HERACLES
No you look upon your wife indeed.

ADMETUS
Beware! May it not be some phantom from the Underworld?

HERACLES
Do not think your guest a sorcerer.

ADMETUS
But do I indeed look upon the wife I buried?

HERACLES
Yes-but I do not wonder at your mistrust.

ADMETUS
Can I touch, speak to her, as my living wife?

HERACLES
Speak to her-you have all you desired.

ADMETUS (taking ALCESTIS in his arms)
O face and body of the dearest of women! I have you once more,

when I thought I should never see you again!
HERACLES

You have her-may the envy of the Gods be averted from you!
ADMETUS

O noble son of greatest Zeus, fortune be yours, and may your
Father guard you! But how did you bring her back from the Underworld

to the light of day?
HERACLES

By fighting with the spirit who was her master.
ADMETUS

Then did you contend with Death?
HERACLES

I hid by the tomb and leaped upon him.
ADMETUS

But why is she speechless?
HERACLES

You may not hear her voice until she is purified from her
consecration to the Lower Gods, and until the third dawn has risen.

Lead her in.
And you, Admetus, show as ever a good man's welcome to your

guests.
Farewell! I go to fulfil the task set me by the King, the son of

Sthenelus.
ADMETUS

Stay with us, and share our hearth.
HERACLES

That may be hereafter, but now I must be gone in haste.
(HERACLES departs.)

ADMETUS (gazing after him)
Good fortune to you, and come back here! (To the CHORUS) In all

the city and in the four quarters of Thessaly let there be choruses to
rejoice at this good fortune, and let the altars smoke with the

flesh of oxen in sacrifice! To-day we have changed the past for a
better life. I am happy.

(He leads ALCESTIS into the Palace.)
CHORUS (singing)

Spirits have many shapes,
Many strange things are performed by the Gods.

The expected does not always happen,
And God makes a way for the unexpected.

So ends this action.
-THE END-

.

• welcome [´welkəm] a.受欢迎的；可喜的 (初中英语单词)
• fulfil [ful´fil] vt.履行；完成；执行 (初中英语单词)
• contend [kən´tend] v.竞争；斗争；争论 (高中英语单词)
• hereafter [hiər´ɑ:ftə] ad.&n.将来；来世 (高中英语单词)
• phantom [´fæntəm] n.幽灵；幻影 a.幻想的 (英语六级单词)