Choose Reform or Civil War,

When through thy streets, instead of hare with dogs,
A Consort-Queen shall hunt a King with Hogs,
Riding upon the Ionian Minotaur.

ADVERTISEMENT.

THIS tragedy is one of a triad, or system of three plays (an arrangement according to which the Greeks were accustomed to connect their dramatic repre. sentations) elucidating the wonderful and appalling fortunes of the Swellfoot dynasty. It was evidently written by some learned Theban; and, from its characteristic dullness, apparently before the duties on the importation of Attic salt had been repealed by the Boeotarchs. The tenderness with which he treats the Pigs proves him to have been a sus Baotia, possibly Epicuri de grege por tus; for, as the poet observes,

"A fellow feeling makes us wondrous kind."

No liberty has been taken with the translation of this remarkable piece of antiquity, except the suppressing a seditious and blasphemous chorus of the Pigs and Bulls at the last act. The word Hoydipouse (or more properly Edipus has been rendered literally Swellfoot, without its having been conceived necessary to determine whether a swelling of the hind or the fore feet of the Swinish Monarch is particularly indicated.

Should the remaining portions of this tragedy be found, entitled Swellfoot in Angaria and Charité, the translator might be tempted to give them to the reading public.

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

TYRANT SWELLFOOT, King of Thebes.
IONA TAURINA, his Queen.

MAMMON, Arch-Priest of Famine.

PYRGANAX,

DAKRY,

LAOCTONOS,

The GADFLY.

The LEECH.
The RAT.

The MINOTAUR.

MOSES, the Sow-geiuri
SOLOMON, the Portman.
ZEPHANIAH, Pig-butcher.

CHORUS of the Swinish Multitude.
Guards, Attendants, Priests, &c., &c

SCENE-Thebes.

ACT I.

SCENE I.-A magnificent Temple, built of thigh-bones and death'sheads, and tiled with scalps. Over the altar the statue of Famine, veiled; a number of Boars, Sows, and Sucking Pigs, crowned with thistle, shamrock, and oak, sitting on the steps, and clinging round the altar of the Temple.

Enter SWELLFOOT, in his royal robes, without perceiving the Pigs. Swellfoot. THOU supreme Goddess, by whose power divine These graceful limbs are clothed in proud array

[He contemplates himself with satisfaction.
Of gold and purple, and this kingly paunch
Swells like a sail before a favouring breeze,
And these most sacred nether promontories
Lie satisfied with layers of fat, and these
Boeotian cheeks, like Egypt's pyramid,
(Nor with less toil were their foundations laid)
Sustain the cone of my untroubled brain,
That point, the emblem of a pointless nothing!
Thou to whom Kings and laurelled Emperors,
Radical-butchers, Paper-money-millers,
Bishops and Deacons, and the entire army
Of those fat martyrs to the persecution
Of stifling turtle-soup and brandy-devils,
Offer their secret vows! thou plenteous Ceres
Of their Eleusis, hail!

The Swine. Eigh! eigh! eigh! eigh!
Swellfoot.
Ha! what are ye,

Who, crowned with leaves devoted to the Furies,

Cling round this sacred shrine?

Swine. Aigh! aigh! aigh!

Swellfoot.

What! ye that are

The very beasts that, offered at her altar

With blood and groans, salt-cake and fat and inwards,

Ever propitiate her reluctant will

When taxes are withheld?

Swine. Ugh! ugh! ugh!

Swellfoot.

What! ye

who grub

With filthy snouts my red potatoes up

In Allen's rushy Bog? who eat the oats
Up, from my cavalry in the Hebrides?
Who swill the hog-wash soup my cooks digest
From bones, and rags, and scraps of shoe-leather,
Which should be given to cleaner Pigs than you?

THE SWINE-SEMICHORUS I.
The same, alas! the same;
Though only now the name
Of Pig remains to me.

SEMICHORUS II.

If 'twere your kingly will

Us wretched Swine to kill,

What should we yield to thee?

Swellfoot. Why, skin and bones, and some few hairs for mortar.

CHORUS OF SWINE.

I have heard your Laureate sing
That pity was a royal thing.

Under your mighty ancestors, we Pigs

Were blessed as nightingales on myrtle sprigs,
Or grasshoppers that live on noonday dew,
And sung, old annals tell, as sweetly too.

But now our sties are fallen in, we catch

The murrain and the mange, the scab and itch;
Sometimes your royal dogs tear down our thatch,
And then we seek the shelter of a ditch;
Hog-wash, or grains, or ruta-baga, none
Has yet been ours since your reign begun.

FIRST SOW.

My Pigs, 'tis in vain to tug!

SECOND SOw.

I could almost eat my litter!

FIRST PIG.

I suck, but no milk will come from the dug.

