DIONYSUS And set a quiet carriage to thy rage.
PENTHEUS How comest thou here? How didst thou break thy cage? Speak!
DIONYSUS Said I not, or didst thou mark not me, There was One living that should set me free?
PENTHEUS Who? Ever wilder are these tales of thine.
DIONYSUS He who first made for man the clustered vine.
DIONYSUS For Dionyse 'Tis well; for in thy scorn his glory lies.
PENTHEUS (_to his guard_) Go swift to all the towers, and bar withal Each gate!
DIONYSUS What, cannot God o'erleap a wall?
PENTHEUS Oh, wit thou hast, save where thou needest it!
DIONYSUS Whereso it most imports, there is my wit!-- Nay, peace! Abide till he who hasteth from The mountain side with news for thee, be come. We will not fly, but wait on thy command. [_Enter suddenly and in haste a Messenger from the Mountain._]
MESSENGER Great Pentheus, Lord of all this Theban land, I come from high Kithaeron, where the frore Snow spangles gleam and cease not evermore....
PENTHEUS And what of import may thy coming bring?
MESSENGER I have seen the Wild White Women there, O King, Whose fleet limbs darted arrow-like but now From Thebes away, and come to tell thee how They work strange deeds and passing marvel. Yet I first would learn thy pleasure. Shall I set My whole tale forth, or veil the stranger part? Yea Lord, I fear the swiftness of thy heart, Thine edgèd wrath and more than royal soul.
PENTHEUS Thy tale shall nothing scathe thee.--Tell the whole. It skills not to be wroth with honesty. Nay, if thy news of them be dark, 'tis he Shall pay it, who bewitched and led them on.