of the same sire born,Our own Hesione,
Persuading her with gifts
As wife to share thy couch.
Io. What land is this? What people? Whom shall I
Say that I see thus vexed
With bit and curb of rock?
For what offence dost thou
Bear fatal punishment?
Tell me to what far land
I've wandered here in woe.
Ah me! ah me!
Again the gadfly stings me miserable.
Spectre of Argos, thou, the earth-born one —
Ah, keep him off, O Earth!
I fear to look upon that herdsman dread,
Him with ten thousand eyes:
Ah lo! he cometh with his crafty look,
Whom Earth refuses even dead to hold;172
But coming from beneath
He hunts me miserable,
And drives me famished o'er the sea-beach sand.
And still his waxened reed-pipe soundeth clear
A soft and slumberous strain;
O heavens! O ye Gods!
Whither do these long wanderings lead me on?
For what offence, O son of Cronos, what,
Hast thou thus bound me fast
In these great miseries?
Ah me! ah me!
And why with terror of the gadfly's sting
Dost thou thus vex me, frenzied in my soul?
Burn me with fire, or bury me in earth,
Or to wild sea-beasts give me as a prey:
Nay, grudge me not, O King,
An answer to my prayers:
Enough my many-wandered wanderings
Have exercised my soul,
Nor have I power to learn
How to avert the woe.
(To Prometheus.) Hear'st thou the voice of maiden crowned with horns?
Prom. Surely I heard the maid by gadfly driven,
Daughter of Inachos, who warmed the heart
Of Zeus with love, and now through Hera's hate
Is tried, perforce, with wanderings over-long?
Io. How is it that thou speak'st my father's name?
Tell me, the suffering one,
Who art thou, who, poor wretch,
Who thus so truly nam'st me miserable,
And tell'st the plague from Heaven,
Which with its haunting stings
Wears me to death? Ah woe!
And I with famished and unseemly bounds
Rush madly, driven by Hera's jealous craft.
Ah, who of all that suffer, born to woe,
Have trouble like the pain that I endure?
But thou, make clear to me,
What yet for me remains,
What remedy, what healing for my pangs.
Show me, if thou dost know:
Speak out and tell to me,
The maid by wanderings vexed.
Prom. I will say plainly all thou seek'st to know;
Not in dark tangled riddles, but plain speech,
As it is meet that friends to friends should speak;
Thou see'st Prometheus who gave fire to men.
Io. O thou to men as benefactor known,
Why, poor Prometheus, sufferest thou this pain?
Prom. I have but now mine own woes ceased to wail.
Io. Wilt thou not then bestow this boon on me?
Prom. Say what thou seek'st, for I will tell thee all.
Io. Tell me, who fettered thee in this ravine?
Prom. The counsel was of Zeus, the hand Hephæstos'.
Io. Of what offence dost thou the forfeit pay?
Prom. Thus much alone am I content to tell.
Io. Tell me, at least, besides, what end shall come
To my drear wanderings; when the time shall be.
Prom. Not to know this is better than to know.
Io. Nay, hide not from me what I have to bear.
Prom. It is not that I grudge the boon to thee.
Io. Why then delayest thou to tell the whole?
Prom. Not from ill will, but loth to vex thy soul.
Io. Nay, care thou not beyond what pleases me.
Prom. If thou desire it I must speak. Hear then.
Chor. Not yet though; grant me share of pleasure too.
Let us first ask the tale of her great woe,
While she unfolds her life's consuming chances;
Her future sufferings let her learn from thee.
Prom. 'Tis thy work, Io, to grant these their wish,
On other grounds and as thy father's kin:173
For to bewail and moan one's evil chance,
Here where one trusts to gain a pitying tear
From those who hear, – this is not labour lost.
Io. I know not how to disobey your wish;
So ye shall learn the whole that ye desire
In speech full clear. And yet I blush to tell
The storm that came from God, and brought the loss
Of maiden face, what way it seized on me.
For nightly visions coming evermore
Into my virgin bower, sought to woo me
With glozing words. “O virgin greatly blest,
Why art thou still a virgin when thou might'st
Attain to highest wedlock? For with dart
Of passion for thee Zeus doth glow, and fain
Would make thee his. And thou, O child, spurn not
The bed of Zeus, but go to Lerna's field,
Where feed thy father's flocks and herds,
That so the eye of Zeus may find repose
From this his craving.” With such visions I
Was haunted every evening, till I dared
To
So Io was represented, we are told, by Greek sculptors (Herod. ii. 41), as Isis was by those of Egypt. The points of contact between the myth of Io and that of Prometheus, as adopted, or perhaps developed, by Æschylos are – (1) that from her the destined deliverer of the chained Titan is to come; (2) that both were suffering from the cruelty of Zeus; (3) that the wanderings of Io gave scope for the wild tales of far countries on which the imagination of the Athenians fed greedily. But, as the
Argos had been slain by Hermes, and his eyes transferred by Hera to the tail of the peacock, and that bird was henceforth sacred to her.
Inachos the father of Io (identified with the Argive river of the same name), was, like all rivers, a son of Okeanos, and therefore brother to the nymphs who had come to see Prometheus.
