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The Eleven Comedies, Volume 2

by Aristophanes · English · Gutenberg #8689 · 618,690 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Eleven Comedies, Volume 2

Author: Aristophanes


        
Release date: August 1, 2005 [eBook #8689]
                Most recently updated: January 2, 2021

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8689

Credits: Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Thomas Berger, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ELEVEN COMEDIES, VOLUME 2 ***




Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Thomas Berger, and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.



The Athenian Society


ARISTOPHANES

THE ELEVEN COMEDIES


Now For The First Time Literally And Completely Translated From The Greek
Tongue Into English

With Translator's Foreword An Introduction To Each Comedy And Elucidatory
Notes


The Second Of Two Volumes

       *       *       *       *       *

CONTENTS OF THE SECOND VOLUME

THE WASPS
Introduction
Text And Notes

THE BIRDS
Introduction
Text And Notes

THE FROGS
Introduction
Text And Notes

THE THESMOPHORIAZUSAE
Introduction
Text And Notes

THE ECCLESIAZUSAE
Introduction
Text And Notes

PLUTUS
Introduction
Text And Notes

INDEX




THE WASPS




INTRODUCTION

"This Comedy, which was produced by its Author the year after the
performance of 'The Clouds,' may be taken as in some sort a companion
picture to that piece. Here the satire is directed against the passion of
the Athenians for the excitement of the law-courts, as in the former its
object was the new philosophy. And as the younger generation--the modern
school of thought--were there the subjects of the caricature, so here the
older citizens, who took their seats in court as jurymen day by day, to
the neglect of their private affairs and the encouragement of a litigious
disposition, appear in their turn in the mirror which the satirist holds
up."

There are only two characters of any importance to the action--Philocleon
('friend of Cleon') and his son Bdelycleon ('enemy of Cleon'). The plot
is soon told. Philocleon is a bigoted devotee of the malady of
litigiousness so typical of his countrymen and an enthusiastic attendant
at the Courts in his capacity of 'dicast' or juryman. Bdelycleon
endeavours to persuade his father by every means in his power to change
this unsatisfactory manner of life for something nobler and more
profitable; but all in vain. As a last resource he keeps his father a
prisoner indoors, so that he cannot attend the tribunals.

The old man tries to escape, and these attempts are conceived in the
wildest vein of extravaganza. He endeavours to get out by the chimney,
pretending he is "only the smoke"; and all hands rush to clap a cover on
the chimney-top, and a big stone on that. He slips through a hole in the
tiles, and sits on the roof, pretending to be "only a sparrow"; and they
have to set a net to catch him. Then the Chorus of Wasps, representing
Philocleon''s fellow 'dicasts,' appear on the scene to rescue him. A
battle royale takes place on the stage; the Wasps, with their formidable
stings, trying to storm the house, while the son and his retainers defend
their position with desperate courage. Finally the assailants are
repulsed, and father and son agree upon a compromise. Bdelycleon
promises, on condition that his father gives up attending the public
trails, to set up a mock tribunal for him in his own house.

Presently the theft of a Sicilian cheese by the house-dog Labes gives the
old fellow an opportunity of exercising his judicial functions. Labes is
duly arraigned and witnesses examines. But alas! Philocleon inadvertently
casts his vote for the defendant's _acquittal_, the first time in his
life "such a thing has ever occurred," and the old man nearly dies of
vexation.

At this point follows the 'Parabasis,' or Author's personal address to
the audience, after which the concluding portion of the play has little
connection with the main theme. This is a fault, according to modern
ideas, common to many of these Comedies, but it is especially marked in
this particular instance. The final part might almost be a separate play,
under the title perhaps of 'The dicast turned gentleman,' and relates
various ridiculous mistakes and laughable blunders committed by
Philocleon, who, having given up his attendance on the law-courts, has
set up for playing a part in polite society.

The drama, as was very often the case, takes its title from the Chorus--a
band of old men dressed up as wasps, who acrimonious, stinging,
exasperated temper is meant to typify the character fostered among
Athenian citizens by excessive addiction to forensic business.

Racine, in the only comedy he attempted, 'Les Plaideurs,' borrows the
incident of the mock trial of the house-dog, amplifying and adding
further diverting features.

Perhaps 'The Wasps' is the least amusing of all our Author's pieces which
have come down to us--at any rate to a modern reader. The theme of its
satire, the litigious spirit of the Athenians, is after all purely local
and temporary, while the fun often strikes us as thin and forced.
Schlegel writes in his 'Dramatic Literature': "The subject is too
limited, the folly it ridicules appears a disease of too singular a
description, without a sufficient universality of application, and the
action is too much drawn out."

       *       *       *       *       *

THE WASPS


DRAMATIS PERSONAE

PHILOCLEON, a Dicast.
BDELYCLEON, his Son.
SOSIAS, House-servant of Philocleon.
XANTHIAS, House-servant of Philocleon.
BOYS.
A DOG.
A BAKER'S WIFE.
ACCUSER.
CHORUS OF ELDERS, costumed as Wasps.

SCENE: Philocleon's house at Athens.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE WASPS


SOSIAS. Why, Xanthias! what are you doing, wretched man?

XANTHIAS. I am teaching myself how to rest; I have been awake and on
watch the whole night.

SOSIAS. So you want to earn trouble for your ribs,[1] eh? Don't you know
what sort of an animal we are guarding here?

XANTHIAS. Aye indeed! but I want to put my cares to sleep for a while.

SOSIAS. Beware what you do. I too feel soft sleep spreading over my eyes.
Resist it, for you must be as mad as a Corybant if you fall asleep.[2]

XANTHIAS. No! 'Tis Bacchus who lulls me off.

SOSIAS. Then you serve the same god as myself. Just now a heavy slumber
settled on my eyelids like a hostile Mede; A nodded and, faith! I had a
wondrous dream.

XANTHIAS. Indeed! and so had I. A dream such as I never had before. But
first tell me yours.

SOSIAS. Methinks I saw an eagle, a gigantic bird, descend upon the
market-place; it seized a brazen buckler with its talons and bore it away
into the highest heavens; then I saw 'twas Cleonymus had thrown it away.

XANTHIAS. This Cleonymus is a riddle worth propounding among guests. How
can one and the same animal have cast away his buckler both on land, in
the sky and at sea?[3]

SOSIAS. Alas!  what ill does such a dream portend for me?

XANTHIAS. Rest undisturbed! An it please the gods, no evil will befall
you.

SOSIAS. Nevertheless, 'tis a fatal omen when a man throws away his
weapons. But what was your dream? Let me hear.

XANTHIAS. Oh! it is a dream of high import. It has reference to the hull
of the State; to nothing less.

SOSIAS. Tell it me quickly; show me its very keel.

XANTHIAS. In my first slumber I thought I saw sheep, wearing cloaks and
carrying staves,[4] met in assembly on the Pnyx; a rapacious whale was
haranguing them and screaming like a pig that is being grilled.

SOSIAS. Faugh! faugh!

XANTHIAS. What's the matter?

SOSIAS. Enough, enough, spare me. Your dream stinks vilely of old
leather.[5]

XANTHIAS. Then this scoundrelly whale seized a balance and set to
weighing ox-fat.[6]

SOSIAS. Alas! 'tis our poor Athenian people, whom this accursed beast
wished to cut up and despoil of their fat.

XANTHIAS. Seated on the ground close to it, I saw Theorus,[7] who had the
head of a crow. The Alcibiades said to me in his lisping way, "Do you
thee? Theoruth hath a crow'th head."[8]

SOSIAS. Ah! 'twas very well lisped indeed!

XANTHIAS. This is might strange; Theorus turning into a crow!

SOSIAS. No, it is glorious.

XANTHIAS. Why?

SOSIAS. Why? He was a man and now he has suddenly become a crow; does it
not foretoken that he will take his flight from here and go to the
crows?[9]

XANTHIAS. Interpreting dreams so aptly certainly deserves two obols.[10]

SOSIAS. Come, I must explain the matter to the spectators. But first a
few words of preamble: expect nothing very high-flown from us, nor any
jests stolen from Megara;[11] we have no slaves, who throw baskets of
nuts[12] to the spectators, nor any Heracles to be robbed of his
dinner,[13] nor is Euripides loaded with contumely; and despite the happy
chance that gave Cleon his fame[14] we shall not go out of our way to
belabour him again. Our little subject is not wanting in sense; it is
well within your capacity and at the same time cleverer than many vulgar
Comedies.--We have a master of great renown, who is now sleeping up there
on the other story. He has bidden us keep guard over his father, whom he
has locked in, so that he may not go out. This father has a curious
complaint; not one of you could hit upon or guess it, if I did not tell
you.--Well then, try! I hear Amynias, the son of Pronapus, over there,
saying, "He is addicted to gambling."

XANTHIAS. He's wrong! He is imputing his own malady to others.

SOSIAS. No, yet love is indeed the principal part of his disease. Ah!
here is Sosias telling Dercylus, "He loves drinking."

XANTHIAS. Not at all! The love of wine is the complaint of good men.

SOSIAS. "Well then," says Nicostratus of the Scambonian deme, "he either
loves sacrifices or else strangers."

XANTHIAS. Ah! great gods! no, he is not fond of strangers, Nicostratus,
for he who says "Philoxenus" means a dirty fellow.[15]

SOSIAS. 'Tis mere waste of time, you will not find it out. If you want to
know it, keep silence! I will tell you our master's complaint: of all
men, it is he who is fondest of the Heliaea.[16] Thus, to be judging is
his hobby, and he groans if he is not sitting on the first seat. He does
not close an eye at night, and if he dozes off for an instant his mind
flies instantly to the clepsydra.[17] He is so accustomed to hold the
balloting pebble, that he awakes with his three fingers pinched
together[18] as if he were offering incense to the new moon. If he sees
scribbled on some doorway, "How charming is Demos,[19] the son of
Pyrilampes!" he will write beneath it, "How charming is Cemos!"[20] His
cock crowed one evening; said he, "He has had money from the accused to
awaken me too late."[21] As soon as he rises from supper he bawls for his
shoes and away he rushes down there before dawn to sleep beforehand,
glued fast to the column like an oyster.[22] He is a merciless judge,
never failing to draw the convicting line[23] and return home with his
nails full of wax like a bumble-bee. Fearing he might run short of
pebbles[24] he keeps enough at home to cover a sea-beach, so that he may
have the means of recording his sentence. Such is his madness, and all
advice is useless; he only judges the more each day. So we keep him under
lock and key, to prevent his going out; for his son is broken-hearted
over this mania. At first he tried him with gentleness, wanted to
persuade him to wear the cloak no longer,[25] to go out no more; unable
to convince him, he had him bathed and purified according to the
ritual[26] without any greater success, and then handed him over the the
Corybantes;[27] but the old man escaped them, and carrying off the
kettle-drum,[28] rushed right into the midst of the Heliasts. As Cybelé
could do nothing with her rites, his son took him again to Aegina and
forcibly made him lie one night in the temple of Asclepius, the God of
Healing, but before daylight there he was to be seen at the gate of the
tribunal. Since then we let him go out no more, but he escaped us by the
drains or by the skylights, so we stuffed up every opening with old rags
and made all secure; then he drove short sticks into the wall and sprang
from rung to rung like a magpie. Now we have stretched nets all round the
court and we keep watch and ward. The old man's name is Philocleon,[29]
'tis the best name he could have, and the son is called Bdelycleon,[30]
for he is a man very fit to cure an insolent fellow of his boasting.

BDELYCLEON. Xanthias! Sosias! Are you asleep?

XANTHIAS. Oh! oh!

SOSIAS. What is the matter?

XANTHIAS. Why, Bdelycleon is rising.

BDELYCLEON. Will neither of you come here?  My father has got into the
stove-chamber and is ferreting about like a rat in his hole. Take care he
does not escape through the bath drain. You there, put all your weight
against the door.

SOSIAS. Aye, aye, master.

BDELYCLEON. By Zeus!  what is that noise in the chimney?  Hullo! who are
you?

PHILOCLEON. I am the smoke going up.

BDELYCLEON. Smoke?  smoke of what wood?

PHILOCLEON. Of fig-wood.[31]

BDELYCLEON. Ah!  'this the most acrid of all. But you shall not get out.
Where is the chimney cover?[32] Come down again. Now, up with another
cross-bar. Now look out some fresh dodge. But am I not the most
unfortunate of men? Henceforward, I shall only be called the son of the
smoky old man. Slave, hold the door stoutly, throw your weight upon it,
come, put heart into the work. I will come and help you. Watch both lock
and bolt. Take care he does not gnaw through the peg.

PHILOCLEON. What are you dong, you wretches?  Let me go out; it is
imperative that I go and judge, or Dracontides will be acquitted.

BDELYCLEON. What a dreadful calamity for you!

PHILOCLEON. Once at Delphi, the god, whom I was consulting, foretold,
that if an accused man escaped me, I should die of consumption.

