The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

THE WORKS OF
LUCIAN OF SAMOSATA
Complete with exceptions specified in the preface

TRANSLATED BY

H. W. FOWLER AND F. G. FOWLER

IN FOUR VOLUMES

What work nobler than transplanting foreign thought into the barren domestic soil? except indeed planting thought of your own, which the fewest are privileged to do.—Sartor Resartus.

At each flaw, be this your first thought: the author doubtless said something quite different, and much more to the point. And then you may hiss me off, if you will.—Lucian, Nigrinus, 9.

(Lucian) The last great master of Attic eloquence and Attic wit.—Lord Macaulay.

VOLUME IV

OXFORD

AT THE CLARENDON PRESS

1905

HENRY FROWDE, M.A.

PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

LONDON, EDINBURGH NEW YORK AND TORONTO

CONTENTS OF VOL. IV

SLANDER, A WARNING

A terrible thing is ignorance, the source of endless human woes, spreading a mist over facts, obscuring truth, and casting a gloom upon the individual life. We are all walkers in darkness—or say, our experience is that of blind men, knocking helplessly against the real, and stepping high to clear the imaginary, failing to see what is close at their feet, and in terror of being hurt by something that is leagues away. Whatever we do, we are perpetually slipping about. This it is that has found the tragic poets a thousand themes, Labdacids, Pelopids, and all their kind. Inquiry would show that most of the calamities put upon the boards are arranged by ignorance as by some supernatural stage-manager. This is true enough as a generality; but I refer more particularly to the false reports about intimates and friends that have ruined families, razed cities, driven fathers into frenzy against their offspring, embroiled brother with brother, children with parents, and lover with beloved. Many are the friendships that have been cut short, many the households set by the ears, because slander has found ready credence.

By way of precaution against it, then, it is my design to sketch the nature, the origin, and effects of slander, though indeed the picture is already in existence, by the hand of Apelles. He had been traduced in the ears of Ptolemy as an accomplice of Theodotas in the Tyrian conspiracy. As a matter of fact he had never seen Tyre, and knew nothing of Theodotas beyond the information that he was an officer of Ptolemy's in charge of Phoenicia. However, that did not prevent another painter called Antiphilus, who was jealous of his court influence and professional skill, from reporting his supposed complicity to Ptolemy: he had seen him at Theodotas's table in Phoenicia, whispering in his ear all through dinner; he finally got as far as making Apelles out prime instigator of the Tyrian revolt and the capture of Pelusium.

Ptolemy was not distinguished for sagacity; he had been brought up on the royal diet of adulation; and the incredible tale so inflamed and carried him away that the probabilities of the case never struck him: the traducer was a professional rival; a painter's insignificance was hardly equal to the part; and this particular painter had had nothing but good at his hands, having been exalted by him above his fellows. But no, he did not even find out whether Apelles had ever made a voyage to Tyre; it pleased him to fall into a passion and make the palace ring with denunciations of the ingrate, the plotter, the conspirator. Luckily one of the prisoners, between disgust at Antiphilus's effrontery and compassion for Apelles, stated that the poor man had never been told a word of their designs; but for this, he would have paid with his head for his non-complicity in the Tyrian troubles.

Ptolemy was sufficiently ashamed of himself, we learn, to make Apelles a present of £25,000, besides handing Antiphilus over to him as a slave. The painter was impressed by his experience, and took his revenge upon Slander in a picture.

On the right sits a man with long ears almost of the Midas pattern, stretching out a hand to Slander, who is still some way off, but coming. About him are two females whom I take for Ignorance and Assumption. Slander, approaching from the left, is an extraordinarily beautiful woman, but with a heated, excitable air that suggests delusion and impulsiveness; in her left hand is a lighted torch, and with her right she is haling a youth by the hair; he holds up hands to heaven and calls the Gods to witness his innocence. Showing Slander the way is a man with piercing eyes, but pale, deformed, and shrunken as from long illness; one may easily guess him to be Envy. Two female attendants encourage Slander, acting as tire-women, and adding touches to her beauty; according to the cicerone, one of these is Malice, and the other Deceit. Following behind in mourning guise, black-robed and with torn hair, comes (I think he named her) Repentance. She looks tearfully behind her, awaiting shame-faced the approach of Truth. That was how Apelles translated his peril into paint.

I propose that we too execute in his spirit a portrait of Slander and her surroundings; and to avoid vagueness let us start with a definition or outline. Slander, we will say, is an undefended indictment, concealed from its object, and owing its success to one-sided half-informed procedure. Now we have something to go upon. Further, our actors, as in comedy[1], are three—the slanderer, the slandered, and the recipient of the slander; let us take each in turn and see how his case works out.

And first for our chief character, the manufacturer of the slander. That he is not a good man needs no proof; no good man will injure his neighbour; good men's reputation, and their credit for kindness, is based on the benefits they confer upon their friends, not on unfounded disparagement of others and the ousting of them from their friends' affections.

Secondly, it is easy to realize that such a person offends against justice, law, and piety, and is a pest to all who associate with him. Equality in everything, and contentment with your proper share, are the essentials of justice; inequality and over-reaching, of injustice; that every one will admit. It is not less clear that the man who secretly slanders the absent is guilty of over-reaching; he is insisting on entire possession of his hearer, appropriating and enclosing his ears, guarding them against impartiality by blocking them with prejudice. Such procedure is unjust to the last degree; we have the testimony of the best lawgivers for that; Solon and Draco made every juror swear that he would hear indifferently, and view both parties with equal benevolence, till the defence should have been compared with the prosecution and proved better or worse than it. Before such balancing of the speeches, they considered that the forming of a conclusion must be impious and unholy. We may indeed literally suppose Heaven to be offended, if we license the accuser to say what he will, and then, closing our own ears or the defendant's mouth, allow our judgement to be dictated by the first speech. No one can say, then, that the uttering of slander is reconcilable with the requirements of justice, of law, or of the juror's oath. If it is objected that the lawgivers are no sufficient authority for such extreme justice and impartiality, I fall back on the prince of poets, who has expressed a sound opinion, or let me say, laid down a sound law on the subject:

Nor give thy judgement, till both sides are heard.

He too was doubtless very well aware that, of all the ills that flesh is heir to, none is more grievous or more iniquitous than that a man should be condemned unjudged and unheard. That is precisely what the slanderer tries to effect by exposing the slandered without trial to his hearer's wrath, and precluding defence by the secrecy of his denunciation.

Every such person is a skulker and a coward; he will not come into the open; he is an ambuscader shooting from a lurking-place, whose opponent cannot meet him nor have it out with him, but must be shot down helplessly before he knows that war is afoot; there could be no clearer proof that his allegations are baseless. Of course a man who knows he is bringing true charges does the exposure in public, challenges inquiry, and faces examination; just so no one who can win a pitched battle will resort to ambush and deceit.

It is in kings' courts that these creatures are mostly found; they thrive in the atmosphere of dominion and power, where envy is rife, suspicions innumerable, and the opportunities for flattery and back-biting endless. Where hopes are higher, there envy is more intense, hatred more reckless, and jealousy more unscrupulous. They all keep close watch upon one another, spying like duellists for a weak spot. Every one would be first, and to that end shoves and elbows his neighbour aside, and does his best to pull back or trip the man in front of him. One whose equipment is limited to goodness is very soon thrown down, dragged about, and finally thrust forth with ignominy; while he who is prepared to flatter, and can make servility plausible, is high in credit, gets first to his end, and triumphs. These people bear out the words of Homer:

Th' impartial War-God slayeth him that slew.

Convinced that the prize is great, they elaborate their mutual stratagems, among which slander is at once the speediest and the most uncertain; high are the hopes with which this child of envy or hatred is born; pitiful, gloomy and disastrous the end to which it comes.

Success is by no means the easy simple matter it may be supposed; it demands much skill and tact, with the most concentrated attention. Slander would never do the harm it does, if it were not made plausible; it would never prevail against truth, that strongest of all things, if it were not dressed up into really attractive bait.

The chief mark for it is the man who is in favour, and therefore enviable in the eyes of his distanced competitors; they all regard him as standing in their light, and let fly at him; every one thinks he will be first if he can only dispose of this conspicuous person and spoil him of his favour. You may see the same thing among runners at the games. The good runner, from the moment the barrier falls, simply makes the best of his way; his thoughts are on the winning-post, his hopes of victory in his feet; he leaves his neighbour alone and does not concern himself at all with his competitors. It is the ill qualified, with no prospect of winning by his speed, who resorts to foul play; his one pre-occupation is how he may stop, impede, curb the real runner, because failing that his own victory is out of the question. The persons we are concerned with race in like manner for the favour of the great. The one who forges ahead is at once the object of plots, is taken at a disadvantage by his enemies when his thoughts are elsewhere, and got rid of, while they get credit for devotion by the harm they do to others.

The credibility of the slander is by no means left to take care of itself; it is the chief object of their solicitude; they are extremely cautious against inconsistencies or contradictions. The usual method is to seize upon real characteristics of a victim, and only paint these in darker colours, which allows verisimilitude. A man is a doctor; they make him out a poisoner; wealth figures as tyranny; the tyrant's ready tool is a ready traitor too.

Sometimes, however, the hint is taken from the hearer's own nature; the villains succeed by using a bait that will tempt him. They know he is jealous, and they tell him: 'He beckoned to your wife at dinner, and sighed as he gazed at her; and Stratonice—well, did not seem offended.' Or he writes poetry, and piques himself upon it; then, 'Philoxenus had great sport pulling your poem to pieces—said the metre was faulty and the composition vile.' A devout religious person is told that his friend is an atheist and a blasphemer, rejects belief and denies Providence. That is quite enough; the venom has entered at the ear and inflamed the brain; the man does not wait for confirmation, but abandons his friend.

In a word, they invent and say the kind of thing that they know will be most irritating to their hearer, and having a full knowledge of his vulnerable point, concentrate their fire upon it; he is to be too much flustered by rage to have time for investigation; the very surprise of what he is told is to be so convincing to him that he will not hear, even if his friend is willing to plead.

That slander, indeed, is especially effective which is unwelcome; Demetrius the Platonic was reported to Ptolemy Dionysus for a water drinker, and for the only man who had declined to put on female attire at the Dionysia. He was summoned next morning, and had to drink in public, dress up in gauze, clash and dance to the cymbals, or he would have been put to death for disapproving the King's life, and setting up for a critic of his luxurious ways.

At Alexander's court there was no more fatal imputation than that of refusing worship and adoration to Hephaestion. Alexander had been so fond of him that to appoint him a God after his death was, for such a worker of marvels, nothing out of the way. The various cities at once built temples to him, holy ground was consecrated, altars, offerings and festivals instituted to this new divinity; if a man would be believed, he must swear by Hephaestion. For smiling at these proceedings, or showing the slightest lack of reverence, the penalty was death. The flatterers cherished, fanned, and put the bellows to this childish fancy of Alexander's; they had visions and manifestations of Hephaestion to relate; they invented cures and attributed oracles to him; they did not stop short of doing sacrifice to this God of Help and Protection. Alexander was delighted, and ended by believing in it all; it gratified his vanity to think that he was now not only a God's son, but a God-maker. It would be interesting to know how many of his friends in those days found that what the new divinity did for them was to supply a charge of irreverence on which they might be dismissed and deprived of the King's favour.

