How then the Maenads set upon him and tore him to pieces, his own mother leading them on: in triumph dance they are bringing his head to the city. Adore the gods, is the moral. { 1164}
A short outburst of triumph from the Chorus: then the { 1180}
begins with the approach of the Maenads, Agave bearing her son's head on a thyrsus. In a brief _lyric concerto_ between her and the mocking Chorus her phrensied triumph is brought out, and how she takes the bleeding object to be head of a young lion. At that moment the trumpet sounds, and the army that had been summoned appears at the Electran gate. Agave turns to them, and (in blank verse) calls all Thebans to behold the quarry she has taken without the useless weapons of the hunter; it shall be nailed up a trophy before her father's house. _Shortly after enters on the right a melancholy procession of Cadmus and his servants bearing the fragments of Pentheus' body, with difficulty discovered and pieced together_. In extended parallel dialogue between Cadmus and Evadne the phrensy gradually passes away from her and she recognizes the deed she has done. Cadmus sums up the final situation: all the house enwrapped in one dread doom. The Chorus sympathize with Cadmus, but have no pity for Agave. She then follows with a rhesis of woe, interrupted by { 1365}
Dionysus appears aloft, in divine form. The MSS. are defective here: from what we have the god appears to be painting the future of Cadmus: life in a dragon form, victories at the head of barbarian hosts, finally the Isles of the Blest. Agave as stained with blood is banished the land, vainly imploring the god's mercy. With lamentations at the thought of exile, which is the lot of both, the play ends.
[1] The quotations are from Milman's translation in Routledge's Universal Library.
_Prometheus._ List rather to the deeds I did for mortals: how, being fools before I made them wise and true in aim of soul, And let me tell you--not as taunting men, But teaching you the intention of my gifts-- How, first beholding, they beheld in vain, And hearing, heard not, but like shapes in dreams Mixed all things wildly down the tedious time; Nor knew to build a house against the sun With wicketed sides, nor any woodcraft knew, But lived, like silly ants, beneath the ground, In hollow caves unsunned. There came to them No steadfast sign of winter nor of spring, Flower perfumed, nor summer full of fruit; But blindly and lawlessly they did all things, Until I taught them how the stars do rise And set in mystery, and devised for them Number, the inducer of philosophies, The synthesis of letters, and, beside, The artificer of all things, Memory, That sweet Muse-Mother. I was first to yoke The servile beasts in couples, carrying An heirdom of man's burdens on their backs. I joined to chariots steeds that love the bit They clamp at--the chief pomp of golden ease. And none but I originated ships, The seaman's chariots wandering on the brine, With linen wings. And I--oh miserable!-- Who did devise for mortals all these arts, Have no device left now to save myself From the woe I suffer.