Hecuba
A noble speech, my daughter! but there is sorrow linked with its noble sentiments. Odysseus, if you must please the son of Peleus, and avoid reproach,
do not slay this maid, but lead me to Achilles’ pyre and torture me unsparingly; it was I that bore
Paris
, whose fatal shaft laid low the son of Thetis.
385
Odysseus
It is not your death, my lady, that Achilles’ ghost
has demanded of the Achaeans, but hers.
390
Hecuba
At least then slaughter me with my child; so shall there be a double drink of blood for the earth and the dead that claims this sacrifice.
Odysseus
The maiden’s death suffices; no need to add
a second to the first; would we did not need even this!
395
Hecuba
Die with my daughter I must and will.
Odysseus
How so? I did not know I had a master.
Hecuba
I will cling to her like ivy to an oak.
Odysseus
Not if you will listen to those who are wiser than you.
Hecuba
Be sure I will never willingly relinquish my child.
400
Odysseus
Well, be equally sure I will never go away and leave her here.
Hecuba. Euripides. Edward P. Coleridge (Translator). London. 1891.
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