Agathocles of Samos was a valued officer of his, who very narrowly escaped being thrown into a lion's cage; the offence reported against him was shedding tears as he passed Hephaestion's tomb. The tale goes that he was saved by Perdiccas, who swore, by all the Gods and Hephaestion, that the God had appeared plainly to him as he was hunting, and charged him to bid Alexander spare Agathocles: his tears had meant neither scepticism nor mourning, but been merely a tribute to the friendship that was gone.

Flattery and slander had just then their opportunity in Alexander's emotional condition. In a siege, the assailants do not attempt a part of the defences that is high, precipitous, or solid; they direct all their force at some rotten, low, or neglected point, expecting to get in and effect the capture most easily so. Similarly the slanderer finds out where the soul is weak or corrupt or accessible, there makes his assault, there applies his engines, or effects an entry at a point where there are no defenders to mark his approach. Once in, he soon has all in flames; fire and sword and devastation clear out the previous occupants; how else should it be when a soul is captured and enslaved?

His siege-train includes deceit, falsehood, perjury, insinuation, effrontery, and a thousand other moral laxities. But the chief of them all is Flattery, the blood relation, the sister indeed, of Slander. No heart so high, so fenced with adamant, but Flattery will master it, with the aid of Slander undermining and sapping its foundations.

That is what goes on outside. But within there are traitorous parties working to the same end, stretching hands of help to the attack, opening the gates, and doing their utmost to bring the capture about. There are those ever-present human frailties, fickleness and satiety; there is the appetite for the surprising. We all delight, I cannot tell why, in whisperings and insinuations. I know people whose ears are as agreeably titillated with slander as their skin with a feather.

Supported by all these allies, the attack prevails; victory is hardly in doubt for a moment; there is no defence or resistance to the assault; the hearer surrenders without reluctance, and the slandered knows nothing of what is going on; as when a town is stormed by night, he has his throat cut in his sleep.

The most pitiful thing is when, all unconscious of how matters stand, he comes to his friend with a cheerful countenance, having nothing to be ashamed of, and talks and behaves as usual, just as if the toils were not all round him. Then if the other has any nobility or generous spirit of fair play in him, he gives vent to his anger and pours out his soul; after which he allows him to answer, and so finds out how he has been abused.

But if he is mean and ignoble, he receives him with a lip smile, while he is gnashing his teeth in covert rage, wrathfully brooding in the soul's dark depth, as the poet describes it. I know nothing so characteristic of a warped slavish nature as to bite the lip while you nurse your spite and cultivate your secret hatred, one thing in your heart and another on your tongue, playing with the gay looks of comedy a lamentable sinister tragedy. This is especially apt to occur, when the slander comes from one who is known for an old friend of the slandered. When that is the case, a man pays no attention to anything the victim or his apologists may say; that old friendship affords a sufficient presumption of truth; he forgets that estrangements, unknown to outsiders, constantly part the greatest friends; and sometimes a man will try to escape the consequences of his own faults by attributing similar ones to his neighbour and getting his denunciation in first. It may be taken, indeed, that no one will venture to slander an enemy; that is too unconvincing; the motive is so obvious. It is the supposed friend that is the most promising object, the idea being to give your hearer absolute proof of your devotion to him by sacrificing your dearest to his interests.

It must be added that there are persons who, if they subsequently learn that they have condemned a friend in error, are too much ashamed of that error to receive or look him in the face again; you might suppose the discovery of his innocence was a personal injury to them.

It is not, then, too much to say that life is made miserable by these lightly and incuriously credited slanders. Antea said to Proetus, after she had solicited and been scorned by Bellerophon:

Die thou the death, if thou slay not the man
That so would have enforc'd my chastity!

By the machinations of this lascivious woman, the young man came near perishing in his combat with the Chimera, as the penalty for continence and loyalty to his host. And Phaedra, who made a similar charge against her stepson, succeeded in bringing down upon Hippolytus a father's curse, though God knows how innocent he was.

'Ah, yes,' I fancy some one objecting; 'but the traducer sometimes deserves credit, being known for a just and a wise man; then he ought to be listened to, as one incapable of villany.' What? was there ever a juster man than Aristides? yet he led the opposition to Themistocles and incited the people against him, pricked by the same political ambition as he. Aristides was a just man in all other relations; but he was human, he had a gall, he was open to likes and dislikes.

And if the story of Palamedes is true, the wisest of the Greeks, a great man in other respects too, stands convicted of hatching that insidious plot[2]; the ties that bind kinsmen, friends, and comrades in danger, had to yield to jealousy. To be a man is to be subject to this temptation.

It is superfluous to refer to Socrates, misrepresented to the Athenians as an impious plotter, to Themistocles or Miltiades, suspected after all their victories of betraying Greece; such examples are innumerable, and most of them familiar.

What, then, should a man of sense do, when he finds one friend's virtue pitted against another's truth? Why, surely, learn from Homer's parable of the Sirens; he advises sailing past these ear-charmers; we should stuff up our ears; we should not open them freely to the prejudiced, but station there a competent hall-porter in the shape of Judgement, who shall inspect every vocal visitor, and take it on himself to admit the worthy, but shut the door in the face of others. How absurd to have such an official at our house door, and leave our ears and understandings open to intrusion!

So, when any one comes to you with a tale, examine it on its merits, regardless of the informant's age, general conduct, or skill in speech. The more plausible he is, the greater need of care. Never trust another's judgement—it may be in reality only his dislike—but reserve the inquiry to yourself; let envy, if such it was, recoil upon the backbiter, your trial of the two men's characters be an open one, and your award of contempt and approval deliberate. To award them earlier, carried away by the first word of slander—why, God bless me, how puerile and mean and iniquitous it all is!

And the cause of it, as we started with saying, is ignorance, and the mystery that conceals men's characters. Would some God unveil all lives to us, Slander would retire discomfited to the bottomless pit; for the illumination of truth would be over all.

H.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] 'Cratinus was the first to limit the number of actors to three.... There were no further innovations, and the number of the actors in comedy was permanently fixed at three.' Haigh's Attic Theatre.

[2] Odysseus.

THE HALL

As Alexander stood gazing at the transparent loveliness of the Cydnus, the thought of a plunge into those generous depths, of the delicious shock of ice-cold waters amid summer heat, was too much for him; and could he have foreseen the illness that was to result from it, I believe he would have had his bath just the same. With such an example before him, can any one whose pursuits are literary miss a chance of airing his eloquence amid the glories of this spacious hall, wherein gold sheds all its lustre, whose walls are decked with the flowers of art, whose light is as the light of the sun? Shall he who might cause this roof to ring with applause, and contribute his humble share to the splendours of the place,—shall such a one content himself with examining and admiring its beauties without a word, and so depart, like one that is dumb, or silent from envy? No man of taste or artistic sensibility, none but a dull ignorant boor, would consent thus to cut himself off from the highest of enjoyments, or could need to be reminded of the difference between the ordinary spectator and the educated man. The former, when he has carried his eyes around and upwards in silent admiration, and clasped ecstatic hands, has done all that can be expected of him; he ventures not on words, lest they should prove inadequate to his subject. With the cultured observer, it is otherwise: he, surely, will not rest content with feasting his eyes on beauty; he will not stand speechless amid his splendid surroundings, but will set his mind to work, and as far as in him lies pay verbal tribute. Nor will his tribute consist in mere praise of the building. It was well enough, no doubt, for the islander Telemachus to express his boyish amazement in the palace of Menelaus, and to liken that prince's gold and ivory to the glories of Heaven;—his limited experience afforded him no earthly parallel: but here, the very use to which the hall is put, and the distinguished quality of the audience, are an essential part of the praise bestowed upon it.

Nothing, surely, could be more delightful than to find this noble building thrown open for the reception of eloquent praise, its atmosphere laden with panegyric, its very walls reechoing, cavern-like, to every syllable, prolonging each cadence, dwelling on each period;—nay, they are themselves an audience, most appreciative of audiences, that stores up the speaker's words in memory, and recompenses his efforts with a meed of most harmonious flattery. Even so do the rocks resound to the shepherd's flute; the notes come ringing back again, and simple rustics think it is the voice of some maid, who dwells among the crags, and from the depths of her rocky haunt makes answer to their songs and their cries.

I feel as if a certain mental exaltation resulted from this magnificence: it is suggestive; the imagination is stimulated. It would scarcely be too much to say that through the medium of the eyes Beauty is borne in upon the mind, and suffers no thought to find utterance before it has received her impress. We hold it for true that Achilles' wrath was whetted against the Phrygians by the sight of his new armour, and that as he donned it for the first time his lust of battle was uplifted on wings: and why should not a beautiful building similarly be a whet to the zeal of the orator? Luxuriant grass, a fine plane-tree and a clear spring, hard by Ilissus, were inspiration enough for Socrates: in such a spot he could sit bantering Phaedrus, refuting Lysias, and invoking the Muses; never doubting—indelicate old person—but that those virgin Goddesses would grace his retirement with their presence, and take part in his amorous discourse. But to such a place as this we may surely hope that they will come uninvited. We can offer them something better than the shade of a plane-tree, though for that upon Ilissus' bank we should substitute the golden one of the Persian King. His tree had one claim to admiration—it was expensive: but for symmetry and proportion and beautiful workmanship, nothing of that kind was thrown in; the gold was gold, an uncouth manifestation of solid wealth, calculated to excite envy in the beholder, and to procure congratulations for the possessor, but far from creditable to the artist. The line of the Arsacidae cared nothing for beauty; they did not appeal to men's taste; not How may I win approval? but How may I dazzle? was the question they asked themselves. The barbarian has a keen appreciation of gold: to the treasures of art he is blind.

But I see about me in this Hall beauties that were never designed to please barbarians, nor to gratify the vulgar ostentation of Persian monarchs. Poverty is not here the sole requirement of the critic: taste is also necessary; nor will the eyes deliver judgement without the assistance of Reason. The eastern aspect, procuring us, as in the temples of old, that first welcome peep of the sun in his new-born glory, and suffering his rays to pour in without stint through the open doors, the adaptation of length to breadth and breadth to height, the free admission of light at every stage of the Sun's course,—all is charmingly contrived, and redounds to the credit of the architect. What admirable judgement has been shown, too, in the structure and decoration of the roof! nothing wanting, yet nothing superfluous; the gilding is exactly what was required to achieve elegance without empty display; it is precisely that little touch of adornment with which a beautiful and modest woman sets off her loveliness; it is the slender necklace about her neck, the light ring upon her finger, the earrings, the brooch, the fillet that imprisons her luxuriant hair, and, like the purple stripe upon a robe, enhances its beauty. Contrast with this the artifices of courtesans, and particularly of the most unlovely among them, whose robes are all of purple, and their necks loaded with golden chains, who hope to render themselves attractive by their extravagance, and by external adornments to supply the deficiencies of Nature; their arms, they think, will look more dazzlingly white if gold glitters upon them, a clumsy foot pass unobserved if hidden in a golden sandal, and the face be irresistible that appears beneath a halo of gold. The modest house, far from resorting to such meretricious charms, uses as little gold as may be; I think she knows that she would have no cause to blush, though she should display her beauty stripped of all adornment.

And so it is with this Hall. The roof—the head, as I may say,—comely in itself, is not without its golden embellishments: yet they are but as the stars, whose fires gleam here and there, pranked in the darkness of the sky. Were that sky all fire, it would be beautiful to us no longer, only terrible. Observe, too, that the gold is not otiose, not merely an ornament among ornaments, put there to flatter the eye: it diffuses soft radiance from end to end of the building, and the walls are tinged with its warm glow. Striking upon the gilded beams, and mingling its brightness with theirs, the daylight glances down upon us with a clearness and a richness not all its own. Such are the glories overhead, whose praises might best be sung by him who told of Helen's high-vaulted chamber, and Olympus' dazzling peak.

