A shrouded corpse is disclosed.Orestes and Pylades stand near it.
Aegisthus
O Zeus, I see an image which could not have fallen without divine spite—but, if Nemesis attend what I say, let it be unsaid!To Orestes. Undo the coverings from his eyes, so that our kinship, at least, may receive due mourning from me also.
Orestes
[1470]
Lift the veil yourself. It is not for me, but for you to look upon these remains and greet them kindly.
Aegisthus
You advise well, and I will obey you.To Electra. But you, call Clytaemnestra for me, if she is at home.
Orestes
She is near you; do not look elsewhere.
Aegisthus
Aegisthus removes the cloth from the face of the corpse.
[1475]
O, what sight is this!
Orestes
Why so scared? Is the face so strange?
Aegisthus
Who are the men into whose nets I have miserably fallen?
Orestes
Do you not perceive how you have long been addressing the living in terms suited to the dead?
Aegisthus
Ah, I read the riddle! It cannot be that
[1480]
this is not Orestes who speaks to me!
Orestes
And, though so good a prophet, were you deceived so long?
Aegisthus
Oh, I am destroyed, undone! Yet allow me to speak just a little.
Electra
By the gods, brother, do not allow him to speak any more or to plead at length!
[1485]
When mortals are embroiled in misfortunes, how can one who is to die benefit from lapse of time? No, kill him as quickly as you can, and throw his corpse to the creatures from whom his kind should have burial, throw it far from our sight! For in my eyes this
[1490]
alone can bring us release from the misery of the past.
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Sophocles. The Electra of Sophocles. Edited with introduction and notes by Sir Richard Jebb. Sir Richard Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1894.
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