BDELYCLEON. Apollo, the Saviour, what a prophecy!

PHILOCLEON. Ah!  I beseech you, if you do not want my death, let me go.

BDELYCLEON. No, Philocleon, no never, by Posidon!

PHILOCLEON. Well then, I shall gnaw through the net[33] with my teeth.

BDELYCLEON. But you have no teeth.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! you rascal, how can I kill you?  How?  Give me a sword,
quick, or a conviction tablet.

BDELYCLEON. Our friend is planning some great crime.

PHILOCLEON. No, by Zeus!  but I want to go and sell my ass and its
panniers, for 'this the first of the month.[34]

BDELYCLEON. Could I not sell it just as well?

PHILOCLEON. Not as well as I could.

BDELYCLEON. No, but better. Come, bring it here, bring it here by all
means--if you can.

XANTHIAS. What a clever excuse he has found now!  What cunning to get you
to let him go out!

BDELYCLEON. Yes, but I have not swallowed the hook; I scented the trick.
I will go in and fetch the ass, so that the old man may not point his
weapons that way again....[35] Stupid old ass, are you weeping because
you are going to be sold? Come, go a bit quicker. Why, what are you
moaning and groaning for?  You might be carrying another Odysseus.[36]

XANTHIAS. Why, certainly, so he is!  someone has crept beneath his belly.

BDELYCLEON. Who, who?  Let us see.

XANTHIAS. 'Tis he.

BDELYCLEON. What does this mean?  Who are you?  Come, speak!

PHILOCLEON. I am Nobody.

BDELYCLEON. Nobody?  Of what country?

PHILOCLEON. Of Ithaca, son of Apodrasippides.[37]

BDELYCLEON. Ha!  Mister Nobody, you will not laugh presently. Pull him
out quick!  Ah!  the wretch, where has be crept to? Does he not resemble
a she-ass to the life?

PHILOCLEON. If you do not leave me in peace, I shall commence
proceedings.

BDELYCLEON. And what will the suit be about?

PHILOCLEON. The shade of an ass.[38]

BDELYCLEON. You are a poor man of very little wit, but thoroughly brazen.

PHILOCLEON. A poor man!  Ah!  by Zeus!  you know not now what I am worth;
but you will know when you disembowel the old Heliast's money bag.[39]

BDELYCLEON. Come, get back indoors, both you and your ass.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! my brethren of the tribunal! oh! Cleon! to the rescue!

BDELYCLEON. Go and bawl in there under lock and key. And you there, pile
plenty of stones against the door, thrust the bolt home into the staple,
and to keep this beam in its place roll that great mortar against it.
Quick's the word.

SOSIAS. Oh! my god! whence did this brick fall on me?

XANTHIAS. Perhaps a rat loosened it.

SOSIAS. A rat? 'tis surely our gutter-judge,[40] who has crept beneath
the tiles of the roof.

XANTHIAS. Ah! woe to us! there he is, he has turned into a sparrow; he
will be flying off. Where is the net? where? pschit! pschit! get back!

BDELYCLEON. Ah! by Zeus! I would rather have to guard Scioné[41] than
such a father.

SOSIAS. And how that we have driven him in thoroughly and he can no
longer escape without our knowledge, can we not have a few winks of
sleep, no matter how few?

BDELYCLEON. Why, wretch! the other jurymen will be here almost directly
to summon my father!

SOSIAS. Why, 'tis scarcely dawn yet!

BDELYCLEON. Ah, they must have risen late to-day. Generally it is the
middle of the night when they come to fetch him. They arrive here,
carrying lanterns in their hands and singing the charming old verses of
Phrynichus' "Sidonian Women";[42] 'tis their way of calling him.

SOSIAS. Well, if need be, we will chase them off with stones.

BDELYCLEON. What!  you dare to speak so?  Why, this class of old men, if
irritated, becomes as terrible as a swarm of wasps. They carry below
their loins the sharpest of stings, with which to sting their foe; they
shout and leap and their stings burn like so many sparks.

SOSIAS. Have no fear!  If I can find stones to throw into this nest of
jurymen-wasps, I shall soon have them cleared off.

CHORUS. March on, advance boldly and bravely!  Comias, your feet are
dragging; once you were as tough as a dog-skin strap and now even
Charinades walks better than you. Ha!  Strymodorus of Conthylé, you best
of mates, where is Euergides and where is Chales of Phyla?  Ha, ha,
bravo! there you are, the last of the lads with whom we mounted guard
together at Byzantium.[43] Do you remember how, one night, prowling
round, we noiselessly stole the kneading-trough of a baker's-wife; we
split it in two and cooked our green-stuff with it.--But let us hasten,
for the case of the Laches[44] comes on to-day, and they all say he has
embezzled a pot of money. Hence Cleon, our protector, advised us
yesterday to come early and with a three days' stock of fiery rage so as
to chastise him for his crimes. Let us hurry, comrades, before it is
light; come, let us search every nook with our lanterns to see whether
those who wish us ill have not set us some trap.

BOY. Ah!  here is mud!  Father, take care!

CHORUS. Pick up a blade of straw and trim the lamp of your lantern.

BOY. No, I can trim it quite well with my finger.

CHORUS. Why do you pull out the wick, you little dolt?  Oil is scarce,
and 'tis not you who suffer when it has to be paid for. (_Strikes him._)

BOY. If you teach us again with your fists, we shall put out the lamps
and go home; then you will have no light and will squatter about in the
mud like ducks in the dark.

CHORUS. I know how to punish other offenders bigger than you. But I think
I am treading in some mud. Oh! 'tis certain it will rain in torrents for
four days at least; look, what thieves are in our lamps; that is always
a sign of heavy rain; but the rain and the north wind will be good for
the crops that are still standing.... Why, what can have happened to our
mate, who lives here?  Why does he not come to join our party?  There
used to be no need to haul him in our wake, for he would march at our
head singing the verses of Phrynichus; he was a lover of singing. Should
we not, friends, make a halt here and sign to call him out?  The charm of
my voice will fetch him out, if he hears it.

Why does the old man not show himself before the door?  why does he not
answer?  Has he lost his shoes? has he stubbed his toe in the dark and
thus got a swollen ankle?  Perhaps he has a tumour in his groin. He was
the hardest of us all; he alone _never_ allowed himself to be moved. If
anyone tried to move him, he would lower his head, saying, "You might
just as well try to boil a stone." But I bethink me, an accused ma
escaped us yesterday through his false pretence that he loved Athens and
had been the first to unfold the Samian plot.[45] Perhaps his acquittal
has so distressed Philocleon that he is abed with fever--he is quite
capable of such a thing.--Friend, arise, do not thus vex your heart, but
forget your wrath. Today we have to judge a man made wealthy by treason,
one of those who set Thrace free;[46] we have to prepare him a funeral
urn ... so march on, my boy, get a-going.

BOY. Father, would you give me something if I asked for it?

CHORUS. Assuredly, my child, but tell me what nice thing do you want me
to buy you?  A set of knuckle-bones, I suppose.

BOY. No, dad, I prefer figs; they are better.

CHORUS. No, by Zeus! even if you were to hang yourself with vexation.

BOY. Well then, I will lead you no father.

CHORUS. With my small pay, I am obliged to buy bread, wood, stew; and now
you ask me for figs!

BOY. But, father, if the Archon[47] should not form a court to-day, how
are we to buy our dinner? Have you some good hope to offer us or merely
"Hellé's sacred waves"?[48]

CHORUS. Alas! alas! I have not a notion how we shall dine.

BOY. Oh! my poor mother! why did you let me see this day?

CHORUS. Oh! my little wallet! you seem like to be a mere useless
ornament!

BOY. 'Tis our destiny to groan.

PHILOCLEON.[49] My friends, I have long been pining away while listening
to you from my window, but I absolutely know not what do do. I am
detained here, because I have long wanted to go with you to the law court
and do all the harm I can. Oh! Zeus! cause the peals of they thunder to
roll, change me quickly into smoke or make me into a Proxenides, a
perfect braggart, like the son of Sellus. Oh, King of Heaven! hesitate
not to grant me this favour, pity my misfortune or else may thy dazzling
lightning instantly reduce me to ashes; then carry me hence, and may thy
breath hurl me into some burning pickle[50] or turn me into one of the
stones on which the votes are counted.

CHORUS. Who is it detains you and shuts you in? Speak, for you are
talking to friends.

PHILOCLEON. 'Tis my son. But no bawling, he is there in front asleep;
lower your voice.

CHORUS. But, poor fellow, what is his aim? what is his object?

PHILOCLEON. My friends, he will not have me judge nor do anyone any ill,
but he wants me to stay at home and enjoy myself, and I will not.

CHORUS. This wretch, this Demolochocleon[51] dares to say such odious
things, just because you tell the truth about our navy!

PHILOCLEON. He would not have dared, had he not been a conspirator.

CHORUS. Meanwhile, you must devise some new dodge, so that you can come
down here without his knowledge.

PHILOCLEON. But what? Try to find some way. For myself, I am ready for
anything, so much do I burn to run along the tiers of the tribunal with
my voting-pebble in my hand.

CHORUS. There is surely some hole through which you could manage to
squeeze from within, and escape dressed in rags, like the crafty
Odysseus.[52]

PHILOCLEON. Everything is sealed fast; not so much as a gnat could get
through. Think of some other plan; there is no possible hold of escape.

CHORUS. Do you recall how, when you were with the army at the taking of
Naxos,[53] you descended so readily from the top of the wall by means of
the spits you have stolen?

PHILOCLEON. I remember that well enough, but what connection is there
with present circumstances? I was young, clever at thieving, I had all my
strength, none watched over me, and I could run off without fear. But
to-day men-at-arms are placed at every outlet to watch me, and two of
them are lying in wait for me at this very door armed with spits, just as
folk lie in wait for a cat that has stolen a piece of meat.

CHORUS. Come, discover some way as quick as possible. Here is the dawn
come, my dear little friend.

PHILOCLEON. The best way is to gnaw through the net. Oh! goddess, who
watches over the nets,[54] forgive me for making a hole in this one.

CHORUS. 'Tis acting like a man eager for his safety. Get your jaws to
work!

PHILOCLEON. There! 'tis gnawed through! But no shouting! let Bdelycleon
notice nothing!

CHORUS. Have no fear, have no fear! if he breathes a syllable, 'twill be
to bruise his own knuckles; he will have to fight to defend his own head.
We shall teach him not to insult the mysteries of the goddesses.[55] But
fasten a rope to the window, tie it around your body and let yourself
down to the ground, with your heart bursting with the fury of
Diopithes.[56]

PHILOCLEON. But if these notice it and want to fish me up and drag me
back into the house, what will you do? Tell me that.

CHORUS. We shall call up the full strength of out courage to your aid.
That is what we will do.

PHILOCLEON. I trust myself to you and risk the danger. If misfortune
overtakes me, take away my body, bathe it with your tears and bury it
beneath the bar of the tribunal.

CHORUS. Nothing will happen to you, rest assured. Come friend, have
courage and let yourself slide down while you invoke your country's gods.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! mighty Lycus![57] noble hero and my neighbour, thou, like
myself, takest pleasure in the tears and the groans of the accused. If
thou art come to live near the tribunal, 'tis with the express design of
hearing them incessantly; thou alone of all the heroes hast wished to
remain among those who weep. Have pity on me and save him, who lives
close to thee; I swear I will never make water, never, nor relieve my
belly with a fart against the railing of thy statue.

BDELYCLEON. Ho there! ho! get up!

SOSIAS. What's the matter?

BDELYCLEON. Methought I heard talking close to me.

SOSIAS. Is the old man at it again, escaping through some loophole?

BDELYCLEON. No, by Zeus! no, but he is letting himself down by a rope.

SOSIAS. Ha, rascal! what are you doing there? You shall not descend.

BDELYCLEON. Mount quick to the other window, strike him with the boughs
that hang over the entrance; perchance he will turn back when he feels
himself being thrashed.

PHILOCLEON. To the rescue! all you, who are going to have lawsuits this
year--Smicythion, Tisiades, Chremon and Pheredipnus. 'Tis now or never,
before they force me to return, that you must help.

CHORUS. Why do we delay to let loose that fury, that is so terrible, when
our nests are attacked? I feel my angry sting is stiffening, that sharp
sting, with which we punish our enemies. Come, children, cast your cloaks
to the winds, run, shout, tell Cleon what is happening, that he may march
against this foe to our city, who deserves death, since he proposes to
prevent the trial of lawsuits.

BDELYCLEON. Friends, listen to the truth, instead of bawling.

CHORUS. By Zeus! we will shout to heaven and never forsake our friend.
Why, this is intolerable, 'tis manifest tyranny. Oh! citizens, oh!
Theorus,[58] the enemy of the gods! and all you flatterers, who rule us!
come to our aid.