And for the rest, the frescoed walls, with their exquisite colouring, so clear, so highly finished, so true to nature, to what can I compare them but to a flowery meadow in spring? Even so the comparison halts. Those flowers wither and decay and shed their beauty: but here is one eternal spring; this meadow fades not, its flowers are everlasting; for no hand is put forth to pluck away their sweetness, only the eye feeds thereon. And what eye would not delight to feed on joys so varied? What orator would not feel that his credit was at stake, and be fired with ambition to surpass himself, rather than be found wanting to his theme?

The contemplation of beautiful objects is of all things the most inspiring, and not to men only. I think even a horse must feel some increase of pleasure in galloping over smooth, soft fields, that give an easy footing, and ring back no defiance to his hoofs: it is then that he goes his best; the beauty of his surroundings puts him on his mettle; he will not be beaten, if pace counts for anything. And look at the peacock. Spring has just begun; never are flowers a gladder sight than now; it is as if they were really brighter, their hues more fresh, than at other times. Watch the bird, as he struts forth into some meadow: he spreads his feathers, and displays them to the Sun; up goes his tail, a towered circle of flowery plumage; for with him too it is spring, and the meadow challenges him to do his utmost. See how he turns about, and shows forth his gorgeous beauty. As the sun's rays strike upon him, the wonder grows: there is a subtle transmutation of colours, one glory vanishing and giving place to another. The change is nowhere more apparent than in those rainbow rings at the ends of his feathers: here a slight movement turns bronze to gold, and (such is the potency of light) purple becomes green, because sun is exchanged for shadow. As for the sea, I need not remind you how inviting, how attractive, is its appearance on a calm day: the veriest landlubber must long to be upon it, and sail far away from the shore, as he marks how the light breeze fills the sails and speeds the vessel on its gentle gliding course over the crests of the waves.

The beauty of this Hall has a similar power over the orator, encouraging him, stimulating him to fresh effort, enlarging his ambition. The spell was irresistible: I have yielded to it, and come hither to address you, as though drawn by wryneck's or by Siren's charm; nor am I without hope that my words, bald though they be in themselves, may yet borrow something from that atmosphere of beauty in which they are here clothed as in a garment.

Scarcely have I pronounced these last words, when a certain Theory (and a very sound one, too, if we can take its own word for it), which has been interrupting me all along, and doing its best to break my speech off, informs me that there is no truth in my statements, and expresses its surprise at my assertion that gilding and mural decoration are favourable to the display of rhetorical skill. The very contrary, it maintains, is the case. On second thoughts, it may as well come forward and plead its own cause; you, gentlemen, will kindly serve as jury, and hear what it has to say in favour of the cheap and nasty in architecture, considered as rhetorical conditions. My own sentiments on this subject you have already heard, nor is there any occasion for me to repeat them. The Theory is therefore at liberty to speak; I will withdraw for a while, and hold my tongue.

'Gentlemen of the jury,' it begins, 'a splendid tribute has been paid to this Hall by the last speaker; and I for my part am so far from having any fault to find with the building, that I propose to supply the deficiencies of his encomium; for by magnifying its glories, I am so much the nearer to proving my point, which is, its unsuitableness to the purposes of the orator. And first I shall ask your permission to avail myself of his simile of feminine adornments. In my opinion, it is not enough to say that lavish ornament adds nothing to feminine beauty: it actually takes away from it. Dazzled by gold and costly gems, how should the beholder do justice to the charms of a clear complexion, to neck, and eye, and arm, and finger? Sards and emeralds, bracelets and necklaces, claim all his attention, and the lady has the mortification of finding herself eclipsed by her own jewels, whose engrossed admirers can spare no words, and barely a casual glance for herself. The same fate, it seems to me, awaits the orator who exhibits his skill amid these wondrous works of art: his praises are obscured, quite swallowed up, in the splendour of the things he praises. It is as if a man should bring a wax light to feed a mighty conflagration, or set up an ant for exhibition on a camel's or an elephant's back. That is one pitfall for the orator. And there is another: the distracting influence of that resonant music that echoes through the Hall, making voluminous answer to his words, nay, drowning them in the utterance; surely as trumpet quells flute, or the sea-roar the boatswain's pipe, if he presume to contend with the crash of waves, so surely shall the orator's puny voice be overmastered by this mighty music, and seem like silence.

'Then again, my opponent spoke of the stimulating, the encouraging effect produced on the speaker by architectural beauty. I should have said that the effect was rather dispiriting than otherwise: the speaker's thoughts are scattered, and his confidence shaken, as he reflects on the disgrace that must attach to mean words uttered beneath a noble roof. There could be no more crushing ignominy; he is precisely in the position of a warrior in brilliant armour who sets the example of flight, and whose cowardice is only emphasized by his splendid equipment. To this principle I should refer the conduct of Homer's model orator, who, so far from attaching any importance to externals, affected the bearing of a man that was altogether witless; his design was to bring his eloquence into stronger relief by the studied ungracefulness of his attitude.

'The orator's mind, too, is so engrossed with what he sees, that it is absolutely impossible for him to preserve the thread of his discourse; he cannot think of what he is saying, so imperatively do the sights around him claim his attention. It is not to be expected that he will do himself justice: he is too full of his subject. And I might add that his supposed hearers, when they come into such a building as this, are no longer hearers of his eloquence, but spectators of its beauties; he must be a Thamyris, an Amphion, an Orpheus among orators who could gain their attention in such circumstances. Once let a man cross this threshold, and a blaze of beauty envelops his senses; he is all eyes, and to the orator is "as one that marketh not";—unless, indeed, he be altogether blind, or take a hint from the court of Areopagus, and give audience in the dark. Compare the story of the Sirens with that of the Gorgons, if you would know how insignificant is the power of words in comparison with that of visible objects. The enchantments of the former were at the best a matter of time; they did but flatter the ear with pleasing songs; if the mariner landed, he remained long on their hands, and it has even happened to them to be disregarded altogether. But the beauty of the Gorgons, irresistible in might, won its way to the inmost soul, and wrought amazement and dumbness in the beholder; admiration (so the legend goes) turned him to stone. All that my opponent has just said about the peacock illustrates my point: that bird charms not the ear, but the eye. Take a swan, take a nightingale, and set her singing: now put a silent peacock at her side, and I will tell you which bird has the attention of the company. The songstress may go hang now; so invincible a thing is the pleasure of the eyes. Shall I call evidence? A sage, then, shall be my witness, how far mightier are the things of the eye than those of the ear. Usher, call me Herodotus, son of Lyxes, of Halicarnassus.—Ah, since he has been so obliging as to hear the summons, let him step into the box. You will excuse the Ionic dialect; it is his way.'

Gentlemen of the jury, the Theory hath spoken sooth. Give good heed to that he saith, how sight is a better thing than hearing; for a man shall sooner trust his eyes than his ears.

'You hear him, gentlemen? He gives the preference to sight, and rightly. For words have wings; they are no sooner out of the mouth than they take flight and are lost: but the delight of the eyes is ever present, ever draws the beholder to itself. Judge, then, the difficulty the orator must experience in contending with such a rival as this Hall, whose beauty attracts every eye.

'But my weightiest argument I have kept till now: you, gentlemen, throughout the hearing of this case, have been gazing with admiration on roof and wall, scanning each picture in its turn. I do not reproach you: you have done what every man must do, when he beholds workmanship so exquisite, subjects so varied. Here are works whose perfect technique, applied as it is to the illustration of all that is useful in history and mythology, holds out an irresistible challenge to the judgement of the connoisseur. Now I would not have your eyes altogether glued to those walls; I would fain have some share of your attention: let me try, therefore, to give you word-pictures of these originals; I think it may not be uninteresting to you to hear a description of those very objects which your eyes view with such admiration. And you will perhaps count it a point in my favour, that I, and not my antagonist, have hit upon this means of doubling your pleasure. It is a hazardous enterprise, I need not say,—without materials or models to put together picture upon picture; this word-painting is but sketchy work.

'On our right as we enter, we have a story half Argive, half Ethiopian. Perseus slays the sea-monster, and sets Andromeda free; it will not be long ere he leads her away as his bride; an episode, this, in his Gorgon expedition. The artist has given us much in a small space: maiden modesty, girlish terror, are here portrayed in the countenance of Andromeda, who from her high rock gazes down upon the strife, and marks the devoted courage of her lover, the grim aspect of his bestial antagonist. As that bristling horror approaches, with awful gaping jaws, Perseus in his left hand displays the Gorgon's head, while his right grasps the drawn sword. All of the monster that falls beneath Medusa's eyes is stone already; and all of him that yet lives the scimetar hews to pieces.

'In the next picture, a tale of retributive justice is dramatically set forth. The painter seems to have taken his hint from Euripides or Sophocles; each of them has portrayed this incident. The two young men are friends: Pylades of Phocis, and Orestes, who is thought to be dead. They have stolen into the palace unobserved, and together they slay Aegisthus. Clytemnestra has already been dispatched: her body lies, half-naked, upon a bed; all the household stand aghast at the deed; some cry out, others look about for means of escape. A fine thought of the painter's: the matricide is but slightly indicated, as a thing achieved: with the slaying of the paramour, it is otherwise; there is something deliberate in the manner in which the lads go about their work.

'Next comes a more tender scene. We behold a comely God, and a beautiful boy. The boy is Branchus: sitting on a rock, he holds out a hare to tease his dog, who is shown in the act of jumping for it. Apollo looks on, well pleased: half of his smile is for the dog's eagerness, and half for the mischievous boy.

'Once more Perseus; an earlier adventure, this time. He is cutting off Medusa's head, while Athene screens him from her sight. Although the blow is struck, he has never seen his handiwork, only the reflection of the head upon the shield; he knows the price of a single glance at the reality.

'High upon the middle wall, facing the door, a shrine of Athene is modelled. The statue of the Goddess is in white marble. She is not shown in martial guise; it is the Goddess of War in time of peace.

'We have seen Athene in marble: next we see her in painting. She flies from the pursuit of amorous Hephaestus; it was to this moment that Erichthonius owed his origin.

'The next picture deals with the ancient story of Orion. He is blind, and on his shoulder carries Cedalion, who directs the sightless eyes towards the East. The rising Sun heals his infirmity; and there stands Hephaestus on Lemnos, watching the cure.

'Then we have Odysseus, seeking by feigned madness to avoid joining the expedition of the Atridae, whose messengers have already appeared to summon him. Nothing could be more convincing than his plough-chariot, his ill-assorted team, and his apparent unconsciousness of all that is going forward. But his paternal feeling betrays him. Palamedes, penetrating his secret, seizes upon Telemachus, and threatens him with drawn sword. If the other can act madness, he can act anger. The father in Odysseus is revealed: he is frightened into sanity, and throws aside the mask.

'Last of all is Medea, burning with jealousy, glaring askance upon her children, and thinking dreadful thoughts. See, the sword even now is in her hand: and there sit the victims, smiling; they see the sword, yet have no thought of what is to come.

