Hippolytus/The Bacchae

Ah! if I could!

NURSE
What wouldst thou with them--fancies all!--
Thy hunting and thy fountain brink?
What wouldst thou? By the city wall
Canst hear our own brook plash and fall
Downhill, if thou wouldst drink.

PHAEDRA
O Mistress of the Sea-lorn Mere
Where horse-hoofs beat the sand and sing,
O Artemis, that I were there
To tame Enetian steeds and steer

Swift chariots in the ring!

NURSE
Nay, mountainward but now thy hands
Yearned out, with craving for the chase;
And now toward the unseaswept sands
Thou roamest, where the coursers pace!
O wild young steed, what prophet knows
The power that holds thy curb, and throws
Thy swift heart from its race?
[_At these words PHAEDRA gradually recovers herself
and pays attention._]

PHAEDRA