Togail na Tebe = The Thebiad of Statius : the Irish text

THE THEBAIDthat, until two others of his people came to him, to wit, Mopsusand Actor, and related the same things to him, and more inaddition. And at that tale the brave battalions of the Greeksturned about unto their camp in flight and in haste withoutarranging an end of conflict and a feat of battle. Tired weretheir horses and their chariot-fighters, and exhausted were theirsoldiers, and sad were their champions after that struggle inwhich Amphiaraus had fallen.As regards the Thebans, however,joyously and powerfully they marched, and thereupon came thenight.That is the first battle of Thebes.Now gloomily and dejectedly did the Greeks pass that nightin their camp, and it was not praise of their horses or their ownprowess that they engaged in, but in relating Amphiaraus' combatsand his heroic deeds. And they resolved that divers festivalsand honourable sacrifices should be made to him. And caresand the long deep anxieties of the war pressed greatly upon themind of the Greeks, till sleep and long slumber fell upon them.Now it was not thus that the Thebans spent that night, bufcthey were engaged in drinking, making merry, and extollingthe prowess of their fathers and grandfathers, and in offeringsacrifices to their noble gods that are to be worshipped.And itis related that that was the first night after he had been blindedthat Oedipus son of Laius and father of Eteocles and Polynices,was brought unto the Thebans to drink and -make merry; andit is related that his hair had not been rinsed, and his face hadnot been washed, since he was blinded, till the period of this hour,owing to the greatness of his gloom. And it was not to drink or tomake merry even that he had come to them that night, but to urgeon the war between the Thebans and the Greeks, and beautifulwas the pre-eminence with which he did that. And thus werethose people that night. As for Adrastus, however, high-king ofGreeks, though his hosts slept with the fatigue of the struggle,he himself did not sleep as he listened to the Thebans' shoutsc 193 13