'Need I say, gentlemen, how the sight of all these pictures draws away the attention of the audience upon them, and leaves the orator without a single hearer? If I have described them at length, it was not in order to impress you with the headstrong audacity of my opponent, in voluntarily thrusting himself upon an audience so ill-disposed. I seek not to call down your condemnation nor your resentment upon him, nor do I ask you to refuse him a hearing: rather I would have you assist his endeavours, listen to him, if you can, with closed eyes, and remember the difficulty of his undertaking; when you, his judges, have become his fellow workers, he will still have much ado to escape the imputation of bringing discredit upon this magnificent Hall. And if it seem strange to you that I should plead thus on my antagonist's behalf, you must attribute it to my fondness for this same Hall, which makes me anxious that every man who speaks in it should come off creditably, be he who he may.'

F.

PATRIOTISM

It is a truism with no pretensions to novelty that there is nothing sweeter than one's country. Does that imply that, though there is nothing pleasanter, there may be something grander or more divine? Why, of all that men reckon grand and divine their country is the source and teacher, originating, developing, inculcating. For great and brilliant and splendidly equipped cities many men have admiration, but for their own all men have love. No man—not the most enthusiastic sightseer that ever was—is so dazzled by foreign wonders as to forget his own land.

He who boasts that he is a citizen of no mean city misses, it seems to me, the true patriotism; he suggests that it would be a mortification to him to belong to a State less distinguished. It is country in the abstract that I delight rather to honour. It is well enough when you are comparing States to investigate the questions of size or beauty or markets; but when it is a matter of choosing a country, no one would exchange his own for one more glorious; he may wish that his own resembled those more highly blest, but he will choose it, defects and all.

It is the same with loyal sons, or good fathers. A young man who has the right stuff in him will honour no man above his father; nor will a father set his affections on some other young man to the neglect of his son. On the contrary, fathers are so convinced of their children's being better than they really are, that they reckon them the handsomest, the tallest, the most accomplished of their generation. Any one who does not judge his offspring thus I cannot allow to have the father's eye.

The fatherland! it is the first and the nearest of all names. It is true there is nothing nearer than a father; but a man who duly honours his father, according to the dictates of law and nature, will yet be right to honour his fatherland in still higher degree; for that father himself belongs to the fatherland; so does his father's father, and all his house back and back, till the line ends with the Gods our fathers.

The Gods too love the lands of their nativity; though they may be supposed to concern themselves with human affairs in general, claiming the whole of earth and sea as theirs, yet each of them honours above all other lands the one that gave him birth. That State is more majestic which a God calls his country, that isle has an added sanctity in which poesy affirms that one was born. Those are acceptable offerings, which a man has come to their respective homes to make. And if Gods are patriotic, shall not men be more so?

For it was from his own country that every man looked his first upon the Sun; that God, though he be common to all men, yet each reckons among his country Gods, because in that country he was revealed to him. There speech came to him, the speech that belonged to that soil, and there he got knowledge of the Gods. If his country be such that to attain true culture he must seek another, yet even for that culture let him thank his country; the word State he could never have known, had not his country shown him that States existed.

And surely men gather culture and learning, that they may thereby render themselves more serviceable to their country; they amass wealth that they may outdo their neighbours in devoting it to their country's good. And 'tis no more than reason; it is not for those who have received the greatest of all benefits to prove thankless; if we are grateful, as we doubtless should be, to the individual benefactor, much more ought we to give our country her due; against neglect of parents the various States have laws; we should account our country the common mother of us all, and recompense her who bred us, and taught us that there were laws.

The man was never known who so forgot his country as to be indifferent to it when established in another State. All who fare ill abroad are perpetually thinking how country is the best of all good things; and those who fare well, whatever their general prosperity, are ever conscious of the one thing lacking: they do not live at home, but are exiles; and exile is a reproach. Those again whose sojourn has brought them distinction by way of garnered wealth or honourable fame, acknowledged culture or approved courage, all of them, you will find, yearn for their native land, where are the spectators of their triumphs that they would most desire. A man's longing for home is indeed in direct proportion to his credit abroad.

Even the young have the patriotic sentiment; but in the old it is as much more keen as their sense is greater. Every old man directs his efforts and his prayers to ending his life in his own land; where he began to live, there would he lay his bones, in the soil that formed him, and join his fathers in the grave. It is a dread fate to be condemned to exile even in death, and lie in alien earth.

But if you would know the true man's feeling for his country, it is in the born citizen that you must study it. The merely naturalized are a sort of bastards ever ready for another change; they know not nor love the name of country, but think they may find what they need in one place as well as another; their standard of happiness is the pleasures of the belly. Those whose country is their true mother love the land whereon they were born and bred, though it be narrow and rough and poor of soil. If they cannot vaunt the goodness of the land, they are still at no loss for praises of their country; if they see others making much of bounteous plains and meadows variegated with all plants that grow, they too can call up their country's praise; another may breed good horses; what matter? theirs breeds good men.

A man is fain to be at home, though the home be but an islet; though he might have fortune among strangers, he will not take immortality there; to be buried in his own land is better. Brighter to him the smoke of home than the fire of other lands.

In such honour everywhere is the name of country that you will find legislators all the world over punishing the worst offences with exile, as the heaviest penalty at their command. And it is just the same with generals on service. When the men are taking their places for battle, no such encouragement as to tell them they are fighting for their country. No one will disgrace himself after that if he can help it; the name of country turns even a coward into a brave man.

H.

DIPSAS, THE THIRST-SNAKE

The southern parts of Libya are all deep sand and parched soil, a desert of wide extent that produces nothing, one vast plain destitute of grass, herb, vegetation, and water; or if a remnant of the scanty rain stands here and there in a hollow place, it is turbid and evil-smelling, undrinkable even in the extremity of thirst. The land is consequently uninhabited; savage, dried up, barren, droughty, how should it support life? The mere temperature, an atmosphere that is rather fire than air, and a haze of burning sand, make the district quite inaccessible.

On its borders dwell the Garamantians, a lightly clad, agile tribe of tent-dwellers subsisting mainly by the chase. These are the only people who occasionally penetrate the desert, in pursuit of game. They wait till rain falls, about the winter solstice, mitigating the excessive heat, moistening the sand, and making it just passable. Their quarry consists chiefly of wild asses, the giant ostrich that runs instead of flying, and monkeys, to which the elephant is sometimes added; these are the only creatures sufficiently proof against thirst and capable of bearing that incessant fiery sunshine. But the Garamantians, as soon as they have consumed the provisions they brought with them, instantly hurry back, in fear of the sand's recovering its heat and becoming difficult or impassable, in which case they would be trapped, and lose their lives as well as their game. For if the sun draws up the vapour, dries the ground rapidly, and has an access of heat, throwing into its rays the fresh vigour derived from that moisture which is its aliment, there is then no escape.

But all that I have yet mentioned, heat, thirst, desolation, barrenness, you will count less formidable than what I now come to, a sufficient reason in itself for avoiding that land. It is beset by all sorts of reptiles, of huge size, in enormous numbers, hideous and venomous beyond belief or cure. Some of them have burrows in the sand, others live on the surface—toads, asps, vipers, horned snakes and stinging beetles, lance-snakes, reversible snakes[3], dragons, and two kinds of scorpion, one of great size and many joints that runs on the ground, the other aerial, with gauzy wings like those of the locust, grasshopper, or bat. With the multitude of flying things like these, that part of Libya has no attraction for the traveller.

But the direst of all the reptiles bred in the sand is the dipsas or thirst-snake; it is of no great size, and resembles the viper; its bite is sharp, and the venom acts at once, inducing agonies to which there is no relief. The flesh is burnt up and mortified, the victims feel as if on fire, and yell like men at the stake. But the most overpowering of their torments is that indicated by the creature's name. They have an intolerable thirst; and the remarkable thing is, the more they drink, the more they want to drink, the appetite growing with what it feeds on. You will never quench their thirst, though you give them all the water in Nile or Danube; water will be fuel, as much as if you tried to put out a fire with oil.

Doctors explain this by saying that the venom is originally thick, and gains in activity when diluted with the drink, becoming naturally more fluid and circulating more widely.

I have not seen a man in this condition, and I pray Heaven I never may behold such human sufferings; I am happy to say I have not set foot upon Libyan soil. But I have had an epitaph repeated to me, which a friend assured me he had read on the grave of a victim. My friend, going from Libya to Egypt, had taken the only practicable land route by the Great Syrtis. He there found a tomb on the beach at the sea's very edge, with a pillar setting forth the manner of death. On it a man was carved in the attitude familiar in pictures of Tantalus, standing by a lake's side scooping up water to drink; the dipsas was wound about his foot, in which its fangs were fastened, while a number of women with jars were pouring water over him. Hard by were lying eggs like those of the ostrich hunted, as I mentioned, by the Garamantians. And then there was the epitaph, which it may be worth while to give you:

See the envenom'd cravings Tantalus
Could find no thirst-assuaging charm to still,
The cask that daughter-brood of Danaus,
For ever filling, might not ever fill.

There are four more lines about the eggs, and how he was bitten while taking them; but I forget how they go.

The neighbouring tribes, however, do collect and value these eggs, and not only for food; they use the empty shells for vessels and make cups of them; for, as there is nothing but sand for material, they have no pottery. A particularly large egg is a find; bisected, it furnishes two hats big enough for the human head.

Accordingly the dipsas conceals himself near the eggs, and when a man comes, crawls out and bites the unfortunate, who then goes through the experiences just described, drinking and increasing his thirst and getting no relief.

Now, gentlemen, I have not told you all this to show you I could do as well as the poet Nicander, nor yet by way of proof that I have taken some trouble with the natural history of Libyan reptiles; that would be more in the doctor's line, who must know about such things with a view to treatment. No, it is only that I am conscious (and now pray do not be offended by my going to the reptiles for my illustration)—I am conscious of the same feelings towards you as a dipsas victim has towards drink; the more I have of your company, the more of it I want; my thirst for it rages uncontrollably; I shall never have enough of this drink. And no wonder; where else could one find such clear sparkling water? You must pardon me, then, if, bitten to the soul (most agreeably and wholesomely bitten), I put my head under the fountain and gulp the liquor down. My only prayer is that the stream that flows from you may never fail; never may your willingness to listen run dry and leave me thirstily gaping! On my side there is no reason why drinking should not go on for ever; the wise Plato says that you cannot have too much of a good thing.

H.

FOOTNOTES:

[3] The amphisbaena, supposed to have a head at each end and move either way.

A WORD WITH HESIOD

Lycinus. Hesiod

Ly. As to your being a first-rate poet, Hesiod, we do not doubt that, any more than we doubt your having received the gift from the Muses, together with that laurel-branch; it is sufficiently proved by the noble inspiration that breathes in every line of your works. But there is one point on which we may be excused for feeling some perplexity. You begin by telling us that your divine gifts were bestowed upon you by Heaven in order that you might sing of the glories that have been, and tell of that which is to come. Well, now, one half of your duties you have admirably performed. You have traced back the genealogy of the Gods to Chaos and Ge and Uranus and Eros; you have specified the feminine virtues; and you have given advice to the farmer, adding complete information with reference to the Pleiads, the seasons suitable for ploughing, reaping, and sailing,—and I know not what besides. But that far diviner gift, which would have been of so much more practical utility to your readers, you do not exercise at all: the soothsaying department is entirely overlooked. We find no parallel in your poems to those prophetic utterances which Calchas, and Telemus, and Polyidus, and Phineus—persons less favoured by the Muses than yourself—were wont to dispense freely to all applicants. Now in these circumstances, you must plead guilty to one of three charges. Either the alleged promise of the Muses to disclose the future to you was never given, and you are—excuse the expression—a liar: or it was given, and fulfilled, but you, niggard, have quietly pocketed the information, and refuse to impart it to them that have need: or, thirdly, you have composed a number of prophetic works, but have not yet given them to the world; they are reserved for some more suitable occasion. I do not presume to suggest, as a fourth possibility, that the Muses have only fulfilled half of their promise, and revoked the other,—which, observe, is recorded first in your poem. Now, if you will not enlighten me on this subject, who can? As the Gods are 'givers of good,' so you, their friends and pupils, should impart your knowledge frankly, and set our doubts at rest.

