Old age,
Struggling with many griefs, O, how I hate thee!"
But to return to Iphigenia,--how infinitely melting is her appeal to
Orestes, whom she holds in her robe!
"My brother, small assistance canst thou give
Thy friends; yet for thy sister with thy tears
Implore thy father that she may not die.
Even infants have a sense of ills; and see,
My father! silent though he be, he sues
To thee. Be gentle to me; on my life
Have pity. Thy two children by this beard
Entreat thee, thy dear children; one is yet
An infant, one to riper years arrived."
The mention of Orestes, then an infant, though slight, is of a
domestic charm that prepares the mind to feel the tragedy of his after
lot. When the queen says,
"Dost thou sleep,
My son? The rolling chariot hath subdued thee;
Wake to thy sister's marriage happily."
we understand the horror of the doom which makes this cherished child
a parricide. And so, when Iphigenia takes leave of him after her fate
is by herself accepted,--
"_Iphi_. To manhood train Orestes.
_Cly_. Embrace him, for thou ne'er shalt see him more.
_Iphi_.
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