XANTHIAS. By Heracles! they have stings. Do you see them, master?

BDELYCLEON. 'Twas with these weapons that they killed Philippus the son
of Gorgias[59] when he was put on trial.

CHORUS. And you too shall die. Turn yourselves this way, all, with your
stings out for attack and throw yourselves upon him in good and serried
order, and swelled up with wrath and rage. Let him learn to know the sort
of foes he has dared to irritate.

XANTHIAS. The fight will be fast and furious, by great Zeus! I tremble at
the sight of their stings.

CHORUS. Let this man go, unless you want to envy the tortoise his hard
shell.

PHILOCLEON. Come, my dear companions, wasps with relentless hearts, fly
against him, animated with your fury. Sting him in the back, in his eyes
and on his fingers.

BDELYCLEON. Midas, Phryx, Masyntias, here! Come and help. Seize this man
and hand him over to no one, otherwise you shall starve to death in
chains. Fear nothing, I have often heard the crackling of fig-leaves in
the fire.[60]

CHORUS. If you won't let him go, I shall bury this sting in your body.

PHILOCLEON. Oh, Cecrops, mighty hero with the tail of a dragon! Seest
thou how these barbarians ill-use me--me, who have many a time made them
weep a full bushel of tears?

CHORUS. Is not old age filled with cruel ills? What violence these two
slaves offer to their old master! they have forgotten all bygones, the
fur-coats and the jackets and the caps he bought for them; in winter he
watched that their feet should not get frozen. And only see them now;
there is no gentleness in their look nor any recollection of the slippers
of other days.

PHILOCLEON. Will you let me go, you accursed animal? Don't you remember
the day when I surprised you stealing the grapes; I tied you to an
olive-tree and I cut open your bottom with such vigorous lashes that
folks thought you had been pedicated. Get away, you are ungrateful. But
let go of me, and you too, before my son comes up.

CHORUS. You shall repay us for all this and 'twill not be long first.
Tremble at our ferocious glance; you shall taste our just anger.

BDELYCLEON. Strike! strike, Xanthias! Drive these wasps away from the
house.

XANTHIAS. That's just what I am doing; but do you smoke them out
thoroughly too.

SOSIAS. You will not go? The plague seize you! Will you not clear off?
Xanthias, strike them with your stick!

XANTHIAS. And you, to smoke them out better, throw Aeschinus, the son of
Selartius, on the fire. Ah! we were bound to drive you off in the end.

BDELYCLEON. Eh! by Zeus! you would not have put them to flight so easily
if they had fed on the verses of Philocles.

CHORUS. It is clear to all the poor that tyranny has attacked us sorely.
Proud emulator of Amynias, you, who only take pleasure in doing ill, see
how you are preventing us from obeying the laws of the city; you do not
even seek a pretext or any plausible excuse, but claim to rule alone.

BDELYCLEON. Hold! A truce to all blows and brawling! Had we not better
confer together and come to some understanding?

CHORUS. Confer with you, the people's foe! with you, a royalist, the
accomplice of Brasidas![61] with you, who wear woollen fringes on your
cloak and let your beard grow!

BDELYCLEON. Ah! it were better to separate altogether from my father than
to steer my boat daily through such stormy seas!

CHORUS. Oh! you have but reached the parsley and the rue, to use the
common saying.[62] What you are suffering is nothing! but welcome the
hour when the advocate shall adduce all these same arguments against you
and shall summon your accomplices to give witness.

BDELYCLEON. In the name of the gods! withdraw or we shall fight you the
whole day long.

CHORUS. No, not as long as I retain an atom of breath. Ha! your desire is
to tyrannize over us!

BDELYCLEON. Everything is now tyranny with us, no matter what is
concerned, whether it be large or small. Tyranny! I have not heard the
word mentioned once in fifty years, and now it is more common than
salt-fish, the word is even current on the market. If you are buying
gurnards and don't want anchovies, the huckster next door, who is selling
the latter, at once exclaims, "That is a man, whose kitchen savours of
tyranny!" If you ask for onions to season your fish, the green-stuff
woman winks one eye and asks, "Ha! you ask for onions! are you seeking to
tyrannize, or do you think that Athens must pay you your seasonings as a
tribute?"

XANTHIAS. Yesterday I went to see a gay girl about noon and suggested she
should mount and ride me; she flew into a rage, pretending I wanted to
restore the tyranny of Hippias.[63]

BDELYCLEON. That's the talk that pleases the people! As for myself, I
want my father to lead a joyous life like Morychus[64] instead of going
away before dawn to basely calumniate and condemn; and for this I am
accused of conspiracy and tyrannical practice!

PHILOCLEON. And quite right too, by Zeus! The most exquisite dishes do
not make up to me for the life of which you deprive me. I scorn your red
mullet and your eels, and would far rather eat a nice little law suitlet
cooked in the pot.

BDELYCLEON. 'Tis because you have got used to seeking your pleasure in
it; but if you will agree to keep silence and hear me, I think I could
persuade you that you deceive yourself altogether.

PHILOCLEON. _I_ deceive myself, when I am judging?

BDELYCLEON. You do not see that you are the laughing-stock of these men,
whom you are ready to worship. You are their slave and do not know it.

PHILOCLEON. _I_ a slave, I, who lord it over all!

BDELYCLEON. Not at all, you think you are ruling when you are only
obeying. Tell me, father, what do you get out of the tribute paid by so
many Greek towns?

PHILOCLEON. Much, and I appoint my colleagues jurymen.

BDELYCLEON. And I also. Release him, all of you, and bring me a sword. If
my arguments do not prevail I will fall upon this blade. As for you, tell
me whether you accept the verdict of the Court.

PHILOCLEON. May I never drink my Heliast's pay in honour of the good
Genius, if I do not.

CHORUS. Tis now we have to draw upon our arsenal for some fresh weapon;
above all do not side with this youth in his opinions. You see how
serious the question has become; 'twill be all over with us, which the
gods forfend, if he should prevail.

BDELYCLEON. Let someone bring me my tablets with all speed!

CHORUS. Your tablets? Ha, ha! what an importance you would fain assume!

BDELYCLEON. I merely wish to note down my father's points.

PHILOCLEON. But what will you say of it, if he should triumph in the
debate?

CHORUS. That old men are no longer good for anything; we shall be
perpetually laughed at in the streets, shall be called thallophores,[65]
mere brief-bags. You are to be the champion of all our rights and
sovereignty. Come, take courage! Bring into action all the resources of
your wit.

PHILOCLEON. At the outset I will prove to you that there exists no king
whose might is greater than ours. Is there a pleasure, a blessing
comparable with that of a juryman? Is there a being who lives more in the
midst of delights, who is more feared, aged though he be? From the moment
I leave my bed, men of power, the most illustrious in the city, await me
at the bar of the tribunal; the moment I am seen from the greatest
distance, they come forward to offer me a gentle hand,--that has pilfered
the public funds; they entreat me, bowing right low and with a piteous
voice, "Oh! father," they say, "pity me, I adjure you by the profit _you_
were able to make in the public service or in the army, when dealing with
the victuals." Why, the man who thus speaks would not know of my
existence, had I not let him off on some former occasion.

BDELYCLEON. Let us note this first point, the supplicants.

PHILOCLEON. These entreaties have appeased my wrath, and I enter--firmly
resolved to do nothing that I have promised. Nevertheless I listen to the
accused. Oh! what tricks to secure acquittal! Ah! there is no form of
flattery that is not addressed to the heliast! Some groan over their
poverty and they exaggerate the truth in order to make their troubles
equal to my own. Others tell us anecdotes or some comic story from Aesop.
Others, again, cut jokes; they fancy I shall be appeased if I laugh. If
we are not even then won over, why, then they drag forward their young
children by the hand, both boys and girls, who prostrate themselves and
whine with one accord, and then the father, trembling as if before a god,
beseeches me not to condemn him out of pity for them, "If you love the
voice of the lamb, have pity on my son's"; and because I am fond of
little sows,[66] I must yield to his daughter's prayers. Then we relax
the heat of our wrath a little for him. Is not this great power indeed,
which allows even wealth to be disdained?

BDELYCLEON. A second point to note, the disdain of wealth. And now recall
to me what are the advantages you enjoy, you, who pretend to rule over
Greece?

PHILOCLEON. Being entrusted with the inspection of the young men, we have
a right to examine their organs. Is Aeagrus[67] accused, he is not
acquitted before he has recited a passage from 'Niobe'[68] and he chooses
the finest. If a flute-player gains his case, he adjusts his
mouth-strap[69] in return and plays us the final air while we are
leaving. A father on his death-bed names some husband for his daughter,
who is his sole heir; but we care little for his will or for the shell so
solemnly placed over the seal;[70] we give the young maiden to him who
has best known how to secure our favour. Name me another duty that is so
important and so irresponsible.

BDELYCLEON. Aye, 'tis a fine privilege, and the only one on which I can
congratulate you; but surely to violate the will is to act badly towards
the heiress.

PHILOCLEON. And if the Senate and the people have trouble in deciding
some important case, it is decreed to send the culprits before the
heliasts; then Euathlus[71] and the illustrious Colaconymus,[72] who cast
away his shield, swear not to betray us and to fight for the people. Did
ever an orator carry the day with his opinion if he had not first
declared that the jury should be dismissed for the day as soon as they
had given their first verdict? We are the only ones whom Cleon, the great
bawler, does not badger. On the contrary, he protects and caresses us; he
keeps off the flies, which is what you have never done for your father.
Theorus, who is a man not less illustrious than Euphemius,[73] takes the
sponge out of the pot and blacks our shoes. See then what good things you
deprive and despoil me of. Pray, is this obeying or being a slave, as you
pretended to be able to prove?

BDELYCLEON. Talk away to your heart's content; you must come to a stop at
last and then you shall see that this grand power only resembles one of
those things that, wash 'em as you will, remain as foul as ever.

PHILOCLEON. But I am forgetting the most pleasing thing of all. When I
return home with my pay, everyone runs to greet me because of my money.
First my daughter bathes me, anoints my feet, stoops to kiss me and,
while she is calling me "her dearest father," fishes out my triobolus
with her tongue;[74] then my little wife comes to wheedle me and brings a
nice light cake; she sits beside me and entreats me in a thousand ways,
"Do take this now; do have some more." All this delights me hugely, and I
have no need to turn towards you or the steward to know when it shall
please him to serve my dinner, all the while cursing and grumbling. But
if he does not quickly knead my cake, I have this,[75] which is my
defence, my shield against all ills. If you do not pour me out drink, I
have brought this long-eared jar[76] full of wine. How it brays, when I
bend back and bury its neck in my mouth! What terrible and noisy
gurglings, and how I laugh at your wine-skins. As to power, am I not
equal to the king of the gods? If our assembly is noisy, all say as they
pass, "Great gods! the tribunal is rolling out its thunder!" If I let
loose the lightning, the richest, aye, the noblest are half dead with
fright and shit themselves with terror. You yourself are afraid of me,
yea, by Demeter! you are afraid.

BDELYCLEON. May I die if you frighten me.

CHORUS. Never have I heard speech so elegant or so sensible.

PHILOCLEON. Ah! he thought he had only to turn me round his finger; he
should, however, have known the vigour of my eloquence.

CHORUS. He has said everything without omission. I felt myself grow
taller while I listened to him. Methought myself meting out justice in
the Islands of the Blest, so much was I taken with the charm of his
words.

BDELYCLEON. How overjoyed they are! What extravagant delight! Ah! ah! you
are going to get a thrashing to-day.

CHORUS. Come, plot everything you can to beat him; 'tis not easy to
soften me if you do not talk on my side, and if you have nothing but
nonsense to spout, 'tis time to buy a good millstone, freshly cut withal,
to crush my anger.

BDELYCLEON. The cure of a disease, so inveterate and so widespread in
Athens, is a difficult task and of too great importance for the scope of
Comedy. Nevertheless, my old father....

PHILOCLEON. Cease to call me by that name, for, if you do not prove me a
slave and that quickly too, you must die by my hand, even if I must be
deprived of my share in the sacred feasts.

BDELYCLEON. Listen to me, dear little father, unruffle that frowning brow
and reckon, you can do so without trouble, not with pebbles, but on your
fingers, what is the sum-total of the tribute paid by the allied towns;
besides this we have the direct imposts, a mass of percentage dues, the
fees of the courts of justice, the produce from the mines, the markets,
the harbours, the public lands and the confiscations. All these together
amount to close on two thousand talents. Take from this sum the annual
pay of the dicasts; they number six thousand, and there have never been
more in this town; so therefore it is one hundred and fifty talents that
come to you.

PHILOCLEON. What! our pay is not even a tithe of the State revenue?

BDELYCLEON. Why no, certainly not.

PHILOCLEON. And where does the rest go then?

