mother’s voice? O day the bitterest sure
• That ever rose since my dear father’s death!
• I fear I said too much, but my full heart,
• Spite of myself, would pour its venom forth:
• She told me my Orestes was no more;
• Could I bear that? O if a cruel mother
• Has robbed me of my best, my dearest treasure,
• Why should I court my worst of foes, why fawn
• And cringe to her, to live a vile dependant
• On her precarious bounties; to lift up
• These withered hands to unrelenting heaven,
• To see my father’s bed and throne usurped
• By this base spoiler, this inhuman tyrant,
• Who robbed me of a mother’s heart, and now
• Hath taken Orestes from me?

SCENE VII.

electra, iphisa.

iphisa.

• O Electra,
• Complain no more.

electra.

• Why not?

iphisa.

• Partake my joy.

electra.

• Joy is a stranger to this heart, Iphisa,
• And ever shall be.

iphisa.

• Still there is hope.

electra.

• O no,
• Still must we weep: for if I may believe
• A mother, our dear brother, our Orestes,
• Is dead.

iphisa.

• And if I may believe these eyes,
• He lives, he’s here, Electra.

electra.

• Can it be?
• Good heaven! O do not trifle with a heart
• Like mine: Iphisa, didst thou say Orestes?

iphisa.

• I did.

electra.

• Thou wouldst not with a flattering dream
• Deceive me, my Iphisa—but, go on,
• For hope and fear distract me.

iphisa.

• O my sister,
• Two strangers, cast by some benignant God
• On these unhappy coasts, are just arrived,
• And hither, by the care of good Pammenes,
• Conducted; one of them—

electra.

• I faint: die—
• Well, one of them—

iphisa.

• I saw the noble youth:
• O what a lustre sparkled in his eye!
• His air, his mien, his every gesture bore
• The perfect semblage of a demi-god;
• Even as they paint the illustrious Grecian chief,
• The conqueror of Troy; such majesty
• And sweet deportment ne’er did I behold;
• But with Pammenes he retired, and hid
• His beauteous form from my desiring eyes:
• Struck with the charming image, and amazed,
• I ran to seek thee here, beneath the shade
• Of this dark grove, to tell the pleasing tale:
• But mark what followed—on the sacred tomb,
• Where we so oft have mingled our sad tears,
• I saw fresh garlands, saw the votive wreath,
• The water sprinkled over it, and the hair
• Doubtless of those whom I so late had seen,
• The illustrious strangers: near to these was laid,
• What most confirmed my hopes, a glittering sword,
• That spoke methought the day of vengeance near:
• Who but a son, a brother, and a hero,
• Raised by the gods to save his falling country,
• Would dare to brave the tyrant thus? ’Tis he,
• Electra, heaven hath sent him to our aid,
• The lightning glares upon us, and the thunder
• Will soon be heard.

electra.

• I must believe Iphisa,
• And hope the best; but is it not a snare
• Laid by the tyrant? Come: we’ll know the truth,
• Let us away—I must be satisfied.

iphisa.

• We must not search him in the dark retreat
• Where he is hid. Pammenes says, his life
• Would answer for it.

electra.

• Ha! what dost thou say?
• Alas! we are deceived, betrayed, Iphisa,
• By cruel heaven: thus, after fifteen years,
• Restored, Orestes would have run with joy
• To the dear arms that saved him, would have cheered
• Electra’s mournful heart, he ne’er had fled
• From thee, Iphisa: O that sword thou sawest,
• Which raised thy sanguine hope, alarms my fears;
• A cruel mother would be well informed,
• And in her eyes I read the barbarous joy
• She felt within: O dart one ray of hope,
• Ye vengeful gods, on my despairing soul!
• Will not Pammenes yield to my entreaties?
• He will; he must: away, I’ll speak to him.

iphisa.

• Do not, Electra; think what cruel eyes
• Watch o’er our steps, and mark our every action.
• If he is come, we shall discover him
• By our fond zeal, and hazard his sweet life:
• If we’re deceived, our search but irritates
• The tyrant, and endangers good Pammenes;
• But let us pay our duty at the tomb,
• There we at least may weep without offence.
• Who knows, Electra, but the noble stranger
• May meet us in that blest asylum; there
• That heaven, whose goodness thy impatient rage
• Hath called in question, may yet hear my vows,
• And give him to our wishes and our tears:
• Let us be gone.

electra.

• Thou hast revived my hopes:
• But O, I die with grief, if thou deceivest me!

End of the Second Act.