Chorus Leader
Now more than before, Electra, I feel the warmth of joy at my heart; for perhaps good fortune, advancing with difficulty, might come to a good resting-place.
Electra
O reckless man, why, knowing the poverty of your house,
[405]
did you welcome these strangers, greater than you?
Peasant
What? If they are really as noble as they seem, won't they be equally content among great and small?
Electra
Since you, one of the small, have now made this error, go to my father's dear old servant,
[410]
who tends his flocks, an outcast from the city, by the river Tanaus which cuts a boundary between Argive land and the land of Sparta; bid him come, since these men have arrived at my house, and provide something for the guests' meal.
[415]
He will be glad, and will offer prayers to the gods, when he hears that the child, whom he once saved, is alive. I cannot get anything from my mother or from my father's house; for we would bring bitter news, if she, the hard-hearted, were to learn that Orestes is still alive.
Peasant
[420]
I will take this message to the old man, if you wish; but go inside the house at once and make things ready there. Surely a woman, if she wants to, can find many additions to a meal. Really there is still enough in the house
[425]
to cram them with food for one day at least. It is in such cases, whenever I fail in my intentions, that I see how wealth has great power, to give to strangers, and to expend in curing the body when it falls sick; but money for our daily food
[430]
comes to little; for every man when full, rich or poor, gets an equal amount.The Peasant departs as Electra enters the hut.
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Table of Contents:
Euripides. The Complete Greek Drama, edited by Whitney J. Oates and Eugene O'Neill, Jr. in two volumes. 2. Electra, translated by E. P. Coleridge. New York. Random House. 1938.
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