Pentheus, the son of Echion, is dead.       1030

 

CORYPHAEUS

All hail to Bromius! Our god is a great god!

 

MESSENGER

What? You dare to rejoice

at these disasters which destroy this house?

 

CORYPHAEUS

I am no Greek. I hail my god

in my own way. No longer need I

shrink with fear of prison.                                   1035

 

MESSENGER

If you suppose this city is so short of men-

 

CORYPHAEUS

Dionysius, not Thebes,

has power over me.

 

MESSENGER

Your feelings might be forgiven, then. But this

is not right.                                                1040

 

CORYPHAEUS

How was he killed?

 

MESSENGER

There were three of us in all: Pentheus and I,

and that stranger who volunteered

his services as guide left Thebes. We forded

the Asopus and struck into                                1045

Cithaeron.

           

From that vantage on the cliff we can see but

Not be seen. Some of the Maenads

wound the stalks of their                               1050.             tattered wands with tendrils                            1055

of fresh ivy; others, frisking like fillies

chanted in Bacchic songs, responsively.

But Pentheus-unhappy man-could not quite see the companies

of women. "Stranger," he said, "from where I stand,

I cannot see the Maenads.      1060

But if I climbed that towering fir

then I could see their shameless orgies

better."

      The stranger reaching for

the highest branch of a great fir,

he bent it down to the dark earth.      1065

No mortal could have forced

the mountain fir to the ground.

Then he seated Pentheus at the highest tip   1070

and let the trunk rise straightly up,

slowly and gently.

And the tree rose with my master

huddled at the top. And now the Maenads saw him

more clearly than he saw them. -But barely had they seen,      .1075

when the stranger vanished and there came a great voice

out of heaven-Dionysius',

crying: "Women, I bring you the man who has mocked

at you and me and at our holy mysteries.      1080

Take vengeance upon him." And as he spoke

a flash of awful fire bound earth and heaven.

The forest grew still.      1085

The Bacchae heard that voice but missed its words,

and leaping up, they stared, peering everywhere.

Again that voice. And now they knew his cry,

the clear command of god. And when they saw my master

perching in his tree, they climbed a great stone 1095

that towered opposite his perch and showered him

with stones and javelins of fir and

hurled their wands. And yet they missed their target,

poor Pentheus in his perch,      1100

 treed, unable to escape.

Then Agave cried out: "Maenads, make a circle

about the trunk and grip it with your hands.

Unless we take this climbing beast, he will reveal

the secrets of the god." With that, thousands of hands

tore the fir tree from the earth, and down      1110

from his high perch fell Pentheus, tumbling

to the ground, sobbing and screaming as he fell,

for he knew his end was near. His own mother,

like a priestess with her victim, fell upon him

first. But snatching off his wig and snood      1115

So she would recognize his face, he touched her cheeks,

screaming "No, no, Mother! I am Pentheus,

your own son, I have done a wrong,      1120

but do not kill your own son for my offense."

But she was foaming at the mouth, and her crazed eyes

rolling with frenzy. She possessed by Bacchus.

Ignoring his cries of pity,

she seized his left arm at the wrist; then

 she pulled, wrenching away

the arm at the shoulder-not by her own strength,

for the god had put inhuman power in her hands.

Ino, meanwhile, on the other side, was scratching off

his flesh. Then Autonoe and the whole horde      1130

of Bacchae swarmed upon him. Shouts everywhere,

they shrieking in triumph. His ribs

were clawed clean of flesh and every hand      1135

was smeared with blood as they played ball with scraps

of Pentheus' body.

            The pitiful remains lie scattered,

in the depthsof the forest.

His mother, picking up his head,      1140

impaled it on her wand. She seems to think it is

some mountain lion's head which she carries in triumph,

she is coming here, gloating

over her grisly prize. She calls upon Bacchus:      1145

he is her "fellow-huntsman," "comrade of the chase,

crowned with victory." But all the victory

she carries home is her own grief

                  Now,

before Agave returns, let me leave

this scene of sorrow. Humility,

a sense of reverence before the sons of heaven-      1150

of all the prizes that a mortal man might win,

these, I say, are wisest; these are best.

 

Exit Messenger.