Part 13

OEDIPUS. Doth any bystander among you know The herd he speaks of, or by seeing him Afield or in the city? answer straight! The hour hath come to clear this business up.

CHORUS. Methinks he means none other than the hind Whom thou anon wert fain to see; but that Our queen Jocasta best of all could tell.

OEDIPUS. Madam, dost know the man we sent to fetch? Is the same of whom the stranger speaks?

JOCASTA. Who is the man? What matter? Let it be. ’Twere waste of thought to weigh such idle words.

OEDIPUS. No, with such guiding clues I cannot fail To bring to light the secret of my birth.

JOCASTA. Oh, as thou carest for thy life, give o’er This quest. Enough the anguish I endure.

OEDIPUS. Be of good cheer; though I be proved the son Of a bondwoman, aye, through three descents Triply a slave, thy honor is unsmirched.

JOCASTA. Yet humor me, I pray thee; do not this.

OEDIPUS. I cannot; I must probe this matter home.

JOCASTA. ’Tis for thy sake I advise thee for the best.

OEDIPUS. I grow impatient of this best advice.

JOCASTA. Ah mayst thou ne’er discover who thou art!

OEDIPUS. Go, fetch me here the herd, and leave yon woman To glory in her pride of ancestry.

JOCASTA. O woe is thee, poor wretch! With that last word I leave thee, henceforth silent evermore. [Exit JOCASTA]

CHORUS. Why, Oedipus, why stung with passionate grief Hath the queen thus departed? Much I fear From this dead calm will burst a storm of woes.

OEDIPUS. Let the storm burst, my fixed resolve still holds, To learn my lineage, be it ne’er so low. It may be she with all a woman’s pride Thinks scorn of my base parentage. But I Who rank myself as Fortune’s favorite child, The giver of good gifts, shall not be shamed. She is my mother and the changing moons My brethren, and with them I wax and wane. Thus sprung why should I fear to trace my birth? Nothing can make me other than I am.

CHORUS. (Str.) If my soul prophetic err not, if my wisdom aught avail, Thee, Cithaeron, I shall hail, As the nurse and foster-mother of our Oedipus shall greet Ere tomorrow’s full moon rises, and exalt thee as is meet. Dance and song shall hymn thy praises, lover of our royal race. Phoebus, may my words find grace!

(Ant.) Child, who bare thee, nymph or goddess? sure thy sure was more than man, Haply the hill-roamer Pan. Of did Loxias beget thee, for he haunts the upland wold; Or Cyllene’s lord, or Bacchus, dweller on the hilltops cold? Did some Heliconian Oread give him thee, a new-born joy? Nymphs with whom he love to toy?

OEDIPUS. Elders, if I, who never yet before Have met the man, may make a guess, methinks I see the herdsman who we long have sought; His time-worn aspect matches with the years Of yonder aged messenger; besides I seem to recognize the men who bring him As servants of my own. But you, perchance, Having in past days known or seen the herd, May better by sure knowledge my surmise.

CHORUS. I recognize him; one of Laius’ house; A simple hind, but true as any man. [Enter HERDSMAN.]

OEDIPUS. Corinthian, stranger, I address thee first, Is this the man thou meanest!

MESSENGER. This is he.

OEDIPUS. And now old man, look up and answer all I ask thee. Wast thou once of Laius’ house?

HERDSMAN. I was, a thrall, not purchased but home-bred.

OEDIPUS. What was thy business? how wast thou employed?

HERDSMAN. The best part of my life I tended sheep.

OEDIPUS. What were the pastures thou didst most frequent?

HERDSMAN. Cithaeron and the neighboring alps.