TWO MESSENGERS.
A CHORUS OF INSPIRED DAMSELS, _following Dionysus from the East_.

_"The play was first produced after the death of Euripides by his son who
bore the same name, together with the Iphigenia in Aulis and the Alcmaeon,
probably in the year 405 B.C."_

_The background represents the front of the Castle of_ PENTHEUS, _King of
Thebes. At one side is visible the sacred Tomb of Semele, a little
enclosure overgrown with wild vines, with a cleft in the rocky floor of it
from which there issues at times steam or smoke. The God_ DIONYSUS _is
discovered alone.

DIONYSUS
Behold, God's Son is come unto this land
Of heaven's hot splendour lit to life, when she
Of Thebes, even I, Dionysus, whom the brand
Who bore me, Cadmus' daughter Semele,
Died here. So, changed in shape from God to man,
I walk again by Dirce's streams and scan
Ismenus' shore. There by the castle side
I see her place, the Tomb of the Lightning's Bride,
The wreck of smouldering chambers, and the great
Faint wreaths of fire undying--as the hate
Dies not, that Hera held for Semele.
Aye, Cadmus hath done well; in purity
He keeps this place apart, inviolate,
His daughter's sanctuary; and I have set
My green and clustered vines to robe it round
Far now behind me lies the golden ground