Hes. My poor friend, there is one very simple answer to all your questions: I might tell you that not one of my poems is my own work; all is the Muses', and to them I might refer you for all that has been said and left unsaid. For what came of my own knowledge, of pasturage, of milking, of driving afield, and all that belongs to the herdsman's art, I may fairly be held responsible: but for the Goddesses,—they give whatso they will to whom they will.—Apart from this, however, I have the usual poet's apology. The poet, I conceive, is not to be called to account in this minute fashion, syllable by syllable. If in the fervour of composition a word slip in unawares, search not too narrowly; remember that with us metre and euphony have much to answer for; and then there are certain amplifications—certain elegances—that insinuate themselves into a verse, one scarce knows how. Sir, you would rob us of our highest prerogative, our freedom, our unfettered movement. Blind to the flowers of poetry, you are intent upon its thorns, upon those little flaws that give a handle to malicious criticism. But there! you are not the only offender, nor I the only victim: in the trivial defects of Homer, my fellow craftsman, many a carping spirit has found material for similar hair-splitting disquisitions.—Come, now, I will meet my accuser on fair ground, face to face. Read, fellow, in my Works and Days: mark the inspired prophecies there set forth: the doom foretold to the negligent, the success promised to him that labours aright and in due season.

One basket shall suffice to store thy grain,
And men shall not regard thee.

Could there be a more timely warning, balanced as it is by the prospect of abundance held out to him that follows the true method of agriculture?

Ly. Admirable; and spoken like a true herdsman. There is no doubting the divine afflatus after that: left to yourself, you cannot so much as defend your own poems. At the same time, this is not quite the sort of thing we expect of Hesiod and the Muses combined. You see, in this particular branch of prophecy, you are quite outclassed by the farmers: they are perfectly qualified to inform us that if the rain comes there will be a heavy crop, and that a drought, on the other hand, will inevitably be followed by scarcity; that midsummer is not a good time to begin ploughing if you wish your seed to do anything, and that you will find no grain in the ear if you reap it when it is green. Nor do we want a prophet to tell us that the sower must be followed by a labourer armed with a spade, to cover up the seed; otherwise, the birds will come and consume his prospective harvest. Call these useful suggestions, if you like: but they are very far from my idea of prophecy. I expect a prophet to penetrate into secrets wholly hidden from our eyes: the prophet informs Minos that he will find his son drowned in a jar of honey; he explains to the Achaeans the cause of Apollo's resentment; he specifies the precise year in which Troy will be captured. That is prophecy. But if the term is to be so extended, then I shall be glad to have my own claims recognized without loss of time. I undertake, without the assistance of Castalian waters, laurel-branches, or Delphian tripods, to foretell and prognosticate: That if a man walk out on a cold morning with nothing on, he will take a severe chill; and particularly if it happens to be raining or hailing at the time. And I further prophesy: That his chill will be accompanied by the usual fever; together with other circumstances which it would be superfluous to mention.

No, Hesiod: your defence will not do; nor will your prophecies. But I dare say there is something in what you said at first—that you knew not what you wrote, by reason of the divine afflatus versifying within you. And that afflatus was no such great matter, either: afflatuses should not promise more than they mean to perform.

F.

THE SHIP: OR, THE WISHES

Lycinus. Timolaus. Samippus. Adimantus

Ly. Said I not well? More easily shall a corpse lie mouldering in the sun, and the vulture mark it not, than any strange sight escape Timolaus, no matter though he must run all the way to Corinth at a stretch for it.—Indefatigable sightseer!

Ti. Well, Lycinus, what do you expect? One has nothing to do, and just then one hears that a great monster of an Egyptian corn-ship has put in to Piraeus. What is more, I believe you and Samippus came down on precisely the same errand.

Ly. So we did, so we did, and Adimantus with us; only he has got lost somewhere in the crowd of spectators. We came all together to the ship; and going on board you were in front, Samippus, if I remember, and Adimantus next, and I was behind, hanging on to him for dear life; he gave me a hand all up the gangway, because I had never taken my shoes off, and he had; but I saw no more of him after that, either on board or when we came ashore.

Sa. You see when it was we lost him, Lycinus? It must have been when that nice-looking boy came up from the hold, you know, with the beautiful clean linen, and his hair parted in the middle and done up in a knot behind. If I know anything of Adimantus, he no sooner saw that charming sight, than he said good-bye to the Egyptian ship-wright who was showing us round; and now stands urging his tearful suit. You know his way; tears come natural to him in these affairs of the heart.

Ly. Well, but, Samippus, this boy was nothing great, that he should make such a conquest; Adimantus has the beauties of Athens at his beck; nice gentlemanly boys, with good Greek on their tongues, and the mark of the gymnasium on every muscle; a man may languish under their rigours with some credit. As for this fellow, to say nothing of his dark skin, and protruding lips, and spindle shanks, his words came tumbling out in a heap, one on the top of another; it was Greek, of course, but the voice, the accent were Egyptian born. And then his hair: no freeman ever had his hair tied up in a knot behind like that.

Ti. Oh, but that is a sign of noble birth in Egypt, Lycinus. All gentlemen's sons wear their hair done up till they reach manhood. It was the other way with our ancestors: the topknot, and the golden grasshopper to keep it together, were the proper thing for old men in their time.

Sa. Very much to the point, Timolaus; you allude to the remarks in Thucydides's preface, about our old luxurious habits, as preserved in the Asiatic colonies.

Ly. Of course! I remember now where it was we lost Adimantus. It was when we were standing all that time looking up at the mast, counting the layers of hides, and watching that marvellous fellow going up the shrouds, and running along the yards, perfectly comfortable, with just a hand on the yard-tackling.

Sa. So it was. Well, now what are we to do? Shall we wait for him here, or do you think I had better go back on board?

Ti. No, no, let us walk on; he has probably gone tearing off home, not being able to find us. Anyhow, he knows the way; he will never get lost for want of us to take care of him.

Ly. It is rather a shame, perhaps, to go off and leave one's friend to shift for himself. However, I agree, if Samippus does.

Sa. Certainly I do. We may find the gymnasium open still.—I say, though, what a size that ship was! 180 feet long, the man said, and something over a quarter of that in width; and from deck to keel, the maximum depth, through the hold, 44 feet. And then the height of the mast, with its huge yard; and what a forestay it takes to hold it! And the lofty stern with its gradual curve, and its gilded beak, balanced at the other end by the long rising sweep of the prow, and the figures of her name-goddess, Isis, on either side. As to the other ornamental details, the paintings and the scarlet topsail, I was more struck by the anchors, and the capstans and windlasses, and the stern cabins. The crew was like a small army. And they were saying she carried as much corn as would feed every soul in Attica for a year. And all depends for its safety on one little old atomy of a man, who controls that great rudder with a mere broomstick of a tiller! He was pointed out to me; Heron was his name, I think; a woolly-pated fellow, half-bald.

Ti. He is a wonderful hand at it, so the crew say; a very Proteus in sea-cunning. Did they tell you how he brought them here, and all their adventures? how they were saved by a star?

Ly. No; you can tell us about that now.

Ti. I had it from the master, a nice intelligent fellow to talk to. They set sail with a moderate wind from Pharus, and sighted Acamas on the seventh day. Then a west wind got up, and they were carried as far east as Sidon. On their way thence they came in for a heavy gale, and the tenth day brought them through the Straits to the Chelidon Isles; and there they very nearly went to the bottom. I have sailed past the Chelidons myself, and I know the sort of seas you get there, especially if the wind is SW. by S.; it is just there, of course, that the division takes place between the Lycian and Pamphylian waters; and the surge caused by the numerous currents gets broken at the headland, whose rocks have been sharpened by the action of the water till they are like razors; the result is a stupendous crash of waters, the waves often rising to the very top of the crags. This was the kind of thing they found themselves in for, according to the master,—and on a pitch dark night! However, the Gods were moved by their distress, and showed them a fire that enabled them to identify the Lycian coast; and a bright star—either Castor or Pollux—appeared at the masthead, and guided the ship into the open sea on their left; just in time, for she was making straight for the cliff. Having once lost their proper course, they sailed on through the Aegean, bearing up against the Etesian winds, until they came to anchor in Piraeus yesterday, being the seventieth day of the voyage; you see how far they had been carried out of their way; whereas if they had taken Crete on their right, they would have doubled Malea, and been at Rome by this time.

Ly. A pretty pilot this Heron, and no mistake, to get so far out in his reckoning; a man after Nereus's heart!—But look! that is surely Adimantus?

Ti. Adimantus it is. Let us hail him. Adimantus!... Son of Strombichus!... of the deme of Myrrhinus! He must be offended with us, or else he is deaf; it is certainly he.

Ly. I can make him out quite clearly now; his cloak, his walk, his cropped head. Let us mend our pace, and catch him up.—We shall have to pull you by the cloak, and compel you to turn round, Adimantus; you will take no notice of our shouts. You seem like one rapt in contemplation; you are pondering on matters of no light import?

Ad. Oh, it is nothing serious. An idle fancy, that came to me as I walked, and engrossed my attention, so that I never heard you.

Ly. And the fancy? Tell us without reserve, unless it is a very delicate matter. And even if it is, you know, we have all been through the Mysteries; we can keep a secret.

Ad. No, I had rather not tell you; you would think it so childish.

Ly. Can it be a love affair? Speak on; those mysteries too are not unknown to us; we have been initiated in full torchlight.

Ad. Oh dear, no; nothing of that kind.—No; I was making myself an imaginary present of a fortune—that 'vain, deluding joy,' as it has been called; I had just reached the pinnacle of luxury and affluence when you arrived.

Ly. Then all I have to say is, 'Halves!' Come, out with your wealth! We are Adimantus's friends: let us share his superfluities.

Ad. Well, I lost sight of you at once on the ship—the moment I had got you safely up, Lycinus. I was measuring the thickness of the anchor, and you disappeared somewhere. However, I went on and saw everything, and then I asked one of the sailors how much the vessel brought in to her owner in an average year. Three thousand pounds, he said, was the lowest reckoning. So afterwards, on the way back, I was thinking: Suppose some God took it into his head to make me a present of that ship; what a glorious life I should have of it, and my friends too! Sometimes I could make the trip myself, at other times I could send my men. On the strength of that three thousand, I had already built myself a house, nicely situated just above the Poecile—I would have nothing more to say to my ancestral abode on the banks of the Ilissus,—and was in treaty for my wardrobe and slaves and chariots and stable. And now behold me on board, the envy of every passenger, and the terror of my crew, who regarded me as next thing to a king; I was getting matters shipshape, and taking a last look at the port in the distance, when up comes Lycinus, capsizes the vessel, just as she is scudding before a wishing wind, and sends all my wealth to the bottom.

Ly. Well, you are a man of spirit: lay hands on me, and away with me to the governor, for the buccaneer that I am. A flagrant case of piracy; on the high roads, too, between Athens and Piraeus. Stay, though; perhaps we can compound the matter. What do you say to five ships, larger and finer ones than your Egyptian; above all, warranted not to sink?—each to bring you, shall we say, five cargoes of corn per annum? Though I foresee that you will be the most unbearable of shipowners when you have got them. The possession of this one made you deaf to our salutations; give you five more—three-masters all of them, and imperishable—and the result is obvious: you will not know your friends when you see them. And so, good voyage to your worship; we will establish ourselves at Piraeus, and question all who land from Egypt or Italy, as to whether they came across Adimantus's great ship, the Isis, anywhere.