SECOND PIG.

Our skin and our bones would be bitter.

THE BOARS.

We fight for this rag of greasy rug,

Though a trough of wash would be fitter.

SEMICHORUS.

Happier Swine were they than we,

Drowned in the Gadarean sea !—

I wish that Pity would drive out the devils
Which in your royal bosom hold their revels,
And sink us in the waves of your compassion.
Alas! the Pigs are an unhappy nation!
Now, if your Majesty would have our bristles

To bind your mortar with, or fill our colons
With rich blood, or make brawn out of our gristles,
In policy-ask else your royal Solons-
You ought to give us hog-wash and clean straw,

And sties well thatched; besides, it is the law!
Swellfoot. This is sedition and rank blasphemy!
Ho! there, my guards!

Guard.

Enter a GUARD.

Your sacred Majesty?

Swellfoot. Call in the Jews, Solomon the court porkman, Moses the sow-gelder, and Zephaniah the hog-butcher. Guard. They are in waiting, sire.

Enter SOLOMON, MOSES, and ZEPHANIAH.

Swellfoot. Out with your knife, old Moses, and spay those Sows

[The Pigs run about in consternation.

That load the earth with Pigs; cut close and deep.
Moral restraint I see has no effect,

Nor prostitution, nor our own example,
Starvation, typhus-fever, war, nor prison.

This was the art which the Arch-priest of Famine
Hinted at in his charge to the Theban clergy.

Cut close and deep, good Moses.

Moses.

Keep the Boars quiet, else-
Swellfoot.

Let your Majesty

Zephaniah, cut

That fat Hog's throat; the brute seems overfed.
Seditious hunks ! to whine for want of grains!
Zephaniah. Your sacred Majesty, he has the dropsy ;
We shall find pints of hydatids in's liver.

He has not half an inch of wholesome fat

Upon his carious ribs.

Swellfoot.

'Tis all the same ;

He'll serve instead of riot-money when

Our murmuring troops bivouaque in Thebes streets;

And January winds, after a day

Of butchering, will make them relish carrion,

Now, Solomon, I'll sell you in a lump

The whole kit of them.

Solomon.

I could not give-
Swellfoot.

Why, your Majesty,

Kill them out of the way;

That shall be price enough. And let me hear

Their everlasting grunts and whines no more!

[Exeunt, driving in the Swine.

Enter MAMMON, the Arch-Priest; and PYRGANAX, Chief of the Council of Wizards.

Pyrganax. The future looks as black as death; a cloud,
Dark as the frown of Hell, hangs over it.

The troops grow mutinous-the revenue fails-
There's something rotten in us-for the level
Of the state slopes, its very bases topple ;
The boldest turn their backs upon themselves!

Mammon. Why, what's the matter, my dear fellow, now? Do the troops mutiny?-decimate some regiments;

Does money fail ?—come to my mint-coin paper,

Till gold be at a discount, and, ashamed

To show his bilious face, go purge himself,

In emulation of her vestal whiteness.

Pyrganax. Oh would that this were all! The oracle Mammon. Why, it was I who spoke that oracle; And whether I was dead-drunk or inspired

I cannot well remember-nor, in truth,

The oracle itself.

Pyrganax.

The words went thus:

"Boeotia, choose reform or civil war,

When through the streets, instead of hare with dogs, A Consort-Queen shall hunt a King with Hogs, Riding upon the Ionian Minotaur."

Mammon. Now, if the oracle had ne'er foretold
This sad alternative, it must arrive,

Or not; and so it must now that it has ;
And whether I was urged by grace divine
Or Lesbian liquor to declare these words
(Which must, as all words must, be false or true)
It matters not: for the same Power made all,
Oracle, wine, and me and you—or none-

'Tis the same thing. If you but knew as much
Of oracles as I do-

Pyrganax.

You Arch-priests

Believe in nothing; if you were to dream

Of a particular number in the lottery,

You would not buy the ticket.

Mammon.

Yet our tickets

Are seldom blanks. But what steps have you taken?

For prophecies, when once they get abroad,

Like liars who tell the truth to serve their ends,

Or hypocrites who, from assuming virtue,

Do the same actions that the virtuous do,
Contrive their own fulfilment. This Iona-
Well-you know what the chaste Pasiphae did,
Wife to that most religious, King of Crete,

And still how popular the tale is here;

And these dull Swine of Thebes boast their descent
From the free Minotaur. You know they still
Call themselves Bulls, though thus degenerate;

And everything relating to a bull

Is popular and respectable in Thebes :

Their arms are seven bulls in a field gules;

They think their strength consists in eating beef.
Now there were danger in the precedent,

If Queen Iona

Pyrganax.

I have taken good care

That shall not be. I struck the crust o' the earth