"
Macaria has the clear Minerva eye; Antigone's is deeper and more
capable of emotion, but calm; Iphigenia's glistening, gleaming with
angel truth, or dewy as a hidden violet.
I am sorry that Tennyson, who spoke with such fitness of all the
others in his "Dream of fair Women," has not of Iphigenia. Of her
alone he has not made a fit picture, but only of the circumstances of
the sacrifice. He can never have taken to heart this work of
Euripides, yet he was so worthy to feel it. Of Jephtha's daughter he
has spoken as he would of Iphigenia, both in her beautiful song, and
when
"I heard Him, for He spake, and grief became
A solemn scorn of Ills.
It comforts me in this one thought to dwell--
That I subdued me to my father's will;
Because the kiss he gave me, ere I fell,
Sweetens the spirit still.
Moreover it is written, that my race
Hewed Ammon, hip and thigh, from Arroer
Or Arnon unto Minneth. Here her face
Glowed as I looked on her.
She looked her lips; she left me where I stood;
'Glory to God,' she sang, and past afar,
Thridding the sombre boskage of the woods,
Toward the morning-star."
In the "Trojan dames" there are fine touches of nature with regard to
Cassandra.
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