Ad. There now; that was why I refused to tell you about it at first; I knew you would make a jest and a laughing-stock of my Wish. So now I shall stop here till you have got on ahead, and then I shall go another voyage on my ship. I like talking to my sailors much better than being jeered at by you.

Ly. That will never do. We shall hang about, and go on board too.

Ad. I shall go on first, and haul up the gangway.

Ly. Then we shall swim across and board you. You seem to think there will be no difficulty about your acquiring these great ships without building them or paying for them; why should not we obtain from the Gods the privilege of swimming for an indefinite distance without getting tired? You made no objection to our company the other day, you know, when we all went across together to Aegina, to see the rites of Hecate, in that tiny little boat, at sixpence a head; and now you are furious at the idea of our going on board with you; you go on ahead, and haul up the gangway. You forget yourself, my Shipowner; you wax fat and kick; you withhold from Nemesis her due. See what comes of houses in fashionable quarters, and great retinues. Well, please remember to bring us back some of those exquisite smoked fish from the Nile, or some myrrh from Canopus, or an ibis from Memphis;—I suppose you would scarcely have room for a pyramid?

Ti. That is enough, Lycinus. Spare his blushes. You have quite swamped his ship; she is laughter-logged, and can weather it no longer. Now, we have still some distance before us; let us break it up into four parts, and each have so many furlongs, in which he may demand of the Gods what he will. This will lighten our journey, and amuse us into the bargain; we shall revel in a delightful waking dream of unlimited prosperity; for each of us will have full control of his own Wish, and it will be understood that the Gods must grant everything, however impracticable. Above all, it will give us an idea who would make the best use of the supposed wealth; we shall see what kind of a man it would have made of him.

Sa. A good idea. I am your man; I undertake to wish when my turn comes. We need not ask Adimantus whether he agrees; he has one foot on board already. We must have Lycinus's sanction, however.

Ly. Why, let us to our wealth, if so it must be. Where all is prosperity, I would not be thought to cast an evil eye.

Ad. Who begins?

Ly. You; and then Samippus, and then Timolaus. I shall only want the last hundred yards or so before the Gate for mine, and a quick hundred, too.

Ad. Well, I stick to my ship still; only I shall wish some more things, as it is allowed. May the God of Luck say Yes to all! I will have the ship, and everything in her; the cargo, the merchants, the women, the sailors, and anything else that is particularly nice to have.

Sa. You forget one thing you have on board—

Ad. Oh, the boy with the hair; yes, him too. And instead of the present cargo of wheat, I will have the same bulk of coined gold, all sovereigns.

Ly. Hullo! The ship will sink. Wheat and gold to the same bulk are not of the same weight.

Ad. Now, don't make envious remarks. When your turn comes, you can have the whole of Parnes turned into a mass of gold if you like, and I shall say nothing.

Ly. Oh, I was only thinking of your safety. I don't want all hands to go down with the golden cargo. It would not matter so much about us, but the poor boy would be drowned; he can't swim.

Ti. Oh, that will be all right. The dolphins will pick him up and get him to shore. Shall a paltry musician be rescued by them for a song's sake, a lifeless Melicertes be carried on their backs to the Isthmus, and Adimantus's latest purchase find never an amorous dolphin at his need?

Ad. Timolaus, you are just as bad as Lycinus, with your superfluous sneers. You ought to know better; it was all your idea.

Ti. You should make it more plausible. Find a treasure under your bed; that would save unloading the gold, and getting it up to town.

Ad. Oh yes! It shall be dug up from under the Hermes in our court; a thousand bushels of coined gold. Well; my first thought has been for a handsome house,—'the homestead first and chiefest,' says Hesiod; and my purchases in the neighbourhood are now complete; there remains my property at Delphi, and the sea-front at Eleusis; and a little something at the Isthmus (I might want to stop there for the games); and the plain of Sicyon; and in short every scrap of land in the country where there is nice shade, or a good stream, or fine fruit; I reserve them all. We will eat off gold plate; and our cups shall weigh 100 lb. apiece; I will have none of the flimsy ware that appears on Echecrates's table.

Ly. I dare say! And how is your cupbearer going to hand you a thing of that weight, when he has filled it? And how will you like taking it from him? It would tax the muscles of a Sisyphus, let alone a cupbearer's.

Ad. Oh, don't keep on picking holes in my Wish. I shall have tables and couches of solid gold, if I like; and servants too, if you say another word.

Ly. Well, take care, or you will be like Midas, with nothing but gold to eat and drink; and die of a right royal hunger, a martyr to superabundance.

Ad. Your turn will come presently, Lycinus, and then you can be as realistic as you like. To proceed: I must have purple raiment, and every luxury, and sleep as late as I like; with friends to come and pay court to me, and every one bowing down to the ground; and they will all have to wait about at my doors from early morning—the great Cleaenetus and Democritus among them; oh yes, and when they come and try to get in before every one else, seven great foreign giants of porters shall slam the door in their faces, just as theirs do now. And as soon as I feel inclined, I shall peep out like the rising sun, and some of that set I shall simply ignore; but if there is some poor man there, like me before I got the treasure, I shall have a kind word for him: 'You must come and have dinner with me, after your bath; you know my hour.' The great men will all choke with envy when they see my chariots and horses, and my handsome slaves—two thousand choice ones, of all ages. Well, so the dinner service is to be of gold,—no silver for me, it is much too cheap—and I shall have smoked fish from Spain; wine from Italy; oil from Spain again; our own honey, but it must be clarified without heat; delicacies from all quarters; wild boars; hares; all sorts of birds, pheasants, Indian peacocks, Numidian capons; and special cooks for everything, artists in sauce and seasoning. And when I call for a beaker or goblet to pledge any one, he shall take it home with him. As to the people who now pass for rich, they, I need not say, will be paupers to me. Dionicus will give up displaying his silver plate and cup in processions, when he sees that my slaves eat off nothing but silver. I should set apart something for the public service, too; a monthly distribution of £4 a head to citizens, and half that to foreigners; and the most beautiful theatres and baths you can imagine; and the sea should be brought along a great canal up to the Double Gates, and there would be a harbour close by, so that my ship could be seen lying at anchor from the Ceramicus. And of you who are my friends, Samippus should have twenty bushels of coined gold paid out to him by my steward; Timolaus, five quarts; and Lycinus one quart, strict measure, because he talks too much, and sneers at my Wish. That is how I would live; revelling in every luxury without stint, superlatively rich. I have done. Hermes bring it all to pass!

Ly. Have you realized on what a slender thread all this wealth depends? Once let that break, and all is gone; your treasure is but dust and ashes.

Ad. How so?

Ly. Why, it is not clear how long this life of affluence is to last. Who knows? You may be sitting one day at your solid gold table, just putting out your hand for a slice of that peacock or capon, when, at that very moment, off flies animula vagula, and Adimantus after her, leaving his all a prey to crows and vultures. Need I enumerate instances? There have been rich men who have died before they knew what it was to be rich; others have lived to be robbed of their possessions by some malign spirit who waits upon wealth. The cases of Croesus and Polycrates are familiar to you. Their riches were greater far than yours; yet at one stroke they lost all. But leaving them out of the case, do you consider that you have good security for the continuance of your health? Look at the number of rich men whose lives are made miserable by their infirmities: some are crippled, others are blind, others have internal diseases. Say what you will, I am sure that for double your wealth you would not consent to be a weakling like rich Phanomachus; not to mention the artful designs, the robberies, the envy, and the unpopularity that are inseparable from wealth. See what troubles your treasure will land you in!

Ad. You are always against me, Lycinus. I shall cancel your quart now, for this last piece of spite.

Ly. That is so like a rich man, to draw back and break his promise; a good beginning! Now, Samippus, it is your turn to wish.

Sa. Well, I am a landsman; I come from Mantinea, you know, in Arcadia; so I shall not ask for a ship; I could make no show with that in my country. Nor will I insult the generosity of the Gods by asking for so much gold down. I understand there is no boon so great, but their power and Timolaus's law can compass it; we are to wish away without ceremony, he says,—they will refuse us nothing. Well then, I wish to be a king. But I will not succeed to a hereditary throne, like Alexander of Macedon, Ptolemy, Mithridates and the rest of them. No, I will begin as a brigand, in a troop of thirty or so, brisk companions ready at need. Then little by little we shall grow to be 300; then 1,000, and presently 10,000; and at last we shall total 50,000 heavy-armed, and 5,000 horse. I shall be elected their chieftain by general consent, having shown myself to be the best qualified for the command and conduct of their affairs. Already, you see, I have the advantage of ordinary kings: I am elected to the command on my own merits; I am no hereditary monarch, reaping the fruits of my predecessor's labours. That would be like Adimantus, with his treasure; but there is much more satisfaction in knowing that your power is the work of your own hands.

Ly. Now really, this is a Wish, and no mistake; the very acme of blessedness; to be commander of that vast company, chosen on your own merits by 50,000 men! A genius, a master of strategy and king-craft has been quietly growing up in Mantinea, and we not a whit the wiser! But I interrupt. Proceed, O King, at the head of your troops; dispose your forces, infantry and cavalry. Whither, I wonder, goes this mighty host, issuing from Arcadia? Who are to be the first victims?

Sa. I'll tell you; or you can come with us, if you like. I will put you in command of the cavalry.

Ly. Why, as to that, your Majesty, I am much beholden to you for the honour; accept my most oriental prostrations; and manuflexions. But, with all respect to your diadem, and the perpendicularity of your tiara, you would do well to take one of these stout fellows instead. I am sadly deficient in horsemanship; indeed, I was never on a horse in my life. I am afraid that when the trumpet sounded to advance, I might fall off, and be trampled, in the general confusion, under some of those numerous hoofs. Or again, my spirited charger might get the bit between his teeth, and carry me right into the midst of the enemy. If I am to remain in possession of saddle and bridle, I shall have to be tied on.

Ad. All right, Samippus, I will command the cavalry; Lycinus can have the right wing. I have the first claim on you, after all those bushels of sovereigns.

Sa. Let us see what my troopers think of you for a leader. All in favour of Adimantus, hold up their hands.

Ad. All hands go up, look.

Sa. You command the cavalry, then, and Lycinus the right wing. Timolaus will have the left wing. I am in the centre, like the Persian monarchs when they take the field in person. Well; after due observance paid to Zeus, king of kings, we advance along the hill-road to Corinth. Greece being now subjugated (for no resistance will be offered to our enormous host, we shall merely walk over), we get our troops on to the galleys, and the horses on to the transports (arrangements having been made at Cenchreae for the requisite number of vessels, with adequate provision and so on), cross the Aegean, and land in Ionia. Here we sacrifice to Artemis, and finding the various cities unfortified, take easy possession of them, put in governors, and march on in the direction of Syria. On the way we pass through Caria, Lycia, Pamphylia, Pisidia, the mountains and sea-board of Cilicia, and so at last reach the Euphrates.

Ly. If your Majesty has no objection, I will stay behind and be Pacha of Greece. I am a poor-spirited fellow; to go all that way from home is not to my liking at all. You evidently meditate an attack upon the Parthians and Armenians, warlike folk, and unerring shots. Let some one else have the right wing, and let me play Antipater here at home. Some arrow, from the walls of Susa or Bactra, might find a chink in my armour, and let daylight through me; and there would be a melancholy end of my strategic career.