BDELYCLEON. To those who say: "I shall never betray the interests of the
masses; I shall always fight for the people." And 'tis you, father, who
let yourself be caught with their fine talk, who give them all power over
yourself. They are the men who extort fifty talents at a time by threat
and intimidation from the allies. "Pay tribute to me," they say, "or I
shall loose the lightning on your town and destroy it." And you, you are
content to gnaw the crumbs of your own might. What do the allies do? They
see that the Athenian mob lives on the tribunal in niggard and miserable
fashion, and they count you for nothing, for not more than the vote of
Connus;[77] 'tis on those wretches that they lavish everything, dishes of
salt fish, wine, tapestries, cheese, honey, sesame-fruit, cushions,
flagons, rich clothing, chaplets, necklets, drinking-cups, all that
yields pleasure and health. And you, their master, to you as a reward for
all your toil both on land and sea, nothing is given, not even a clove of
garlic to eat with your little fish.

PHILOCLEON. No, undoubtedly not; I have had to send and buy some from
Eucharides. But you told me I was a slave. Prove it then, for I am dying
with impatience.

BDELYCLEON. Is it not the worst of all slaveries to see all these
wretches and their flatterers, whom they gorge with gold, at the head of
affairs? As for you, you are content with the three obols they give you
and which you have so painfully earned in the galleys, in battles and
sieges. But what I stomach least is that you go to sit on the tribunal by
order. Some lewd stripling, the son of Chereas, to wit, enters your house
balancing his body, rotten with debauchery, on his straddling legs and
charges you to come and judge at daybreak, and precisely to the minute.
"He who only presents himself after the opening of the Court," says he,
"will not get the triobolus." But he himself, though he arrives late,
will nevertheless get his drachma as a public advocate. If an accused man
makes him some present, he shares it with a colleague and the pair agree
to arrange the matter like two sawyers, one of whom pulls and the other
pushes. As for you, you have only eyes for the public pay-clerk, and you
see nothing.

PHILOCLEON. Can it be I am treated thus? Oh! what is it you are saying?
You stir me to the bottom of my heart! I am all ears! I cannot syllable
what I feel.

BDELYCLEON. Consider then; you might be rich, both you and all the
others; I know not why you let yourself be fooled by these folk who call
themselves the people's friends. A myriad of towns obey you, from the
Euxine to Sardis. What do you gain thereby? Nothing but this miserable
pay, and even that is like the oil with which the flock of wool is
impregnated and is doled to you drop by drop, just enough to keep you
from dying of hunger. They want you to be poor, and I will tell you why.
'Tis so that you may know only those who nourish you, and so that, if it
pleases them to loose you against one of their foes, you shall leap upon
him with fury. If they wished to assure the well-being of the people,
nothing would be easier for them. We have now a thousand towns that pay
us tribute; let them command each of these to feed twenty Athenians; then
twenty thousand of our citizens would be eating nothing but hare, would
drink nothing but the purest of milk, and always crowned with garlands,
would be enjoying the delights to which the great name of their country
and the trophies of Marathon give them the right; whereas to-day you are
like the hired labourers who gather the olives; you follow him who pays
you.

PHILOCLEON. Alas! my hand is benumbed; I can no longer draw my sword.[78]
What has become of my strength?

BDELYCLEON. When they are afraid, they promise to divide Euboea[79] among
you and to give each fifty bushels of wheat, but what have they given
you? Nothing excepting, quite recently, five bushels of barley, and even
these you have only obtained with great difficulty, on proving you were
not aliens, and then choenix by choenix.[80] That is why I always kept
you shut in; I wanted you to be fed by me and no longer at the beck of
these blustering braggarts. Even now I am ready to let you have all you
want, provided you no longer let yourself be suckled by the pay-clerk.

CHORUS. He was right who said, "Decide nothing till you have heard both
sides," for it seems to me, that 'tis you who now gain the complete
victory. My wrath is appeased, I throw away my sticks. Come, comrade, our
contemporary, let yourself be gained over by his words; come, do not be
too obstinate or too perverse. Why have I no relation, no ally to speak
to me like this? Do not doubt it, 'tis a god who is now protecting you
and loading you with his benefits. Accept them.

BDELYCLEON. I will feed him, I will give him everything that is suitable
for an old man, oatmeal gruel, a cloak, soft furs and a maid to rub his
loins and play with his tool. But he is silent and utters not a word;
'tis a bad sign.

CHORUS. He has thought the thing over and has recognized his folly; he
reproaches himself for not having followed your advice always. But there
he is, converted by your words, and has no doubt become wiser to alter
his ways in future and to believe in none but you.

PHILOCLEON. Alas! alas!

BDELYCLEON. Now why this lamentation?

PHILOCLEON. A truce to your promises! What I love is down there, 'tis
down there I want to be, there, where the herald cries, "Who has not yet
voted? Let him rise!" I want to be the last to leave the urn of all. Oh,
my soul, my soul! where art thou? come! oh! dark shadows, make way for
me![81] By Heracles, may I reach the Court in time to convict Cleon of
theft.

BDELYCLEON. Come, father, in the name of the gods, believe me!

PHILOCLEON. Believe you! Ask me anything, anything, except one.

BDELYCLEON. What is it? Let us hear.

PHILOCLEON. Not to judge any more! Before I consent, I shall have
appeared before Pluto.

BDELYCLEON. Very well then, since you find so much pleasure in it, go
down there no more, but stay here and deal out justice to your slaves.

PHILOCLEON. But what is there to judge? Are you mad?

BDELYCLEON. Everything as in a tribunal. If a servant opens a door
secretly, you inflict upon him a simple fine; 'tis what you have
repeatedly done down there. Everything can be arranged to suit you. If it
is warm in the morning, you can judge in the sunlight; if it is snowing,
then seated at your fire; if it rains, you go indoors; and if you only
rise at noon, there will be no Thesmothetes[82] to exclude you from the
precincts.

PHILOCLEON. The notion pleases me.

BDELYCLEON. Moreover, if a pleader is long-winded, you will not be
fasting and chafing and seeking vengeance on the accused.

PHILOCLEON. But could I judge as well with my mouth full?

BDELYCLEON. Much better. Is it not said, that the dicasts, when deceived
by lying witnesses, have need to ruminate well in order to arrive at the
truth?

PHILOCLEON. Well said, but you have not told me yet who will pay salary.

BDELYCLEON. I will.

PHILOCLEON. So much the better; in this way I shall be paid by myself.
Because that cursed jester, Lysistratus,[83] played me an infamous trick
the other day. He received a drachma for the two of us[84] and went on
the fish-market to get it changed and then brought me back three mullet
scales. I took them for obols and crammed them into my mouth;[85] but the
smell choked me and I quickly spat them out. So I dragged him before the
Court.

BDELYCLEON. And what did he say to that?

PHILOCLEON. Well, he pretended I had the stomach of a cock. "You have
soon digested the money," he said with a laugh.

BDELYCLEON. You see, that is yet another advantage.

PHILOCLEON. And no small one either. Come, do as you will.

BDELYCLEON. Wait! I will bring everything here.

PHILOCLEON. You see, the oracles are coming true; I have heard it
foretold, that one day the Athenians would dispense justice in their own
houses, that each citizen would have himself a little tribunal
constructed in his porch similar to the altars of Hecaté,[86] and that
there would be such before every door.

BDELYCLEON. Hold! what do you say? I have brought you everything needful
and much more into the bargain. See, here is an _article,_ should you
want to piss; it shall be hung beside you on a nail.

PHILOCLEON. Good idea! Right useful at my age. You have found the true
preventive of bladder troubles.

BDELYCLEON. Here is fire, and near to it are lentils, should you want to
take a snack.

PHILOCLEON. 'Tis admirably arranged. For thus, even when feverish, I
shall nevertheless receive my pay; and besides, I could eat my lentils
without quitting my seat. But why this cock?

BDELYCLEON. So that, should you doze during some pleading, he may awaken
you by crowing up there.

PHILOCLEON. I want only for one thing more; all the rest is as good as
can be.

BDELYCLEON. What is that?

PHILOCLEON. If only they could bring me an image of the hero Lycus.[87]

BDELYCLEON. Here it is! Why, you might think it was the god himself!

PHILOCLEON. Oh! hero, my master! how repulsive you are to look at! 'Tis
an exact portrait of Cleonymus!

SOSIAS. That is why, hero though he be, he has no weapon.

BDELYCLEON. The sooner you take your seat, the sooner I shall call a
case.

PHILOCLEON. Call it, for I have been seated ever so long.

BDELYCLEON. Let us see. What case shall we bring up first? Is there a
slave who has done something wrong? Ah! you Thracian there, who burnt the
stew-pot t'other day.

PHILOCLEON. Hold, hold! Here is a fine state of things! you had almost
made me judge without a bar,[88] and that is the thing of all others most
sacred among us.

BDELYCLEON. By Zeus! I had forgotten it, but I will run indoors and bring
you one immediately. What is this after all, though, but mere force of
habit!

XANTHIAS. Plague take the brute! Can anyone keep such a dog?

BDELYCLEON. Hullo! what's the matter?

XANTHIAS. Why, 'tis Labes,[89] who has just rushed into the kitchen and
has seized a whole Sicilian cheese and gobbled it up.

BDELYCLEON. Good! this will be the first offence I shall make my father
try. (_To Xanthias._) Come along and lay your accusation.

XANTHIAS. No, not I; the other dog vows he will be accuser, if the matter
is set down for trial.

BDELYCLEON. Well then, bring them both along.

XANTHIAS. I am coming.

PHILOCLEON. What is this?

BDELYCLEON. 'Tis the pig-trough[90] of the swine dedicated to Hestia.

PHILOCLEON. But it's sacrilege to bring it here.

BDELYCLEON. No, no, by addressing Hestia first,[91] I might, thanks to
her, crush an adversary.

PHILOCLEON. Put an end to delay by calling up the case. My verdict is
already settled.

BDELYCLEON. Wait! I must yet bring out the tablets[92] and the
scrolls.[93]

PHILOCLEON. Oh! I am boiling, I am dying with impatience at your delays.
I could have traced the sentence in the dust.

BDELYCLEON. There you are.

PHILOCLEON. Then call the case.

BDELYCLEON. I am here.

PHILOCLEON. Firstly, who is this?

BDELYCLEON. Ah! my god! why, this is unbearable! I have forgotten the
urns.

PHILOCLEON. Well now! where are you off to?

BDELYCLEON. To look for the urns.

PHILOCLEON. Unnecessary, I shall use these vases.[94]

BDELYCLEON. Very well, then we have all we need, except the clepsydra.

PHILOCLEON. Well then! and this? what is it if not a clepsydra?[95]

BDELYCLEON. True again! 'Tis calling things by their right name! Let fire
be brought quickly from the house with myrtle boughs and incense, and let
us invoke the gods before opening the sitting.

CHORUS. Offer them libations and your vows and we will thank them that a
noble agreement has put an end to your bickerings and strife.

BDELYCLEON. And first let there be a sacred silence.

CHORUS. Oh! god of Delphi! oh! Phoebus Apollo! convert into the greatest
blessing for us all what is now happening before this house, and cure us
of our error, oh, Paean,[96] our helper!

BDELYCLEON. Oh! Powerful god, Apollo Aguieus,[97] who watchest at the
door of my entrance hall, accept this fresh sacrifice; I offer it that
you may deign to soften my father's excessive severity; he is as hard as
iron, his heart is like sour wine; do thou pour into it a little honey.
Let him become gentle like other men, let him take more interest in the
accused than in the accusers, may he allow himself to be softened by
entreaties; calm his acrid humour and deprive his irritable mind of all
sting.

CHORUS. We unite our vows and chants to those of this new magistrate.[98]
His words have won our favour and we are convinced that he loves the
people more than any of the young men of the present day.

BDELYCLEON. If there be any judge near at hand, let him enter; once the
proceedings have opened, we shall admit him no more.[99]

PHILOCLEON. Who is the defendant? Ha! what a sentence he will get!

XANTHIAS (_Prosecuting Council_). Listen to the indictment. A dog of
Cydathenea doth hereby charge Labes of Aexonia with having devoured a
Sicilian cheese by himself without accomplices. Penalty demanded, a
collar of fig-tree wood.[100]

PHILOCLEON. Nay, a dog's death, if convicted.

BDELYCLEON. This is Labes, the defendant.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! what a wretched brute! how entirely he looks the rogue!
He thinks to deceive me by keeping his jaws closed. Where is the
plaintiff, the dog of Cydathenea?

DOG. Bow wow! bow wow!

BDELYCLEON. Here he is.

PHILOCLEON. Why, 'tis a second Labes, a great barker and a licker of
dishes.

SOSIAS (_Herald_). Silence! Keep your seats! (_To Xanthias._) And you, up
on your feet and accuse him.

PHILOCLEON. Go on, and I will help myself and eat these lentils.

