Performance Of The Agamemnon Of Aeschylus At Balliol College, Oxford.

almost ludicrous incongruity ; as also was the too audible striking of a Inciter match behind the scenes during the Watchman ' s opening speech , just before he sees the beacon fires ; and the fact ( to those who kneiY it ) that a prompter was concealed within the "thymele . " But with these trifling exceptions , the fears that ludicrous rather than jiathetic emotions might be stirred ivere triumphantly refuted ; and it is not too much to say that the performance gave a far

better impression of the grandeur of one of the greatest of dramas than was generally either hoped for or expected . It is an additional tribute ( if such were needed ) to the dramatic force of yEsch yhis ' -conception that the full tragic pathos of tbe story could be realised so keenly , as it evidently was , by persons unacquainted with the language in which it is written . The main outlines of the play are probably more or less familiar to most of

those who haA'e cared to follow us thus far ; but a short account of some events alluded to in the Agamemnon , and anterior to the action described in it , Avill explain some of the motives of that action . We quote from a paper circulated among tbe audience , and drawn up ( we understand ) by Mr . A . Bradley , Eelloiv of Balliol : —

Atreus , King of Argos , expelled from the city his brother and rival Thyestes , together Avith Thyestes' son iEgisthus . Thyestes , returning as a suppliant , ivas received by Atreus , who prepared for him a banquet , at which the flesh of his own children ivas served to him . Thyestes , discovering Avhat he had unwittingly done , invoked a curse upon the ivhole house of Atreus . Agamemnon , son of Atreus , succeeded him as king , and married Clytemnestra . There iveveborn to them a son , Orestes , and a daughter , Iphegeneia . Helen , the Avife of Menelaus , brother to Agamemnon , fled with Paris the Trojan to Troy ;

and Agamemnon was chosen chief of the Greek host which sailed against Troy . The fleet ivas becalmed at Aulis through the anger of Artemis ; and Agamemnon , at the instance of Calchas , the soothsayer , sacrificed his daughter Iphegeneia to appease the goddess . Through this act , which the Chorus ascribes to an impious frenzy , Agamemnon deepened the curse already resting on his house , and roused the hatred of Clytemnestra . The Trojan Avar lasted ten years ; and , during the absence of Agamemnon , iEgesthus , who had returned to Argos , won the love of Clytemnestra . Agamemnon is , of course , ignorant of it .

The play opens at the date of the fall of Troy . The scene is the front of the palace at Argos . Agamemnon had promised that the taking of Troy should be made known to Clytemnestra by the lighting of a succession of beacon-fires , the last of ivhich Avill be . visible to a watchman on the roof of the palace .

The scene , painted by two undergraduates with the advice and assistance of Professor W . B . Richmond , ivas a simple bnt very effective representation of a Greek front , with a central and two side entrances concealed by curtains . Immediately in front of this was the raised portion of tbe stage , on which tbe principal actors stood ; while below this again , but above the floor of the ball , ivas a wider space , representing the " orchestra , " with the "thymele " in the centreappropriately adorned Avith a figure of Dionysus seated on a tiger . This

, space was occupied throughout by the Chorus . On tbe pediment of the palace , above tbe main entrance , ivas the figure of Apollo in bis chariot , which afterwards attracts the attention of Cassandra . This figure was the work of Professor Richmond .

At about a quarter-past eight the buzz of conversation among the expectant audience ivas stilled by the sudden appearance of the Watchman passing across the stage , and then ascending the roof to watch for the beacon fire . A sudden gloAY reveals it , and with a shout he descends to tell Cly temnestra , passing off the stage with a mysterious allusion to evils in the bouse . Then from the tAvo side-doors the chorus of Argive Elders enters and range themselves in two bands on either side of the thymele , chanting to a monotonous cadence the opening twenty lines of tbe first choral ode . The remainder of tbe long ode ( vv . 60—263 ) was distributed among individual members of the Chorus , of whom Ave may say once for all that their careful knowledge of their