Sa. Oh coward, to desert your post! The penalty for that is decapitation.—We are now at the Euphrates, and have thrown our bridge across. All is secured in our rear by the subordinates whom I have placed in charge of the various districts; officers have also been dispatched for the reduction of Phoenicia and Palestine, and, subsequently, of Egypt. Now, Lycinus, you cross first, with the right wing; I next, and Timolaus after me. Last comes Adimantus with the cavalry. We have now crossed Mesopotamia, and no enemy has yet shown himself; town after town has voluntarily given itself up; we reach Babylon; we enter its gates without warning, and the city is ours. The Persian king meanwhile is at Ctesiphon. He hears of our approach and withdraws to Seleucia, where he proceeds to muster his full strength of cavalry, bowmen, and slingers. Our scouts report that the force already collected numbers something like a million, including two hundred thousand mounted bowmen; and the Armenian, Caspian, and Bactrian contingents are still to come; only the neighbouring districts, the suburbs, as it were, of the empire, have contributed as yet. With such ease does the Persian monarch raise a million of men! It is now time for us to think what we are to do next.

Ad. Well, I say that you should all march for Ctesiphon, leaving me to secure Babylon with the cavalry.

Sa. Are you going to show the white feather too, Adimantus, now that the danger is near?—Timolaus, what is your advice?

Ti. We must march upon the enemy in full force, before they have had time to strengthen their hands with the reinforcements that are pouring in from all quarters; let us engage them whilst they are still making their several ways to Seleucia.

Sa. There is something in that. What do you recommend, Lycinus?

Ly. Well, we have all been on our legs till we are tired out; there was the early walk down, and we must be a good three miles now on the way home; and the sun is extremely powerful—it is just about noon: how would it be to sit down for a bit on that ruined column under the olive trees, till we are sufficiently restored to complete the journey?

Sa. O sancta simplicitas! Did you think that you were at Athens all this time? You are in the plain before Babylon, in a great camp,—engaged in a council of war.

Ly. Why, so I am. I forgot; we are drunk, of course; it is against rules to talk sense.

Sa. Well, now, please, to the attack. Bear yourselves gallantly in this hour of danger: be not less than Greeks. See, the enemy are upon us. Our watchword is 'Lord of Battles.' The moment the trumpet sounds, raise the war-cry, clash spear upon shield, and lose no time in coming to close quarters, out of danger of their arrows; otherwise the bowmen will give us a warm reception. No sooner do we get to work than Timolaus with his left wing routs their right; in the centre the conflict is even; for I have the native Persian troops against me, and the king is in their midst. The whole strength of their cavalry bears down upon our right wing; play the man, therefore, Lycinus; and encourage your troops to receive the charge.

Ly. Just my luck! Every single trooper of them is making straight for me, as if I were the only foeman worthy of their steel. If they go on like this, I think I shall have to turn tail and make for the gymnasium, and leave you to fight it out.

Sa. Nonsense; you have almost beaten them already. Now, observe, the king challenges me to single combat; honour forbids that I should draw back; I accordingly engage him.

Ly. To be sure; and are promptly wounded. No king should omit to receive a wound, when empire is at stake.

Sa. Well, yes; I do get just a scratch; it is well out of sight, however, so the scar will be no disfigurement. On the other hand, observe the fury of my charge: I send my spear through horse and rider at one stroke; cut off the royal head; remove the diadem therefrom, and am saluted as king with universal prostrations. That applies only to the barbarians; from you who are Greeks I shall have merely the usual title of commander-in-chief. You may imagine the rest: the Samippopolises I shall found, the cities I shall storm and destroy for slighting my supremacy. The wealthy Cydias will come in for the largest share of my attention; I have not forgotten his gradual encroachments on my property, in the days when we were neighbours.

Ly. Stop there, Samippus; after such a victory, it is high time you retired to Babylon, to keep festival. Three-quarters of a mile is your allowance of dominion, as I reckon it. Timolaus now selects his wish.

Sa. Well, tell me what you think of mine?

Ly. It seems to me, most sapient monarch, to involve considerably more trouble and annoyance than that of Adimantus. While he lives luxuriously, and hands about gold cups—hundred-pounders—to his guests, you are sustaining wounds in single combat. From morning till night, all is worry and anxiety with you. You have not only the public enemies to fear: there are the numberless conspiracies, the envy and hatred of your courtiers; you have flatterers enough, but not one friend; their seeming goodwill is the work of fear or ambition. As to enjoyment, you can never dream of such a thing. You have to content yourself with glory and gold embroidery and purple; with the victor's garland, and the king's bodyguard; beyond these there is nothing but intolerable toil and continual discomfort. You are either negotiating with ambassadors, or judging cases, or issuing mandates to your subjects. Here a tribe revolts: there an enemy invades. All is fear and suspicion. The world may think you happy; but you know better. And surely it is a very humiliating circumstance that you should be apt to fall ill, just like ordinary people? Fevers seem not to understand that you are a king; nor does Death stand in any awe of your bodyguard; when the fancy takes him, he comes, and carries you off lamenting; what cares he for the diadem? Fallen from your high estate, dragged from your kingly throne, you go the same road as the rest of us; there is no 'benefit of royalty' among the timid flock of shades. You leave behind you upon earth some massive tomb, some stately column, some pyramid of noble outline; but it will be too late then for vanity to enjoy these things; and the statues and temples, the offerings of obsequious cities, nay, your great name itself, all will presently decay, and vanish, and be of no further account. Take it at the best; let all endure for ages: what will it profit your senseless clay? And it is for this that you are to live uneasy days, ever scheming, fearing, toiling!—Timolaus, the wish is with you. We shall expect better things from your judgement and experience.

Ti. See if you can find anything questionable or reprehensible in what I propose. As to treasure-heaps and bushels of coin, I will have none of them; nor monarchy, with the wars and terrors it involves. You rightly censured such things, precarious as they are, exposed to endless machinations, and bringing with them more vexation than pleasure. No; my wish is that Hermes should appear and present me with certain rings, possessed of certain powers. One should ensure its wearer continual health and strength, invulnerability, insensibility to pain. Another, like that of Gyges, should make me invisible. A third should give me the strength to pick up with ease a weight that ten thousand men could barely move. Then I must be able to fly to any height above the earth; a ring for that. Again, I shall want to be able to put people to sleep upon occasion; and at my approach all doors must immediately fly open, all bolts yield, all bars withdraw. One ring may secure these points. There remains yet one, the most precious of them all; for with it on my finger I am the desire of every woman and boy, ay, of whole nations; not one escapes me; I am in all hearts, on all tongues. Women will hang themselves for the vehemence of their passion, boys will go mad. Happy will those few be reckoned on whom I cast a glance; and those whom I scorn will pine away for grief. Hyacinth, Hylas, Phaon, will sink into insignificance beside me. And all this I hold on no brief tenure; the limitations of human life are not for me. I shall live a thousand years, ever renewing my youth, and casting off the slough of old age every time I get to seventeen.—With these rings I shall lack nothing. All that is another's is mine: for can I not open his doors, put his guards to sleep, and walk in unperceived? Instead of sending to India or to the Hyperboreans for their curiosities, their treasures, their wines or their delicacies, I can fly thither myself, and take my fill of all. The phoenix of India, the griffin, that winged monster, are sights unknown to others: I shall see them. I alone shall know the sources of the Nile, the lands that are uninhabited, the Antipodes, if such there be, dwelling on the other side of the earth. Nay, I may learn the nature of the stars, the moon, the sun itself; for fire cannot harm me. And think of the joy of announcing the Olympian victor's name in Babylon, on the day of the contest! or of having one's breakfast in Syria, and one's dinner in Italy! Had I an enemy, I could be even with him, thanks to my invisibility, by cracking his skull with a rock; my friends, on the other hand, I might subsidize with showers of gold as they lay asleep. Have we some overweening tyrant, who insults us with his wealth? I carry him off a couple of miles or so, and drop him over the nearest precipice. I could enjoy the company of my beloved without let or hindrance, going secretly in after I had put every one else in the house to sleep. What a thing it would be to hover overhead, out of range, and watch contending armies! If I liked, I could take the part of the vanquished, send their conquerors to sleep, rally the fugitives and give them the victory. In short, the affairs of humanity would be my diversion; all things would be in my power; mankind would account me a God. Here is the perfection of happiness, secure and indestructible, backed as it is by health and longevity. What faults have you to find, Lycinus?

Ly. None; it is not safe to thwart a man who has wings, and the strength of ten thousand. I have only one question to ask. Did you ever, among all the nations you passed in your flight, meet with a similar case of mental aberration? a man of mature years riding about on a finger-ring, moving whole mountains with a touch; bald and snub-nosed, yet the desire of all eyes? Ah, there was another point. What is to prevent one single ring from doing all the work? Why go about with your left hand loaded,—a ring to every finger? nay, they overflow; the right hand must be forced into the service. And you have left out the most important ring of all, the one to stop your drivelling at this absurd rate. Perhaps you consider that a stiffish dose of hellebore would serve the turn?

Ti. Now, positively, Lycinus, you must have a try yourself. You find fault with everybody else; this time we should like to hear your version of a really unexceptionable wish.

Ly. What do I want with a wish? Here we are at the gates. What with the valiant Samippus's single combat at Babylon, and your breakfasts in Syria and dinners in Italy, you have used up my ground between you; and you are heartily welcome. I have no fancy for a short-lived visionary wealth, with the humiliating sequel of barley-bread and no butter. That will be your fate presently. Your bliss and your wealth will take wings; you will wake from your charming dreams of treasure and diadems, to find that your domestic arrangements are of quite another kind, like the actors who take the king's part in tragedies;—their late majesties King Agamemnon and King Creon usually return to very short commons on leaving the theatre. Some depression, some discontent at your existing arrangements, is to be expected on the occasion. You will be the worst off, Timolaus. Your flying-machine will come to grief, like that of Icarus; you will descend from the skies, and foot it on the ground; and all those rings will slip off and be lost. As for me, I am content with the exquisite amusement afforded me by your various wishes; I would not exchange it for all the treasure in the world, Babylon included. And you call yourselves philosophers!

F.

DIALOGUES OF THE HETAERAE

I

Glycera. Thais

Gly. Thais, that Acarnanian soldier, who used to be so fond of Abrotonum, and then fell in love with me—he was decorated, and wore a military cloak—do you know the man I mean? I suppose you have forgotten him?

Th. Oh no, dear, I know; why, he shared our table last harvest festival. Well? you look as if you had something to tell me about him.

Gly. That wicked Gorgona (such a friend of mine, to be sure!)—she has stolen him away from me.

Th. What! he has given you up, and taken her in your place?

Gly. Yes, dear; isn't it horrid of her?

Th. Well, Glycera darling, it is wicked, of course; but it is not very surprising; it is what all we poor girls do. You mustn't be too much vexed; I shouldn't blame her, if I were you; Abrotonum never blamed you about him, you know; and you were friends, too. But I cannot think what he finds in her; where are his eyes? has he never found out how thin her hair is? what a lot of forehead she shows! and her lips! all livid; they might be a dead woman's; and that scraggy neck, veined all over; and what an amount of nose! I grant you she is tall and straight; and she has quite a nice smile.