XANTHIAS. Men of the jury, listen to this indictment I have drawn up. He
has committed the blackest of crimes, both against me and the
seamen.[101] He sought refuge in a dark corner to glutton on a big
Sicilian cheese, with which he sated his hunger.

PHILOCLEON. Why, the crime is clear; the foul brute this very moment
belched forth a horrible odour of cheese right under my nose.

XANTHIAS. And he refused to share with me. And yet can anyone style
himself your benefactor, when he does not cast a morsel to your poor dog?

PHILOCLEON. Then he has not shared?

XANTHIAS. Not with me, his comrade.

PHILOCLEON. Then his madness is as hot as my lentils.

BDELYCLEON. In the name of the gods, father! No hurried verdict without
hearing the other side!

PHILOCLEON. But the evidence is plain; the fact speaks for itself.

XANTHIAS. Then beware of acquitting the most selfish of canine gluttons,
who has devoured the whole cheese, rind and all, prowling round the
platter.

PHILOCLEON. There is not even enough left for me to fill up the chinks in
my pitcher.

XANTHIAS. Besides, you _must_ punish him, because the same house cannot
keep two thieves. Let me not have barked in vain, else I shall never bark
again.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! the black deeds he has just denounced! What a shameless
thief! Say, cock, is not that your opinion too? Ha, ha! He thinks as I
do. Here, Thesmothetes![102] where are you? Hand me the vessel.

SOSIAS (_Thesmothetes_). Take it yourself. I go to call the witnesses;
these are a plate, a pestle, a cheese knife, a brazier, a stew-pot and
other half-burnt utensils. (_To Philocleon._) But you have not finished?
you are piddling away still! Have done and be seated.

PHILOCLEON. Ha, ha! I reckon I know somebody who will shit himself with
fright today.

BDELYCLEON. Will you never cease showing yourself hard and intractable,
and especially to the accused? You tear them to pieces tooth and nail.

PHILOCLEON. Come forward and defend yourself. What means this silence?
Answer.

SOSIAS. No doubt he has nothing to say.

BDELYCLEON. Not so, but I think he has got what happened once to
Thucydides, when accused;[103] his jaws suddenly set fast. Get away! I
will undertake your defence.--Gentlemen of the jury, 'tis a difficult
thing to speak for a dog who has been calumniated, but nevertheless I
will try. 'Tis a good dog, and he chivies the wolves finely.

PHILOCLEON. He! that thief and conspirator!

BDELYCLEON. But 'tis the best of all our dogs; he is capable of guarding
a whole flock.

PHILOCLEON. And what good is that, if he eats the cheese?

BDELYCLEON. What? he fights for you, he guards your door; 'tis an
excellent dog in every respect. Forgive him his larceny; he is wretchedly
ignorant, he cannot play the lyre.

PHILOCLEON. I wish he did not know how to write either; then the rascal
would not have drawn up his pleadings.

BDELYCLEON. Witnesses, I pray you, listen. Come forward, grafting-knife,
and speak up; answer me clearly. You were paymaster at the time. Did you
grate out to the soldiers what was given you?--He says he did so.

PHILOCLEON. But, by Zeus! he lies.

BDELYCLEON. Oh! have patience. Take pity on the unfortunate. Labes feeds
only on fish-bones and fishes' heads and has not an instant of peace. The
other is good only to guard the house; he never moves from here, but
demands his share of all that is brought in and bites those who refuse.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! Heaven! have I fallen ill? I feel my anger cooling! Woe
to me! I am softening!

BDELYCLEON. Have pity, father, pity, I adjure you; you would not have him
dead. Where are his puppies? Come, poor little beasties, yap, up on your
haunches, beg and whine!

PHILOCLEON. Descend, descend, descend, descend![104]

BDELYCLEON. I will descend, although that word, "descend," has too often
raised false hope. None the less, I will descend.

PHILOCLEON. Plague seize it! Have I then done wrong to eat! What! I to be
crying! Ah! I certainly should not be weeping, if I were not blown out
with lentils.

BDELYCLEON. Then he is acquitted?

PHILOCLEON. I did not say so.

BDELYCLEON. Ah! my dear father, be good! be humane! Take this voting
pebble and rush with your eyes closed to that second urn[105] and,
father, acquit him.

PHILOCLEON. No, I know no more how to acquit than to play the lyre.

BDELYCLEON. Come quickly, I will show you the way.

PHILOCLEON. Is this the first urn?

BDELYCLEON. Yes.

PHILOCLEON. Then I have voted.

BDELYCLEON (_aside_). I have fooled him and he has acquitted in spite of
himself.

PHILOCLEON. Come, I will turn out the urns. What is the result?

BDELYCLEON. We shall see.--Labes, you stand acquitted.--Eh! father,
what's the matter, what is it?

PHILOCLEON. Ah me! ah me! water! water!

BDELYCLEON. Pull yourself together, sir!

PHILOCLEON. Tell me! Is he really acquitted?

BDELYCLEON. Yes, certainly.

PHILOCLEON. Then it's all over with me!

BDELYCLEON. Courage, dear father, don't let this afflict you so terribly.

PHILOCLEON. And so I have charged my conscience with the acquittal of an
accused being! What will become of me? Sacred gods! forgive me. I did it
despite myself; it is not in my character.

BDELYCLEON. Do not vex yourself, father; I will feed you well, will take
you everywhere to eat and drink with me; you shall go to every feast;
henceforth your life shall be nothing but pleasure, and Hyperbolus shall
no longer have you for a tool. But come, let us go in.

PHILOCLEON. So be it; if you will, let us go in.

CHORUS (_Parabasis_). Go where it pleases you and may your happiness be
great. You meanwhile, oh! countless myriads, listen to the sound counsels
I am going to give you and take care they are not lost upon you. 'Twould
be the fate of vulgar spectators, not that of such an audience. Hence,
people, lend me your ear, if you love frank speaking. The poet has a
reproach to make against his audience; he says you have ill-treated him
in return for the many services he has rendered you. At first he kept
himself in the background and lent help secretly to other poets,[106] and
like the prophetic Genius, who hid himself in the belly of Eurycles,[107]
slipped within the spirit of another and whispered to him many a comic
hit. Later he ran the risks of the theatre on his own account, with his
face uncovered, and dared to guide his Muse unaided. Though overladen
with success and honours more than any of your poets, indeed despite all
his glory, he does not yet believe he has attained his goal; his heart is
not swollen with pride and he does not seek to seduce the young folk in
the wrestling school.[108] If any lover runs up to him to complain
because he is furious at seeing the object of his passion derided on the
stage, he takes no heed of such reproaches, for he is only inspired with
honest motives and his Muse is no go-between. From the very outset of his
dramatic career he has disdained to assail those who were men, but with a
courage worthy of Heracles himself he attacked the most formidable
monsters, and at the beginning went straight for that beast[109] with the
sharp teeth, with the terrible eyes that flashed lambent fire like those
of Cynna,[110] surrounded by a hundred lewd flatterers who spittle-licked
him to his heart's content; it had a voice like a roaring torrent, the
stench of a seal, a foul Lamia's testicles,[111] and the rump of a camel.
Our poet did not tremble at the sight of this horrible monster, nor did
he dream of gaining him over; and again this very day he is fighting for
your good. Last year besides, he attacked those pale, shivering and
feverish beings[112] who strangled your fathers in the dark, throttled
your grandfathers,[113] and who, lying in the beds of the most
inoffensive, piled up against them lawsuits, summonses and witnesses to
such an extent, that many of them flew in terror to the Polemarch for
refuge.[114] Such is the champion you have found to purify your country
of all its evil, and last year you betrayed him,[115] when he sowed the
most novel ideas, which, however, did not strike root, because you did
not understand their value; notwithstanding this, he swears by Bacchus,
the while offering him libations, that none ever heard better comic
verses. 'Tis a disgrace to you not to have caught their drift at once; as
for the poet, he is none the less appreciated by the enlightened judges.
He shivered his oars in rushing boldly forward to board his foe.[116] But
in future, my dear fellow-citizens, love and honour more those of your
poets who seek to imagine and express some new thought. Make their ideas
your own, keep them in your caskets like sweet-scented fruit.[117] If you
do, your clothing will emit an odour of wisdom the whole year through.

Formerly we were untiring, especially in _other_ exercises,[118] but 'tis
over now; our brow is crowned with hair whiter than the swan. We must,
however, rekindle a youthful ardour in these remnants of what was, and
for myself, I prefer my old age to the curly hair and the finery of all
these lewd striplings.

Should any among you spectators look upon me with wonder, because of this
wasp waist, or not know the meaning of this sting, I will soon dispel his
ignorance. We, who wear this appendage, are the true Attic men, who alone
are noble and native to the soil, the bravest of all people. 'Tis we who,
weapon in hand, have done so much for the country, when the Barbarian
shed torrents of fire and smoke over our city in his relentless desire to
seize our nests by force. At once we ran up, armed with lance and
buckler, and, drunk with the bitter wine of anger, we gave them battle,
man standing to man and rage distorting our lips.[119] A hail of arrows
hid the sky. However, by the help of the gods, we drove off the foe
towards evening. Before the battle an owl had flown over our army.[120]
Then we pursued them with our lance point in their loins as one hunts the
tunny-fish; they fled and we stung them in the jaw and in the eyes, so
that even now the barbarians tell each other that there is nothing in the
world more to be feared than the Attic wasp.

Oh! at that time I was terrible, I feared nothing; forth on my galleys I
went in search of my foe and subjected him.[121] Then we never thought of
rounding fine phrases, we never dreamt of calumny; 'twas who should prove
the strongest rower. And thus we took many a town from the Medes,[122]
and 'tis to us that Athens owes the tributes that our young men thieve
to-day.

Look well at us, and you will see that we have all the character and
habits of the wasp. Firstly, if roused, no beings are more irascible,
more relentless than we are. In all other things, too, we act like wasps.
We collect in swarms, in a kind of nests,[123] and some go a-judging with
the Archon,[124] some with the Eleven,[125] others at the Odeon;[126]
there are yet others, who hardly move at all, like the grubs in the
cells, but remain glued to the walls[127] and bent double to the ground.
We also pay full attention to the discovery of all sorts of means of
existing and sting the first who comes, so as to live at his expense.
Finally, we have among us drones,[128] who have no sting and who, without
giving themselves the least trouble, seize on our revenues as they flow
past them and devour them. 'Tis this that grieves us most of all, to see
men who have never served or held either lance or oar in defence of their
country, enriching themselves at our expense without ever raising a
blister on their hands. In short, I give it as my deliberate opinion that
in future every citizen not possessed of a sting shall not receive the
triobolus.

PHILOCLEON. As long as I live, I will never give up this cloak; 'tis the
one I wore in that battle[129] when Boreas delivered us from such fierce
attacks,

BDELYCLEON. You do not know what is good for you.

PHILOCLEON. Ah! I know not how to use fine clothing! T'other day, when
cramming myself with fried fish, I dropped so many grease spots that I
had to pay three obols to the cleaner.

BDELYCLEON. At least have a try, since you have once for all handed the
care for your well-being over to me.

PHILOCLEON. Very well then! what must I do?

BDELYCLEON. Take off your cloak, and put on this tunic in its stead.

PHILOCLEON. 'Twas well worth while to beget and bring up children, so
that this one should now wish to choke me.

BDELYCLEON. Come, take this tunic and put it on without so much talk.

PHILOCLEON. Great gods! what sort of a cursed garment is this?

BDELYCLEON. Some call it a pelisse, others a Persian cloak.[130]

PHILOCLEON. Ah! I thought it was a wraprascal like those made at
Thymaetia.[131]

BDELYCLEON. Pray, how should you know such garments? 'Tis only at Sardis
you could have seen them, and you have never been there.

PHILOCLEON. I' faith, no! but it seems to me exactly like the mantle
Morychus[132] sports.

BDELYCLEON. Not at all; I tell you they are woven at Ecbatana.

PHILOCLEON. What! are there woollen ox-guts[133] then at Ecbatana?

BDELYCLEON. Whatever are you talking about? These are woven by the
Barbarians at great cost. I am certain this pelisse has consumed more
than a talent of wool.[134]

PHILOCLEON. It should be called wool-waster then instead of pelisse.

BDELYCLEON. Come, father, just hold still for a moment and put it on.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! horrors! what a waft of heat the hussy wafts up my nose!

BDELYCLEON. Will you have done with this fooling?

PHILOCLEON. No, by Zeus! if need be, I prefer you should put me in the
oven.

BDELYCLEON. Come! I will put it round you. There!

PHILOCLEON. At all events, bring out a crook.

BDELYCLEON. Why, whatever for?

PHILOCLEON. To drag me out of it before I am quite melted.

BDELYCLEON. Now take off those wretched clogs and put on these nice
Laconian slippers.

PHILOCLEON. I put on odious slippers made by our foes! Never!

