SWELLFOOT. Laoctonos is fishing for a compliment, But 'tis his due. Yes, you have drunk more wine, And shed more blood, than any man in Thebes. (TO PURGANAX.) For God's sake stop the grunting of those pigs! PURGANAX. We dare not, sire! 'tis Famine's privilege. CHORUS OF SWINE. Hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine! Thy throne is on blood, and thy robe is of rags; Thou devil which livest on damning ; Saint of new churches, and cant, and GREEN BAGS; Till in pity and terror thou risest, Confounding the schemes of the wisest. When thou liftest thy skeleton form, When the loaves and the skulls roll about, We will greet thee-the voice of a storm Then hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine! MAMMON. I hear a crackling of the giant bones Of the dread image, and in the black pits Which once were eyes, I see two livid flames : Mighty events are hastening to their doom! SWELLFOOT. I only hear the lean and mutinous swine DAKRY. In a crisis Of such exceeding delicacy, I think Is here. MAMMON. The BAG PURGANAX, I have rehearsed the entire scene With an ox-bladder and some ditch-water, On Lady P.-it cannot fail. [Taking up the bag. Your majesty (to SWELLFOOT) In such a filthy business had better Stand on one side, lest it should sprinkle you. Nay, it might hide the blood, which the sad genius IONA TAURINA. My lord, I am ready-nay I am impatient, [A graceful figure in a semi-transparent veil passes unnoticed veil, as if it were written in fire upon its forehead. Its words are almost drowned in the furious grunting of the Pigs, and the business of the trial. She kneels on the steps of the Altar, and speaks in tones at first faint and low, but which ever become louder and louder. Mighty Empress! Death's white wife! Ghastly mother-in-law of life! By the God who made thee such, By the magic of thy touch, By the starving and the cramming, Of fasts and feasts !-by thy dread self, O Famine ! But for those radiant spirits, who are still Be they th' appointed stewards, to fill [Whilst the veiled Figure has been chaunting this strophe, MAMMON, DAKRY, LAOCTONOS, and SWELLFOOT, have surrounded IONA TAURINA, who, with her hands folded on her breast, and her eyes lifted to Heaven, stands, as with saint-like resignation, to wait the issue of the business, in perfect confidence of her innocence. PURGANAX, after unsealing the GREEN BAG, is gravely about to pour the liquor upon her head, when suddenly the whole expression of her figure and countenance changes; she snatches it from his hand with a loud laugh of triumph, and empties it over SWELLFOOT and his whole Court, who are instantly changed into a number of filthy and ugly animals, and rush out of the Temple. The image of FAMINE then arises with a tremendous sound, the Pigs begin scrambling for the loaves, and are tripped up by the sculls; all those who eat the loaves are turned into Bulls, and arrange themselves quietly behind the altar. The image of FAMINE sinks through a chasm in the earth, and a MINOTAUR rises. MINOTAUR. I am the Ionian Minotaur, the mightiest I am the old traditional man bull; And from my ancestors having been Ionian, Even the palings of the royal park, Or double ditch about the new inclosures; IONA TAURINA. [During this speech she has been putting on boots and spurs, Hoa hoa! tallyho! tallyho! ho! ho! These hares, these wolves, these anything but men. Now let your noses be as keen as beagles', 212 EDIPUS TYRANNUS; OR, SWELLFOOT THE TYRANT. But such as they gave you. Tallyho! ho! Through forest, furze, and bog, and den, and desert, FULL CHORUS OF IONA AND THE SWINE. Tallyho! tallyho! Through rain, hail, and snow, Tallyho tallyho! Through pond, ditch, and slough, Like the Devil behind them, Tallyho tallyho! [Exeunt, in full cry; IONA driving on the SWINE, with the empty GREEN BAG. |