The name may be in many a place at once, though not the body.
MENELAUS
Unhand me! the sorrows I brought with me suffice.
HELEN
What! wilt leave me, and take that phantom bride away?
MENELAUS
For thy likeness unto Helen, fare thee well.
HELEN
Ruined! in thee I found my lord only to lose thee.
MENELAUS
The greatness of my troubles at Troy convinces me; thou dost not.
HELEN
Ah, woe is me! who was ever more unfortunate than I? Those whom I love best are leaving me, nor shall I ever reach Hellas, my own dear native land.
(The FIRST MESSENGER enters in haste.)
MESSENGER
At last I find thee, Menelaus, after an anxious search, not till Ihave evandered through the length and breadth of this foreign strand; I am sent by thy comrades, whom thou didst leave behind.
MENELAUS
What news? surely you are not being spoiled by the barbarians?
MESSENGER
A miracle hath happened; my words are too weak for the reality.
MENELAUS
Speak; for judging by this haste, thou hast stirring news.
MESSENGER
My message is: thy countless toils have all been toiled in vain.
MENELAUS
That is an old tale of woe to mourn! come, thy news?
MESSENGER
Thy wife hath disappeared, soaring away into the embracing air; in heaven she now is hidden, and as she left the hollowed cave where we were guarding her, she hailed us thus, "Ye hapless Phrygians, and all Achaea's race! for me upon Scamander's strand by Hera's arts ye died from day to day, in the false belief that Helen was in the hands of Paris. But I, since I have stayed my appointed time, and kept the laws of fate, will now depart unto the sky that gave me birth; but the unhappy daughter of Tyndareus, through no fault of hers, hath borne an evil name without reason." (Catching Sight of HELEN) Daughter of Leda, hail to thee, so thou art here after all! I was just announcing thy departure to the hidden starry realms, little knowing that thou couldst fly at will. I will not a second time let thee flout us thus, for thou didst cause tiki lord and his comrades trouble all for naught in Ilium.
MENELAUS
This is even what she said; her words are proved true; Olonged-for day, how hath it restored thee to my arms!
HELEN
O Menelaus, dearest husband, the time of sorrow has been long, but joy is now ours at last. Ah, friends, what joy for me to hold my husband in a fond embrace after many a weary cycle of yon blazing lamp of day!
MENELAUS
What joy for me to hold my wife! but with all that I would ask about these years, I now know not where I may first begin.
HELEN
O rapture! the very hair upon my head starts up for joy! my tears run down! Around thy neck I fling my arms, dear husband, to hug my joy to me.
MENELAUS
O happy, happy sight! I have no fault to find; my wife, he daughter of Zeus and Leda, is mine again, she whom her brothers on their snow-white steeds, whilst torches blazed, made my happy bride, but gods removed her from my home. Now is the deity guiding us to a new destiny, happier than of yore.
HELEN
Evil into good transformed hath brought us twain together at last, dear husband; but late though it be, God grant me joy of my good luck!
MENELAUS
God grant thee joy! I join thee in the self-same prayer; for of us twain one cannot suffer without the other.
HELEN
No more, my friends, I mourn the past; no longer now I grieve.
My own dear husband is restored to me, whose coming from Troy I have waited many a long year.
MENELAUS
I to thee, and thou to me. And after these long, long years I have at last discovered the fraud of the goddess. But these tears, in gladness shed, are tears of thankfulness rather than of sorrow.
HELEN
What can I say? What mortal heart could e'er have had such hope?
To my bosom I press thee, little as I ever thought to.
MENELAUS
And I to mine press thee, who all men thought hadst gone to Ida's town and the hapless towers of Ilium.
HELEN
Ah me! ah me! that is a bitter subject to begin on.
MENELAUS
Tell me, I adjure thee, how wert thou from my home conveyed?
HELEN
Alas! alas! 'tis a bitter tale thou askest to hear.
MENELAUS
Speak, for I must hear it; all that comes is Heaven's gift.
HELEN
I loathe the story I am now to tell.
MENELAUS
Tell it for all that. 'Tis sweet to hear of trouble past.
HELEN
I ne'er set forth to be the young barbarian's bride, with oars and wings of lawless love to speed me on my way.
MENELAUS
What deity or fate tore thee from thy country, then?
HELEN
Ah, my lord! 'twas Hermes, the son of Zeus, that brought and placed me by the banks of Nile.
MENELAUS
A miracle! Who sent thee thither? O monstrous story!
HELEN
I wept, and still my eyes are wet with tears. 'Twas the wife of Zeus that ruined me.
MENELAUS
Hera? wherefore should she afflict us twain?
HELEN
Woe is me for my awful fate! Woe for those founts and baths where the goddesses made brighter still that beauty, which evoked the fatal verdict!
MENELAUS
Why did Hera visit thee with evil regarding this verdict?
HELEN
To wrest the promise of Cypris-
MENELAUS
How now? Say on.
HELEN
From Paris, to whom that goddess pledged me.
MENELAUS
Woe for thee!
HELEN
And so she brought me hither to Egypt to my sorrow.
MENELAUS
Then she gave him a phantom in thy stead, as thou tellest me?
HELEN
And then began those woes of thine, ah, mother! woe is me!
MENELAUS
What meanest thou?
HELEN
My mother is no more; my shameful marriage made her fix the noose about her neck.
MENELAUS
Ah me! is our daughter Hermione yet alive?
HELEN
Still unwed, childless still, she mourns my fatal marriage.
MENELAUS
O Paris, who didst utterly o'erthrow my home, here was thy ruin too and theirs, those countless mail-clad Danai.
HELEN
From my country, city, and from thee heaven cast me forth unhappy and accursed, because I left,-and yet not I,-home and husband for union of foul shame.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
If haply ye find happiness in the future, it will suffice when to the past ye look.
MESSENGER
Menelaus, grant me too a portion of that joy which, though mine own eyes see, I scarcely comprehend.
MENELAUS
Come then, old friend, and share with us our talk.
MESSENGER
Was it not then in her power to decide all the trouble in Troy?
MENELAUS