BDELYCLEON. Come! put your foot in and push hard. Quick!

PHILOCLEON. 'Tis ill done of you. You want me to put my foot on Laconian
ground.

BDELYCLEON. Now the other.

PHILOCLEON. Ah! no, not that one; one of its toes holds the Laconians in
horror.

BDELYCLEON. Positively you must.

PHILOCLEON. Alas! alas! Then I shall have no chilblains in my old
age.[135]

BDELYCLEON. Now, hurry up and get them on; and now imitate the easy
effeminate gait of the rich. See, like this.

PHILOCLEON. There!... Look at my get-up and tell me which rich man I most
resemble in my walk.

BDELYCLEON. Why, you look like a garlic plaster on a boil.

PHILOCLEON. Ah! I am longing to swagger and sway my rump about.

BDELYCLEON. Now, will you know how to talk gravely with well-informed men
of good class?

PHILOCLEON. Undoubtedly.

BDELYCLEON. What will you say to them?

PHILOCLEON. Oh, lots of things. First of all I shall say, that
Lamia,[136] seeing herself caught, let fly a fart; then, that Cardopion
and her mother....

BDELYCLEON. Come, no fabulous tales, pray! talk of realities, of domestic
facts, as is usually done.

PHILOCLEON. Ah! I know something that is indeed most domestic. Once upon
a time there was a rat and a cat....

BDELYCLEON. "Oh, you ignorant fool," as Theagenes said[137] to the
scavenger in a rage. Are you going to talk of cats and rats among
high-class people?

PHILOCLEON. Then what should I talk about?

BDELYCLEON. Tell some dignified story. Relate how you were sent on a
solemn mission with Androcles and Clisthenes.

PHILOCLEON. On a mission! never in my life, except once to Paros,[138] a
job which brought me in two obols a day.

BDELYCLEON. At least say, that you have just seen Ephudion making good
play in the pancratium[139] with Ascondas and, that despite his age and
his white hair, he is still robust in loin and arm and flank and that his
chest is a very breastplate.

PHILOCLEON. Stop! stop! what nonsense! Who ever contested at the
pancratium with a breast-plate on?

BDELYCLEON. That is how well-behaved folk like to talk. But another
thing. When at wine, it would be fitting to relate some good story of
your youthful days. What is your most brilliant feat?

PHILOCLEON. My best feat? Ah! 'twas when I stole Ergasion's vine-props.

BDELYCLEON. You and your vine-props! you'll be the death of me! Tell of
one of your boar-hunts or of when you coursed the hare. Talk about some
torch-race you were in; tell of some deed of daring.

PHILOCLEON. Ah! my most daring deed was when, quite a young man still, I
prosecuted Phayllus, the runner, for defamation, and he was condemned by
a majority of two votes.

BDELYCLEON. Enough of that! Now recline there, and practise the bearing
that is fitting at table in society.

PHILOCLEON. How must I recline? Tell me quick!

BDELYCLEON. In an elegant style.

PHILOCLEON. Like this?

BDELYCLEON. Not at all.

PHILOCLEON. How then?

BDELYCLEON. Spread your knees on the tapestries and give your body the
most easy curves, like those taught in the gymnasium. Then praise some
bronze vase, survey the ceiling, admire the awning stretched over the
court. Water is poured over our hands; the tables are spread; we sup and,
after ablution, we now offer libations to the gods.

PHILOCLEON. But, by Zeus! this supper is but a dream, it appears!

BDELYCLEON. The flute-player has finished the prelude. The guests are
Theorus, Aeschines, Phanus, Cleon, Acestor;[140] and beside this last, I
don't know who else. You are with them. Shall you know exactly how to
take up the songs that are started?

PHILOCLEON. Better than any born mountaineer of Attica.

BDELYCLEON. That we shall see. Suppose me to be Cleon. I am the first to
begin the song of Harmodius, and you take it up: "There never was yet
seen in Athens ...

PHILOCLEON. ... such a rogue or such a thief."[141]

BDELYCLEON. Why, you wretched man, 'twill be the end of you if you sing
that. He will vow your ruin, your destruction, to chase you out of the
country.

PHILOCLEON. Well! then I shall answer his threats with another song:
"With your madness for supreme power, you will end by overthrowing the
city, which even now totters towards ruin."

BDELYCLEON. And when Theorus, prone at Cleon's feet, takes his hand and
sings, "Like Admetus, love those who are brave,"[142] what reply will you
make him?

PHILOCLEON. I shall sing, "I know not how to play the fox, nor call
myself the friend of both parties."

BDELYCLEON. Then comes the turn of Aeschines, the son of Sellus, and a
well-trained and clever musician, who will sing, "Good things and riches
for Clitagoras and me and eke for the Thessalians!"

PHILOCLEON. "The two of us have squandered a deal between us."

BDELYCLEON. At this game you seem at home. But come, we will go and dine
with Philoctemon.--Slave! slave! place our dinner in a basket, and let us
go for a good long drinking bout.

PHILOCLEON. By no means, it is too dangerous; for after drinking, one
breaks in doors, one comes to blows, one batters everything. Anon, when
the wine is slept off, one is forced to pay.

BDELYCLEON. Not if you are with decent people. Either they undertake to
appease the offended person or, better still, you say something witty,
you tell some comic story, perhaps one of those you have yourself heard
at table, either in Aesop's style or in that of Sybaris; all laugh and
the trouble is ended.

PHILOCLEON. Faith! 'tis worth while learning many stories then, if you
are thus not punished for the ill you do. But come, no more delay!

CHORUS. More than once have I given proof of cunning and never of
stupidity, but how much more clever is Amynias, the son of Sellus and of
the race of forelock-wearers; him we saw one day coming to dine with
Leogaras,[143] bringing as his share one apple and a pomegranate, and
bear in mind he was as hungry as Antiphon.[144] He went on an embassy to
Pharsalus,[145] and there he lived solely among the Thessalian
mercenaries;[146] indeed, is he not the vilest of mercenaries himself?

Oh! blessed, oh! fortunate Automenes, how enviable is your fortune! You
have three sons, the most industrious in the world; one is the friend of
all, a very able man, the first among the lyre-players, the favourite of
the Graces. The second is an actor, and his talent is beyond all praise.
As for Ariphrades, he is by far the most gifted; his father would swear
to me, that without any master whatever and solely through the
spontaneous effort of his happy nature, he taught himself the use of his
tongue in the lewd places[147] where he spends the whole of his time.

Some have said that I and Cleon were reconciled. This is the truth of the
matter: Cleon was harassing me, persecuting and belabouring me in every
way; and, when I was being fleeced, the public laughed at seeing me
uttering such loud cries; not that they cared about me, but simply
curious to know whether, when trodden down by my enemy, I would not hurl
at him some taunt. Noticing this, I have played the wheedler a bit; but
now, look! the prop is deceiving the vine![148]

XANTHIAS. Oh! tortoises! happy to have so hard a skin, thrice happy to
carry this roof that protects your backs! Oh! creatures full of sense!
what a happy thought to cover your bodies with this shell, which shields
it from blows! As for me, I can no longer move; the stick has so
belaboured my body.

CHORUS. Eh, what's the matter, child? for, old as he may be, one has the
right to call anyone a child who has let himself be beaten.

XANTHIAS. Alas! my master is really the worst of all plagues. He was the
most drunk of all the guests, and yet among them were Hippyllus,
Antiphon, Lycon, Lysistratus, Theophrastus and Phrynichus. But he was a
hundred times more insolent than any. As soon as he had stuffed himself
with a host of good dishes, he began to leap and spring, to laugh and to
let wind like a little ass well blown out with barley. Then he set to
a-beating me with all his heart, shouting, "Slave! slave!" Lysistratus,
as soon as he saw him, let fly this comparison at him. "Old fellow," said
he, "you resemble one of the scum assuming the airs of a rich man or a
stupid ass that has broken loose from its stable." "As for you," bawled
the other at the top of his voice, "you are like a grasshopper,[149]
whose cloak is worn to the thread, or like Sthenelus[150] after his
clothes had been sold." All applauded excepting Theophrastus, who made a
grimace as behoved a well-bred man like him. The old man called to him,
"Hi! tell me then what you have to be proud of? Not so much mouthing,
you, who so well know how to play the buffoon and to lick-spittle the
rich!" 'Twas thus he insulted each in turn with the grossest of jests,
and he reeled off a thousand of the most absurd and ridiculous speeches.
At last, when he was thoroughly drunk, he started towards here, striking
everyone he met. Hold, here he comes reeling along. I will be off for
fear of his blows.

PHILOCLEON.[151] Halt! and let everyone begone, or I shall do an evil
turn to some of those who insist on following me. Clear off, rascals, or
I shall roast you with this torch!

BDELYCLEON. We shall all make you smart to-morrow for your youthful
pranks. We shall come in a body to summon you to justice.

PHILOCLEON. Ho! ho! summon me! what old women's babble! Know that I can
no longer bear to hear even the name of suits. Ha! ha! ha! this is what
pleases _me_, "Down with the urns!" Won't you begone? Down with the
dicasts! away with them, away with them! (_To the flute-girl._) Mount up
there, my little gilded cock-chafer; seize hold of this rope's end in
your hand.[152] Hold it tight, but have a care; the rope's a bit old and
worn, but it loves a nice rubbing still. Do you see how opportunely I got
you away from the solicitations of those fellows, who wanted to make you
work their tools in your mouth? You therefore owe me this return to
gratify mine by masturbating it. But will you pay the debt? Oh! I know
well you will not even try; you will play with me, you will laugh
heartily at my poor old weapon as you have done at many another man's.
And yet, if you would not be a naughty girl, I would redeem you, when my
son is dead, and you should be my concubine, my little cuntling. At
present I am not my own master; I am very young and am watched very
closely. My dear son never lets me out of his sight; 'tis an unbearable
creature, who would quarter a thread and skin a flint; he is afraid I
should get lost, for I am his only father. But here he comes running
towards us. But be quick, don't stir, hold these torches. I am going to
play him a young man's trick, the same as he played me before I was
initiated into the mysteries.

BDELYCLEON. Oh! oh! you debauched old dotard! you desire and, meseems,
you love pretty baggages; but, by Apollo, it shall not be with impunity!

PHILOCLEON. Ah! you would be very glad to eat a lawsuit in vinegar, you
would.

BDELYCLEON. 'Tis a rascally trick to steal the flute-girl away from the
other guests.

PHILOCLEON. What flute-girl? Are you distraught, as if you had just
returned from Pluto?

BDELYCLEON. By Zeus! But here is the Dardanian wench in person.[153]

PHILOCLEON. Nonsense. This is a torch that I have lit in the public
square in honour of the gods.

BDELYCLEON. Is this a torch?

PHILOCLEON. A torch? Certainly. Do you not see it is of several different
colours?

BDELYCLEON. And what is that black part in the middle?[154]

PHILOCLEON. 'Tis the pitch running out while it burns.

BDELYCLEON. And there, on the other side, surely that is a girl's bottom?

PHILOCLEON. No. 'Tis a small bit of the torch, that projects.

BDELYCLEON. What do you mean? what bit? Hi! you woman! come here!

PHILOCLEON. Ah! ah! What do you want to do?

BDELYCLEON. To take her from you and lead her away. You are too much worn
out and can do nothing.

PHILOCLEON. Hear me! One day, at Olympia, I saw Euphudion boxing bravely
against Ascondas;[155] he was already aged, and yet with a blow from his
fist he knocked down his young opponent. So beware lest I blacken _your_
eyes.

BDELYCLEON. By Zeus! you have Olympia at your finger-ends!

A BAKER'S WIFE (_to Bdelycleon_). Come to my help, I beg you, in the name
of the gods! This cursed man, when striking out right and left with his
torch, knocked over ten loaves worth an obolus apiece, and then, to cap
the deal, four others.

BDELYCLEON. Do you see what lawsuits you are drawing upon yourself with
your drunkenness? You will have to plead.

PHILOCLEON. Oh, no, no! a little pretty talk and pleasant tales will soon
settle the matter and reconcile her with me.

BAKER'S WIFE. Not so, by the goddesses twain! It shall not be said that
you have with impunity spoilt the wares of Myrtia,[156] the daughter of
Ancylion and Sostraté.

PHILOCLEON. Listen, woman, I wish to tell you a lovely anecdote.

BAKER'S WIFE. Oh! friend, no anecdotes for me, thank you.

PHILOCLEON. One night Aesop was going out to supper. A drunken bitch had
the impudence to bark near him. Aesop said to her, "Oh, bitch, bitch! you
would do well to sell your wicked tongue and buy some wheat."

BAKER'S WIFE. You make a mock of me! Very well! Be you who you like, I
shall summons you before the market inspectors[157] for damage done to my
business. Chaerephon[158] here shall be my witness.

