The Supernatural in the Tragedies of Euripides 41 



Thy coming as a dream-shape would suffice 



To daunt the cravens who would slay thy sons ! " 



Then Hercules is suddenly seen, and though he has in fact re- 

 turned bodily from the nether world, he is at first taken for a 

 spectre who has come at the bidding of Megara ; but soon she be- 

 comes aware that it is no " dream," but Hercules himself : 



" 'Tis he who lay, we heard, beneath the earth. 

 Except in broad day we behold a dream ! 

 What say I? — see they dreams, these yearning eyes? 

 This is none other, ancient, than thy son. 

 Boys, hither ! — hang upon your father's cloak. 

 Speed ye, unhand him not; for this is he, 

 Your helper he, no worse than Saviour Zeus." 



(vv. 516-22.) 



Megara in invoking Hercules in Hades expresses her belief in 

 an invisible world, with which mortals have commerce. 



10. The Iphigenia in Tauris 



Iphigenia who had been doomed to die at Aulis for the Greeks 

 had been snatched from that death by Artemis and had become 

 priestess of the Goddess at the Tauris shrine where human vic- 

 tims were immolated. On landing among the Tauri two strangers 

 were captured by the inhabitants and sentenced to die at the altar 

 according to custom. Iphigenia discovers in them her brother 

 Orestes and his friend Pylades. They plan not only escape for 

 all, but also means of conveying away the statue of the Goddess, 

 which was the special end of their mission. They are recaptured 

 and finally delivered by Athena who commands Thoas, king of 

 the land, to permit their departure. 



A god-fearing herdman in Taurica who first notices the two 

 fugitives, Orestes and Pylades, takes them for Gods, or for the 

 two Dioscuri, or two of the Neried nymphs, and prays to them : 



I. T. 270-74 : 



5i TCOTvias irai KevKo^kas, vewv 4>v\a^, 

 bkcnrora TlaXalixov, e\ecos riixlv yevov, 

 etr oiiv evr aKjals t^aaaerov AioaKopoo, 

 rj N7jp€cos aydXfj,ai9^', 6s tov evyevfj 

 eTLKTe 7revTr]K0i>Ta Nrjp'JjSwt' xopov. 



95 



