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DRAMATIS PERSONE.

MINERVA.

ULYSSES.

AJAX.

CHORUS OF SALAMINIANS.

TECMESSA.

MESSENGER.

TEUCER.

MENELAUS.

AGAMEMNON.

AJAX.

MINERVA.

EVER, son of Laertes, have I observed thee hunting to seize on some attempt on thy foes, and now I see thee at the marine pavilion of Ajax, where he holds his post the blast, long since following him as thy prey, and measuring his freshly-graven foot-prints, that thou mayest discover whether he be, or be not within. Well does thy track, of scent sagacious as the Spartan

a

с

'Agnaσas. This expression is considered by Musgrave as synonymous with the υφαρπάσαι and ξυναρπάσαι of Aristophanes, Nub. V. v. 490,773. Lobeck, however, quotes Plutarch in support of his opinion, that it bears here the same meaning with the "auras captare" of the Latins.

"E'en Ajax and Achilles heard the sound,

Whose ships, remote, the guarded navy bound."

See also Eurip. Iph. Aul. 292.

POPE'S ILIAD, B. XI. v. 11.

The dogs of Sparta are noticed by Virgil for their swiftness, G iii.

brach's, lead thee forth, for the man chances just now to be within, his head and murderous hands dripping with sweat. And there is no need for thee any longer to peer within this his gate, but to declare for what. cause thou hast bestowed this anxious toil, that thou mayest learn of me that know.

ULYSSES.

d

O voice of Minerva, my best-beloved of Deities, how surely do I hear, and grasp with my mind, even though thou be unseen, thy well-known accents, like those of the brazen-throated Tuscan trump! And now thou art rightly advised, that I walk my round [a spy] on mine enemy, Ajax the shielded, since him, and none other, I all this while am tracking. For on this very night hath he worked us a wrong 'unlooked for,

405; which quality Shakespeare has remarked in his Midsummer Night's Dream, and elsewhere speaks of them in a passage perhaps yet more applicable to Ulysses:

- O Spartan dog,

More fell than hunger, anguish, or the sea!

Look on the tragic loading of this bed :

This is thy work.”

OTHELLO, Act 5, scene the last.

d This may be rendered, "that what I know, and thou wouldst learn, thou mayest."

с

Kadav, strictly speaking, is the bell or broad part of the trumpet. That called the Tuscan, (by Athenæus, xixλάoμevov,) from its many windings, produced a louder tone.

f "As in the monstrous grasp of their conception

Defy all codes to image or to name them."

DOGE OF VENICE.

if indeed 'tis he hath done this: for we know nothing certain, but are at fault; and I a volunteer have yoked me to this trouble. We found but now our captive herds all destroyed, and butchered by the hand, they, and the guardians of the flocks themselves: so each one lays the charge at Ajax' door. And to me a watchman, that espied him bounding over the plains alone, with freshly-reeking sword, is his accuser, and hath made it known; so forthwith I, hurry close on his steps, and of part I have proof, but in part I am thrown out, and cannot learn whose they are. But in season art thou come; for in all things, both past (thou knowest) and to come, am I piloted by thy hand.

MIN. I know it, Ulysses; and long since came I forth upon thy path, a zealous guardian to thee in thy hunt.

UL. And do I, dear mistress, toil to purpose? MIN. Thou dost; these deeds are his, be sure. UL. And to what inconceivable purpose hath he thus in fury set his hand?

MIN. O'ercharged with indignation about Achilles'

arms.

UL. Why then hurries he this inroad on the flocks?

• Eigyárra, in Sophocles, is always used actively. Ed. Tyr. 279. Ant. 747.

h "Orov. siσì subaud. See Antigone, v. 318. Ajax, 103.

i This use of the verb aloow is objected to by Rhunkenius, who has altered it in two places of Euripides, where it occurs in an active sense. Lobeck, however, defends it from a similar idiom in the words πάλλειν, δινεῖν, θοάζειν, δε.

MIN. Fancying that in you he stains his hand with murder.

UL. What was this plot of his devised as against the Argives?

MIN. Aye, and he had accomplished it, had I been careless.

UL. With what circumstance of daring, and rashness of soul?

MIN. At night, alone, he traiterously sallies forth against you.

UL. How! was he close upon us, and reached he the goal?

MIN. Yes truly, he was at the gates of the two generals.

UL. And how checked he his hand, ravenous of murder?

MIN. I bar him of his cure-less joy, having cast before his eyes intolerable fancies, and turn him aside on the flocks, and mingled multitude of prey, the herdsmen's yet unparted care. There, falling on, he began to mow down the horned host in slaughter, hacking and hewing all around him, and deemed at one time he held and slew with his own hand the two Atridæ, and then, one here, another there, of the chieftains, assaulting them: while I was urging on, and entrammeling in evil snares, the man, phrenzied with mad distemperature. And afterwards again,

*"Trápa sunt hoc loco ludibria oculorum, specie terribilia, ad deflectendum ab proposito itinere Ajacem." Lobeck. Who also, on the authority of Suidas, objects to Musgrave's proposed reading, γλήμας.

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