PHILOCLEON. But just listen, here's another will perhaps please you
better. Lasus and Simonides[159] were contesting against each other for
the singing prize. Lasus said, "Damn me if I care."

BAKER'S WIFE. Ah! really, did he now!

PHILOCLEON. As for you, Chaerephon, _can_ you be witness to this woman,
who looks as pale and tragic as Ino when she throws herself from her
rock[160] ... at the feet of Euripides?

BDELYCLEON. Here, methinks, comes another to summons you; _he_ has his
witness too. Ah! unhappy indeed we are!

ACCUSER. I summons you, old man, for outrage.

BDELYCLEON. For outrage? Oh! in the name of the gods, do not summons him!
I will be answerable for him; name the penalty and I will be more
grateful still.

PHILOCLEON. I ask for nothing better than to be reconciled with him; for
I admit I struck him and threw stones at him. So, first come here. Will
you leave it in my hands to name the indemnity I must pay, if I promise
you my friendship as well, or will you fix it yourself?

ACCUSER. Fix it; I like neither lawsuits nor disputes.

PHILOCLEON. A man of Sybaris[161] fell from his chariot and wounded his
head most severely; he was a very poor driver. One of his friends came up
to him and said, "Every man to his trade." Well then, go you to
Pittalus[162] to get mended.

BDELYCLEON. You are incorrigible.

ACCUSER (_to his witness_). At all events, make a note of his reply.

PHILOCLEON. Listen, instead of going off so abruptly. A woman at Sybaris
broke a box.

ACCUSER (_to his witness_). I again ask you to witness this.

PHILOCLEON. The box therefore had the fact attested, but the woman said,
"Never worry about witnessing the matter, but hurry off to buy a cord to
tie it together with; 'twill be the more sensible course."

ACCUSER. Oh! go on with your ribaldry until the Archon calls the case.

BDELYCLEON (_to Philocleon_). No, by Demeter! you stay here no longer! I
take you and carry you off.

PHILOCLEON. And what for?

BDELYCLEON. What for? I shall carry you to the house; else there would
not be enough witnesses for the accusers.

PHILOCLEON. One day at Delphi, Aesop ...

BDELYCLEON. I don't care a fig for that.

PHILOCLEON. ... was accused of having stolen a sacred vase. But he
replied, that the horn beetle ... (_Philocleon goes on with his fable
while Bdelycleon is carrying him off the scene by main force._)

BDELYCLEON. Oh, dear, dear! You drive me crazy with your horn-beetle.

CHORUS. I envy you your happiness, old man. What a contrast to his former
frugal habits and his very hard life! Taught now in quite another school,
he will know nothing but the pleasures of ease. Perhaps he will jib at
it, for indeed 'tis difficult to renounce what has become one's second
nature. However, many have done it, and adopting the ideas of others,
have changed their use and wont. As for Philocleon's son, I, like all
wise and judicious men, cannot sufficiently praise his filial tenderness
and his tact. Never have I met a more amiable nature, and I have
conceived the greatest fondness for him. How he triumphed on every point
in his discussion with his father, when he wanted to bring him back to
more worthy and honourable tastes!

XANTHIAS. By Bacchus! 'Tis some Evil Genius has brought this unbearable
disorder into our house. The old man, full up with wine and excited by
the sound of the flute, is so delighted, so enraptured, that he spends
the night executing the old dances that Thespis first produced on the
stage,[163] and just now he offered to prove to the modern tragedians, by
disputing with them for the dancing prize, that they are nothing but a
lot of old dotards.

PHILOCLEON. "Who loiters at the door of the vestibule?"[164]

XANTHIAS. Here comes our pest, our plague!

PHILOCLEON. Let down the barriers.[165] The dance is now to begin.

XANTHIAS. Or rather the madness.

PHILOCLEON. Impetuous movement already twists and racks my sides. How my
nostrils wheeze! how my back cracks!

XANTHIAS. Go and fill yourself with hellebore.[166]

PHILOCLEON. Phrynichus is as bold as a cock and terrifies his rivals.

XANTHIAS. Oh! oh! have a care he does not kick you.

PHILOCLEON. His leg kicks out sky-high, and his arse gapes open.[167]

XANTHIAS. Do have a care.

PHILOCLEON. Look how easily my leg-joints move.

BDELYCLEON. Great gods! What does all this mean? Is it actual, downright
madness?

PHILOCLEON. And now I summon and challenge my rivals. If there be a
tragic poet who pretends to be a skilful dancer, let him come and contest
the matter with me. Is there one? Is there _not_ one?

BDELYCLEON. Here comes one, and one only.

PHILOCLEON. Who is the wretch?

BDELYCLEON. 'Tis the younger son of Carcinus.[168]

PHILOCLEON. I will crush him to nothing; in point of keeping time, I will
knock him out, for he knows nothing of rhythm.

BDELYCLEON. Ah! ah! here comes his brother too, another tragedian, and
another son of Carcinus.

PHILOCLEON. Him I will devour for my dinner.

BDELYCLEON. Oh! ye gods! I see nothing but crabs.[169] Here is yet
another son of Carcinus.

PHILOCLEON. What is't comes here?  A shrimp or a spider?[170]

BDELYCLEON. 'Tis a crab,[171]--a crabkin, the smallest of its kind; he
writes tragedies.

PHILOCLEON. Oh! Carcinus, how proud you should be of your brood! What a
crowd of kinglets have come swooping down here!

BDELYCLEON. Come, come, my poor father, you will have to measure yourself
against them.

PHILOCLEON. Have pickle prepared for seasoning them, if I am bound to
prove the victor.

CHORUS. Let us stand out of the way a little, so that they may twirl at
their ease. Come, illustrious children of this inhabitant of the briny,
brothers of the shrimps, skip on the sand and the shore of the barren
sea; show us the lightning whirls and twirls of your nimble limbs.
Glorious offspring of Phrynichus,[172] let fly your kicks, so that the
spectators may be overjoyed at seeing your legs so high in air. Twist,
twirl, tap your bellies, kick your legs to the sky. Here comes your
famous father, the ruler of the sea,[173] delighted to see his three
lecherous kinglets.[174] Go on with your dancing, if it pleases you, but
as for us, we shall not join you. Lead us promptly off the stage, for
never a Comedy yet was seen where the Chorus finished off with a dance.

       *       *       *       *       *

FINIS OF "THE WASPS"

       *       *       *       *       *

Footnotes:

[1] Meaning, Bdelycleon will thrash you if you do not keep a good watch
on his father.

[2] The Corybantes, priests of Cybelé, comported themselves like madmen
in the celebration of their mysteries and made the air resound with the
the noise of their drums.

[3] Cleonymus had shown himself equally cowardly on all occasions; he is
frequently referred to by Aristophanes, both in this and other comedies.

[4] The cloak and the staff were the insignia of the dicasts; the poet
describes them as sheep, because they were Cleon's servile tools.

[5] An allusion to Cleon, who was a tanner.

[6] In Greek, [Greek: d_emos] ([Greek: d_emós], _fat_; [Greek: d_êmos],
_people_) means both _fat_ and _people_.

[7] A tool of Cleon's; he had been sent on an embassy to Persia (_vide_
'The Acharnians'). The crow is a thief and rapacious, just as Theorus
was.

[8] In his life of Alcibiades, Plutarch mentions this defect in his
speech; or it may have been a 'fine gentleman' affectation.

[9] Among the Greeks, _going to the crows_ was equivalent to our _going
to the devil_.

[10] No doubt the fee generally given to the street diviners who were
wont to interpret dreams.

[11] Coarse buffoonery was welcomed at Megara, where, by the by, it is
said that Comedy had its birth.

[12] To gain the favour of the audience, the Comic poets often caused
fruit and cakes to be thrown to them.

[13] The gluttony of Heracles was a constant subject of jest with the
Comic poets.

[14] The incident of Pylos (see 'The Knights').

[15] The Greek word for _friend of strangers_ is [Greek: philoxenos],
which happened also to be the name of one of the vilest debauchees in
Athens.

[16] The tribunal of the Heliasts came next in dignity only to the
Areopagus. The dicasts, or jurymen, generally numbered 500; at times it
would call in the assistance of one or two other tribunals, and the
number of judges would then rise to 1000 or even 1500.

[17] A water-clock, used in the courts for limiting the time of the
pleaders.

[18] The pebble was held between the thumb and two fingers, in the same
way as one would hold a pinch of incense.

[19] A young Athenian of great beauty, also mentioned by Plato in his
'Gorgias.'  Lovers were font of writing the name of the object of their
adoration on the walls (see 'The Acharnians').

[20] [Greek: K_emos], the Greek term for the funnel-shaped top of the
voting urn, into which the judges dropped their voting pebbles.

[21] Racine has introduced this incident with some modification into his
'Plaideurs.'

[22] Although called _Heliasts_ ([Greek: H_elios], the sun), the judges
sat under cover. One of the columns that supported the roof is here
referred to.

[23] The juryman gave his vote for condemnation by tracing a line
horizontally across a waxed tablet. This was one method in use; another
was by means of pebbles placed in one or other of two voting urns.

[24] Used for the purpose of voting. There were two urns, one for each of
the two opinions, and each heliast placed a pebble in one of them.

[25] The Heliast's badge of office.

[26] To prepare him for initiation into the mysteries of the Corybantes.

[27] Who pretended to cure madness; they were priests of Cybelé.

[28] The sacred instrument of the Corybantes.

[29] _Friend of Cleon,_ who had raised the daily salary of the Heliasts
to three obols.

[30] _Enemy of Cleon._

[31] The smoke of fig-wood is very acrid, like the character of the
Heliasts.

[32] Used for closing the chimney, when needed.

[33] Which had been stretched all round the courtyard to prevent his
escape.

[34] Market-day.

[35] He enters the courtyard, returning with the ass, under whose belly
Philocleon is clinging.

[36] In the Odyssey (Bk. IX) Homer makes his hero, 'the wily' Odysseus,
escape from the Cyclops' cave by clinging on under a ram's belly, which
slips past its blinded master without noticing the trick played on him.
Odysseus, when asked his name by the Cyclops, replies, _Outis_, Nobody.

[37] A name formed out of two Greek words, meaning, _running away on a
horse_.

[38] The story goes that a traveller who had hired an ass, having placed
himself in its shadow to escape the heat of the sun, was sued by the
driver, who had pretended that he had let the ass, not but its shadow;
hence the Greek proverb, _to quarrel about the shade of an ass_, i.e.
about nothing at all.

[39] When you inherit from me.

[40] There is a similar incident in the 'Plaideurs.'

[41] A Macedonian town in the peninsula of Pallené; it had shaken off the
Athenian yoke and was not retaken for two years.

[42] A disciple of Thespis, who even in his infancy devoted himself to
the dramatic art. He was the first to introduce female characters on the
stage. He flourished about 500 B.C., having won his first prize for
Tragedy in 511 B.C., twelve years before Aeschylus.

[43] Originally subjected to Sparta by Pausanias in 478 B.C., it was
retaken by Cimon in 471, or forty-eight years previous to the production
of 'The Wasps.'  The old Heliasts refer to this latter event.

[44] An Athenian general, who had been defeated when sent to Sicily with
a fleet to the succour of Leontini; no doubt Cleon had charged him with
treachery.

[45] The Samians were in league with the Persians, but a certain
Carystion betrayed the plot, and thanks to this the Athenians were able
to retake Samos before the island had obtained help from Asia.

[46] The towns of Thrace, up to that time the faithful allies of Athens,
were beginning to throw off her yoke.

[47] Who fulfilled the office of president.

[48] Meaning, "Will it only remain for us to throw ourselves into the
water?"  Hellé, taken by a ram across the narrow strait, called the
Hellespont after her name, fell into the waves and was drowned.

[49] He is a prisoner inside, and speaks through the closed doors.

[50] This boiling, acid pickle reminds him of the fiery, acrid temper of
the heliasts.

[51] A name invented for the occasion; it really means, _Cleon who holds
the people in his snares_.

[52] When he entered Troy as a spy.

[53] The island of Naxos was taken by Cimon, in consequence of sedition
in the town of Naxos, about fifty years before the production of 'The
Wasps.'

[54] One of the titles under which Artemis, the goddess of the chase, was
worshipped.

[55] Demeter and Persephone. This was an accusation frequently brought
against people in Athens.

[56] An orator of great violence of speech and gesture.

[57] For Philocleon, the titulary god was Lycus, the son of Pandion, the
King of Athens, because a statue stood erected to him close to the spot
where the tribunals sat, and because he recognized no other fatherland
but the tribunals.

[58] A debauchee and an embezzler of public funds, already mentioned a
little above.

[59] Aristophanes speaks of him in 'The Birds' as a traitor and as an
alien who usurped the rights of the city.

[60] A Greek proverb signifying "Much ado about nothing."

[61] A Spartan general, who perished in the same battle as Cleon, before
Amphipolis, in 422 B.C.

