Around my knees
My children hang, and weep their mother lost:
The household servants for their mistress sigh.
This is the scene of misery in my home:
Abroad the nuptials of Thessalia's youth
And the bright circles of assembled dames
Will but augment my grief: how shall I bear
To see the lov'd companions of my wife!
And if one hates me, he will say: Behold {1010}
The man who basely lives, who dared not die,
But giving, through the meanness of his soul,
His wife, avoided death--yet would be deem'd
A man: he hates his parents, yet himself
Had not the spirit to die. These ill reports
Cleave to me: why then wish for longer life,
On evil tongues thus fallen, and evil days!
_Admetus sinks down on the threshold and buries his face in his robe.
The Chorus gather up the feeling of the situation in a full Choral Ode,
celebrating the natural topics of consolation; the stern laws of
Necessity, the fair memory of the dead.
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