Gly. Oh, Thais, you don't think it was her looks caught him. Don't you know? her mother Chrysarium is a witch; she knows Thessalian charms, and can draw down the moon; they do say she flies o' nights. It was she bewitched him with drugs in his drink, and now they are making their harvest out of him.

Th. Ah well, dear, you will get a harvest out of some one else; never mind him.

H.

II

Myrtium. Pamphilus. Doris

Myr. Well, Pamphilus? So I hear you are to marry Phido the shipmaster's daughter,—if you have not done so already! And this is the end of your vows and tears! All is over and forgotten! And I so near my time! Yes, that is all I have to thank my lover for; that, and the prospect of having a child to bring up; and you know what that means to us poor girls. I mean to keep the child, especially if it is a boy: it will be some comfort to me to call him after you; and perhaps some day you will be sorry, when he comes to reproach you for betraying his poor mother. I can't say much for the lady's looks. I saw her only the other day, with her mother, at the Thesmophoria; little did I know then that she was to rob me of my Pamphilus! Hadn't you better see what she is like first? Take a good look at her eyes; and try not to mind the colour, and the cast (she has such a squint!). Or no: there is no need for you to see her: you have seen Phido; you know what a face he has.

Pa. How much more nonsense are you going to talk about shipowners and marriages? What do I know about brides, ugly or pretty? If you mean Phido of Alopece, I never knew he had a grown-up daughter at all. Why, now I think of it, he is not even on speaking terms with my father. They were at law not long ago—something about a shipping contract. He owed my father a talent, I think it was, and refused to pay; so he was had up before the Admiralty Court, and my father never got paid in full, after all, so he said. Do you suppose if I wanted to marry I should pass over Demeas's daughter in favour of Phido's? Demeas was general last year, and she is my cousin on the mother's side. Who has been telling you all this? Is it just a cobweb spun in that jealous little brain of yours?

Myr. Pamphilus! You mean to say you are not going to be married?

Pa. Are you mad, or what is the matter with you? We did not have much to drink yesterday.

Myr. Ask Doris; it is all her fault. I sent her out to buy some wool, and to offer up prayer to Artemis for me. And she said that she met Lesbia, and Lesbia —— Doris, tell him what Lesbia said, unless you invented it all yourself.

Dor. May I die, miss, if I said a word more than the truth! Just by the town-hall Lesbia met me, and 'Doris,' says she, smiling, 'your young gentleman is to marry Phido's daughter. And if you don't believe me,' says she, 'look up their street, and you will see everything crowned with garlands, and a fine bustle going on; flutes playing, and people singing the wedding-song.'

Pa. Well; and you did?

Dor. That I did, sir; and it was all as Lesbia had said.

Pa. Ah, now I see! You have told your mistress nothing but the truth; and there was some ground for what Lesbia told you. However, it is a false alarm. The wedding is not at our house. I remember now. When I went back home yesterday, after leaving you, 'Pamphilus,' said my mother, 'here is neighbour Aristaenetus's son, Charmides, who is no older than you, just going to marry and settle down: when are you going to turn over a new leaf?' And then I dropped off to sleep. I went out early this morning, so that I saw nothing of all that Doris has seen. If you doubt my word, Doris can go again; and look more carefully this time, Doris; mark the house, not the street only, and you will find that the garlands are next door.

Myr. I breathe again! Pamphilus, if it had been true, I should have killed myself!

Pa. True, indeed! Am I mad, that I should forget Myrtium, so soon to become the mother of my child?

F.

III

Philinna. Her Mother

Mother. You must be mad, Philinna; what was the matter with you at the dinner last night? Diphilus was in tears this morning when he came and told me how he had been treated. You were tipsy, he said, and made an exhibition of yourself, dancing when he asked you not to; then you kissed his friend Lamprias, and when Diphilus did not like that, you left him and went and put your arms round Lamprias; and he choking with rage all the time. And afterwards you would not go near him, but let him cry by himself, and kept singing and teasing him.

Phi. Ah, mother, he never told you how he behaved; if you knew how rude he was, you would not take his part. He neglected me and made up to Thais, Lamprias's girl, before Lamprias came. I was angry, and let him see what I thought of him, and then he took hold of Thais's ear, bent her neck back and gave her—oh, such a kiss! I thought it would never end. So I began to cry; but he only laughed, and kept whispering to her—about me, of course; Thais was looking at me and smiling. However, when they heard Lamprias coming, and had had enough of each other at last, I did take my place by him all the same, not to give him an excuse for a fuss afterwards. It was Thais got up and danced first, showing her ankles ever so much, as if no one else had pretty ones. And when she stopped, Lamprias never said a word, but Diphilus praised her to the skies—such perfect time! such varied steps! foot and music always right; and what a lovely ankle! and so on, and so on; it might have been the Sosandra of Calamis he was complimenting, and not Thais; what she is really like, you know well enough. And how she insulted me, too! 'If some one is not ashamed of her spindle-shanks,' she said, 'she will get up and dance now.' Well, that is all, mammy; of course I did get up and dance. What was I to do? take it quietly and make her words seem true and let her be queen?

Mother. You are too touchy, my lass; you should have taken no notice. But go on.

Phi. Well, the others applauded, but Diphilus lay on his back and looked up at the ceiling, till I was tired and gave up.

Mother. But what about kissing Lamprias? is that true? and going across and embracing him? Well, why don't you speak? Those are things I cannot forgive.

Phi. I wanted to pay him out.

Mother. And then not sitting near him! singing while he was in tears! Think how poor we are, girl; you forget how much we have had from him, and what last winter would have been if Aphrodite had not sent him to us.

Phi. I dare say! and I am to let him outrage my feelings just for that?

Mother. Oh, be as angry as you like, but no tit for tat. You ought to know that if a lover's feelings are outraged his love ends, and he finds out his folly. You have always been too hard on the lad; pull too tight, and the rope breaks, you know.

H.

IV

Melitta. Bacchis

Me. Bacchis, don't you know any of those old women—there are any number of them about, 'Thessalians,' they call them—they have incantations, you know, and they can make a man in love with you, no matter how much he hated you before? Do go and bring me one, there's a dear! I'd give the clothes off my back, jewellery and all, to see Charinus here again, and to have him hate Simiche as he hates me at this moment.

Ba. Melitta! You mean to tell me that Charinus has gone off after Simiche, and that after making his people so angry because he wouldn't marry the heiress, all for your sake? She was to have brought him five talents, so they said. I have not forgotten what you told me about that.

Me. Oh, that is all over now; I have not had a glimpse of him for the last five days. No; he and Simiche are with his friend Pammenes enjoying themselves.

Ba. Poor darling! But it can't have been a trifle that drove him away: what was it all about?

Me. I don't know exactly. All I can say is, that he came back the other day from Piraeus (his father had sent him there to collect some money), and wouldn't even look at me! I ran to meet him, expecting him to take me in his arms, instead of which he pushed me away! 'Go to Hermotimus the ship-owner,' he said; 'go and read what is written on the column in the Ceramicus; you will find your name there, and his.' 'Hermotimus? column? what do you mean?' said I. But he would tell me nothing more; he went to bed without any dinner, and never gave me so much as a look. I tried everything: I lavished all my endearments on him, and did all I could to make him look at me. Nothing would soften him: all he said was, 'If you keep on bothering, I shall go away this minute, I don't care what time it is.'

Ba. But you did know Hermotimus, I suppose?

Me. My dear, if I ever so much as heard of a Hermotimus who was a ship-owner, may I be more wretched than I am now!—Next morning, at cock-crow, Charinus got up, and went off. I remembered his saying something about my name being written up in the Ceramicus, so I sent Acis to have a look; and all she found was just this, chalked up close by the Dipylus, on the right as you come in: Melitta loves Hermotimus; and again a little lower down: Hermotimus the ship-owner loves Melitta.

Ba. Ah, mischievous boys! I see what it is! Some one must have written it up to tease Charinus, knowing how jealous he is. And he took it all in at once! I must speak to him if I see him anywhere. He is a mere child, quite unsophisticated.

Me. If you see him, yes: but you are not likely to. He has shut himself up with Simiche; his people have been asking for him, they think he is here still. No, Bacchis, I want one of those old women; she would put all to rights.

Ba. Well, love, I know a capital witch; she comes from Syria, such a brisk, vigorous old thing! Once when Phanias had quarrelled with me in the same way, all about nothing, she brought us together again, after four whole months; I had quite given him up, but her spells drew him back.

Me. What was her fee? do you remember?

Ba. Oh, she was most reasonable: one drachma, and a loaf of bread. Then you have to provide salt, of course, and sulphur, and a torch, and seven pennies. And besides this, you must mix her a bowl of wine, which she has to drink all by herself; and then there must be something belonging to the man, his coat, or his shoes, or a lock of hair, or something.

Me. I have got his shoes.

Ba. She hangs them up on a peg, and fumigates them with the sulphur, throwing a little salt into the fire, and muttering both your names. Then she brings out her magic wheel, and spins it, and rattles off an incantation,—such horrid, outlandish words! Well, she had scarcely finished, when, sure enough, in came Phanias; Phoebis (that was the girl he was with) had begged and implored him not to go, and his friends declared it was a shame; but the spell was too strong for them. Oh yes, and she taught me a splendid charm against Phoebis. I was to mark her footsteps, and rub out the last of them, putting my right foot into her left footprint, and my left into her right; and then I was to say: My foot on thy foot; I trample thee down! I did it exactly as she told me.

Me. Oh, Bacchis, dear, do be quick and fetch the witch. Acis, you see to the bread and sulphur and things.

F.

VII

Musarium. Her Mother

Mother. Well, child, if we get another gallant like Chaereas, we must make some offerings; the earthly Aphrodite shall have a white kid, the heavenly one in the Gardens a heifer, and our lady of windfalls a garland. How well off we shall be, positively rolling in wealth! You see how much this boy brings in; not an obol, not a dress, not a pair of shoes, not a box of ointment, has he ever given you; it is all professions and promises and distant prospects; always, if my father should——, and I should inherit, everything would be yours. And according to you, he swears you shall be his wife.

Mu. Oh yes, mother, he swore it, by the two Goddesses[4] and Polias.

Mother. And you believe it, no doubt. So much so that the other day, when he had a subscription to pay and nothing to pay with, you gave him your ring without asking me, and the price of it went in drink. Another time it was the pair of Ionian necklaces that Praxias the Chian captain got made in Ephesus and brought you; two darics apiece they weighed; a club-dinner with the men of his year it was that time. As for shirts and linen, those are trifles not worth mention. A mighty catch he has been, to be sure!

Mu. He is so handsome with his smooth chin; and he loves me, and cries as he tells me so; and he is the son of Laches the Areopagite and Dinomache; and we shall be his real wife and mother-in-law, you know; we have great expectations, if only the old man would go to bye-bye.

Mother. So when we want shoes, and the shoemaker expects to be paid, we are to tell him we have no money, 'but take a few expectations.' And the baker the same. And on rent-day we shall ask the man to wait till Laches of Collytus is dead; he shall have it after the wedding. Well, I should be ashamed to be the only pretty girl that could not show an earring or a chain or a bit of lace.

Mu. Oh well, mother, are the rest of them happier or better-looking than I am?

Mother. No; but they have more sense; they know their business better than to pin their faith to the idle words of a boy with a mouthful of lover's oaths. But you go in for constancy and true love, and will have nothing to say to anybody but your Chaereas. There was that farmer from Acharnae the other day; his chin was smooth too; and he brought the two mina he had just got for his father's wine; but oh dear me no! you send him away with a sneer; none but your Adonis for you.