Euripides, Iphigenia in Aulis
E. P. Coleridge, Ed.

Clytemnestra
Happiness attend the pair! Which day will he marry her?

Agamemnon
As soon as the full moon comes to give its blessing

Clytemnestra
Have you already offered the goddess a sacrifice to usher in the maiden's marriage?

Agamemnon
I am about to do so; that is the very thing I was engaged in.

Clytemnestra
[720] And then will you celebrate the marriage feast afterwards?

Agamemnon
Yes, when I have offered a sacrifice required by the gods of me.

Clytemnestra
But where am I to make ready the feast for the women?

Agamemnon
Here beside our gallant Argive ships.

Clytemnestra
Finely here! but still I must; good come of it for all that!

Agamemnon
[725] Do you know what to do, lady? Then obey me.

Clytemnestra
In what matter? for I was ever accustomed to obey you.

Agamemnon
Here, where the bridegroom is, I will—

Clytemnestra
Which of my duties will you perform in the mother's absence?

Agamemnon
Give your child away with help of Danaids.

Clytemnestra
[730] And where am I to be then?

Agamemnon
Go to Argos, and take care of your unwedded daughters.

Clytemnestra
And leave my child? Then who will raise her bridal torch?

Agamemnon
I will provide the proper wedding torch.

Clytemnestra
That is not the custom; but you think lightly of these things.

Agamemnon
[735] It is not good for you to be alone among a soldier-crowd.

Clytemnestra
It is good that a mother should give her own child away.

Agamemnon
Yes, and that those maidens at home should not be left alone.

Clytemnestra
They are well guarded in their maiden bowers.

Agamemnon
Obey.

Clytemnestra
No, by the goddess-queen of Argos! [740] Go, manage matters out of doors; but in the house it is my place to decide [what is proper for maidens at their wedding].

Agamemnon
Woe is me! my efforts are baffled; I am disappointed in my hope, anxious as I was to get my wife out of sight; foiled at every point, [745] I form my plots and subtle schemes against my best-beloved. But I will go, in spite of all, with Calchas the priest, to inquire the goddess's good pleasure, fraught with ill-luck as it is to me, and with trouble to Hellas. He who is wise should keep in his house [750] a good and useful wife or none at all.