Part 10 (1/2)

O brave endurance of a soul resolved!

Ca.s.sANDRA

That were ill praise, for those of happier doom.

CHORUS

All fame is happy, even famous death.

Ca.s.sANDRA

Ah sire, ah brethren, famous once were ye!

[_She moves to enter the house, then starts back._

CHORUS

What fear is this that scares thee from the house?

Ca.s.sANDRA

Pah!

CHORUS

What is this cry? some dark despair of soul?

Ca.s.sANDRA

Pah! the house fumes with stench and spilth of blood.

CHORUS

How? 'tis the smell of household offerings.

Ca.s.sANDRA

'Tis rank as charnel-scent from open graves.

CHORUS

Thou canst not mean this scented Syrian nard?

Ca.s.sANDRA

Nay, let me pa.s.s within to cry aloud The monarch's fate and mine--enough of life.

Ah friends!

Bear to me witness, since I fall in death, That not as birds that shun the bush and scream I moan in idle terror. This attest When for my death's revenge another dies, A woman for a woman, and a man Falls, for a man ill-wedded to his curse.