[62] Meaning, the mere beginnings of any matter.

[63] This 'figure of love'--woman atop of the man--is known in Greek as
[Greek: hippos] (Latin _equus_, 'the horse'); note the play upon words
with the name Hippias.

[64] A tragic poet, who was a great lover of good cheer, it appears.

[65] Old men, who carried olive branches in the processions of the
Panathenaea. Those whose great age or infirmity forbade their being used
for any other purpose were thus employed.

[66] An obscene pun. [Greek: Choiros] means both _a sow_ and the female
organ.

[67] A celebrated actor.

[68] There were two tragedies named 'Niobé,' one by Aeschylus and the
other by Sophocles, both now lost.

[69] A double strap, which flute-players applied to their lips and was
said to give softness to the tones.

[70] The shell was fixed over the seal to protect it.

[71] A calumniator and a traitor (see 'The Acharnians').

[72] Cleonymus, whose name the poet modifies, so as to introduce the idea
of a flatterer ([Greek: kolax]).

[73] Another flatterer, a creature of Cleon's.

[74] Athenian poor, having no purse, would put small coins into mouth for
safety. We know that the triobolus was the daily of the judges. Its value
was about 4-1/2 d.

[75] A jar of wine, which he had bought with his pay.

[76] A jar with two long ears or handles, in this way resembling an ass.

[77] A well-known flute-player.

[78] We have already seen that when accepting his son's challenge he
swore to fall upon his sword if defeated in the debate.

[79] Pericles had first introduced the custom of sending poor citizens,
among whom the land was divided, into the conquered countries. The island
of Aegina had been mainly divided in this way among Athenian colonists.

[80] The choenix was a measure corresponding to our quart.

[81] A verse borrowed from Euripides' 'Bellerophon.'

[82] i.e. a legislator. The name given in Athens to the last six of the
nine Archons, because it was their special duty to see the laws
respected.

[83] Mentioned both in 'The Acharnians' and 'The Knights.'

[84] The drachma was worth six obols, or twice the pay of a heliast.

[85] We have already seen that the Athenians sometimes kept their small
money in their mouth.

[86] Which were placed in the courts; dogs were sacrificed on them.

[87] As already stated, the statue of Lycus stood close to the place
where the tribunals sat.

[88] The barrier in the Heliaea, which separated the heliasts from the
public.

[89] The whole of this comic trial of the dog Labes is an allusion to the
general Laches, already mentioned, who had failed in Sicily. He was
accused of taking bribes of money from the Sicilians.

[90] To serve for a bar.

[91] This was a customary formula, [Greek: aph' Estias archou], "begin
from Hestia," first adore Vesta, the god of the family hearth. In similar
fashion, the Romans said, _ab Jove principium_.

[92] For conviction and acquittal.

[93] On which the sentence was entered.

[94] No doubt the stew-pot and the wine-jar.

[95] The _article_ Bdelycleon had brought.--The clepsydra was a kind of
water-clock; the other vessel is compared to it, because of the liquid in
it.

[96] A title of Apollo, worshipped as the god of healing.

[97] A title of Apollo, because of the sacrifices, which the Athenians
offered him in the streets, from [Greek: aguia], a street.

[98] Bdelycleon.

[99] The formula used by the president before declaring the sitting of
the Court opened.

[100] That is, by way of fine.

[101] A reference to the peculations Laches was supposed to have
practised in keeping back part of the pay of the Athenian sailors engaged
in the Sicilian Expedition.

[102] The [Greek: Thesmothetai] at Athens were the six junior Archons,
who judged cases assigned to no special Court, presided at the allotment
of magistrates, etc.

[103] Thucydides, son of Milesias, when accused by Pericles, could not
say a word in his own defence. One would have said his tongue was
paralysed. He was banished.--He must not be confounded with Thucydides
the historian, whose exile took place after the production of 'The
Wasps.'

[104] When the judges were touched by the pleading of the orator and were
decided on acquittal, they said to the defending advocate, "_Cease
speaking, descend from the rostrum._"

[105] There were two urns, one called that of Conviction, the other of
Acquittal.

[106] Meaning, that he had at first produced pieces under the name of
other poets, such as Callistrates and Phidonides.

[107] Eurycles, an Athenian diviner, surnamed the Engastromythes ([Greek:
muthos], speech, [Greek: en gastri], in the belly), because he was
believed to be inspired by a genius within him.--The same name was also
given to the priestesses of Apollo, who spoke their oracles without
moving their lips.

[108] Some poets misused their renown as a means of seduction among young
men.

[109] Cleon, whom he attacked in 'The Knights,' the first Comedy that
Aristophanes had produced in his own name.

[110] Cynna, like Salabaccha, was a shameless courtesan of the day.

[111] The lamiae were mysterious monsters, to whom the ancients ascribed
the most varied forms. They were depicted most frequently with the face
and bosom of a woman and the body of a serpent. Here Aristophanes endows
them with organs of virility. It was said that the blood of young men had
a special attraction for them. These lines, abusive of Cleon, occur again
in the 'Peace,' II. 738-42.

[112] Socrates and the sophists, with whom the poet confounds him in his
attacks.

[113] He likens them to vampires.

[114] The third Archon, whose duty was the protection of strangers. All
cases involving the rights of citizenship were tried before him. These
were a frequent cause of lawsuit at Athens.

[115] 'The Clouds' had not been well received.

[116] Aristophanes lets it be understood that the refusal to crown him
arose from the fact that he had been too bold in his attack.

[117] To perfume their caskets, etc., the Ancients placed scented fruit,
especially oranges, in them.

[118] The pastimes of love.

[119] At Marathon, where the Athenians defeated the Persian invaders, 490
B.C. The battle-field is a plain on the north-east coast of Attica, about
twenty-seven miles from Athens.

[120] A favourable omen, of course. The owl was the bird of Athené.

[121] An allusion to Cimon's naval victories.

[122] The Cyclades islands and many towns on the coast of Asia Minor.

[123] The tribunals.

[124] The six last Archons presided over the civil courts and were styled
Thesmothetae (see above).

[125] Magistrates, who had charge of criminal cases.

[126] Built by Pericles. Musical contests were held there. Here also took
place distributions of flour, and the presence of the magistrates was no
doubt necessary to decide on the spot any disputes that might arise
regarding this.

[127] This, says the Scholiast, refers to magistrates appointed for the
upkeep of the walls. They were selected by ballot from amongst the
general body of Heliasts.

[128] The demagogues and their flatterers.

[129] The battle of Artemisium on the Euboean coast; a terrible storm
arose and almost destroyed the barbarian fleet, while sparing that of the
Athenians.

[130] A mantle trimmed with fur.

[131] A rural deme of Attica. Rough coats were made there, formed of
skins sewn together.

[132] An effeminate poet.

[133] He compares the thick, shaggy stuff of the pelisse to the
intestines of a bullock, which have a sort of crimped and curled look.

[134] An Attic talent was equal to about fifty-seven pounds avoirdupois.

[135] He grumbles over his own good fortune, as old men will.

[136] Lamia, the daughter of Belus and Libya, was loved by Zeus. Heré
deprived her of her beauty and instilled her with a passion for blood;
she is said to have plucked babes from their mothers' breast to devour
them. Weary of her crimes, the gods turned her into a beast of prey.

[137] Theagenes, of the Acharnian deme, was afflicted with a weakness
which caused him to be constantly letting off loud, stinking farts, even
in public--the cause of many gibes on the part of the Comic poets and his
contemporaries.

[138] He had been sent on a mission as an armed ambassador, i.e. as a
common soldier, whose pay was two obols.

[139] The [Greek: pankration] was a combined exercise, including both
wrestling and boxing.

[140] All these names have been already mentioned.

[141] Each time Philocleon takes up the song with words that are a satire
on the guest who begins the strain.

[142] King Admetus (Euripides' 'Alcestis') had suffered his devoted wife
Alcestis to die to save his life when ill to death. Heracles, however, to
repay former benefits received, descended into Hades and rescued Alcestis
from Pluto's clutches.

[143] A famous epicure, the Lucullus of Athens (see 'The Acharnians').

[144] A parasite renowned for his gluttony.

[145] A town in Thessaly.

[146] Because of his poverty.

[147] Four lines in 'The Knights' describe the infamous habits of
Ariphrades in detail.

[148] That is, it ceases to support it; Aristophanes does the same to
Cleon.

[149] Referring to Lysistratus' leanness.

[150] A tragic actor, whose wardrobe had been sold up, so the story went,
by his creditors.

[151] He enters, followed closely by the persons he has ill-used, and
leading a flute-girl by the hand.

[152] Meaning his penis.

[153] Dardanus, a district of Asia Minor, north of the Troad, supplied
many flute-girls to the cities of Greece.

[154] Pointing to the flute-girl's _motte_.

[155] He tells his son the very story the latter had taught him.

[156] The name of the baker's wife.

[157] Or Agoranomi, who numbered ten at Athens.

[158] The disciple of Socrates.

[159] Lasus, a musician and dithyrambic poet, born about 500 B.C. in
Argolis, was the rival of Simonides and thought himself his superior.

[160] Ino, the daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia. Being pursued by her
husband, Athamas, whom the Fury Tisiphoné had driven mad, she threw
herself into the sea with Melicerta, whereupon they were both changed
into sea-goddesses.--This is the subject of one of Euripides' tragedies.

[161] A famous town in Magna Graecia, south coast of Italy.

[162] A celebrated physician.--Philocleon means, "Instead of starting an
action, go and have yourself cared for; that is better worth your while."

[163] The dances that Thespis, the originator of Tragedy, interspersed
with the speaking parts of his plays.

[164] A verse borrowed from an unknown Tragedy.

[165] As was done in the stadia when the races were to be started.

[166] The ancients considered it a specific against madness.

[167] Phrynichus, like all the ancient tragic writers, mingled many
dances with his pieces.

[168] Tragic poet. His three sons had also written tragedies and were
dancers into the bargain.

[169] Carcinus, by a mere transposition of the accent ([Greek:
karkívos]), means _crab_ in Greek; hence the pun.

[170] Carcinus' sons were small and thin.

[171] The third son of Carcinus.

[172] Meaning, the three sons of Carcinus, the dancers, because, as
mentioned before, Phrynichus often introduced a chorus of dancers into
his Tragedies.

[173] Carcinus himself.

[174] The Greek word is [Greek: triorchoi]--possessed of three testicles,
of three-testicle power, inordinately lecherous; with the change of a
letter ([Greek: triarchoi]) it means 'three rulers,' 'three kinglets.'




THE BIRDS




INTRODUCTION

The Birds' differs markedly from all the other Comedies of Aristophanes
which have come down to us in subject and general conception. It is just
an extravaganza pure and simple--a graceful, whimsical theme chosen
expressly for the sake of the opportunities it afforded of bright,
amusing dialogue, pleasing lyrical interludes, and charming displays of
brilliant stage effects and pretty dresses. Unlike other plays of the
same Author, there is here apparently no serious political _motif_
underlying the surface burlesque and buffoonery.

Some critics, it is true, profess to find in it a reference to the
unfortunate Sicilian Expedition, then in progress, and a prophecy of its
failure and the political downfall of Alcibiades. But as a matter of
fact, the whole thing seems rather an attempt on the dramatist's part to
relieve the overwrought minds of his fellow-citizens, anxious and
discouraged at the unsatisfactory reports from before Syracuse, by a work
conceived in a lighter vein than usual and mainly unconnected with
contemporary realities.

The play was produced in the year 414 B.C., just when success or failure
in Sicily hung in the balance, though already the outlook was gloomy, and
many circumstances pointed to impending disaster. Moreover, the public
conscience was still shocked and perturbed over the mysterious affair of
the mutilation of the Hermae, which had occurred immediately before the
sailing of the fleet, and strongly suspicious of Alcibiades'
participation in the outrage. In spite of the inherent charm of the
subject, the splendid outbursts of lyrical poetry in some of the choruses
and the beauty of the scenery and costumes, 'The Birds' failed to win the
first prize. This was acclaimed to a play of Aristophanes' rival,
Amipsias, the title of which, 'The Comastae,' _or_ 'Revellers,' "seems
to imply that the chief interest was derived from direct allusions to the
outrage above mentioned and to the individuals suspected to have been
engaged in it."

For this reason, which militated against its immediate success, viz. the
absence of direct allusion to contemporary politics--there are, of
course, incidental references here and there to topics and personages of
the day--the play appeals perhaps more than any other of our Author's
productions to the modern reader. Sparkling wit, whimsical fancy, poetic
charm, are of all ages, and can be appreciated as readily by ourselves as
by an Athenian audience of two thousand years ago, though, of course,
much is inevitably lost "without the important adjuncts of music,
scenery, dresses and what we may call 'spectacle' generally, which we
know in this instance to have been on the most magnificent scale."

"The plot is this. Euelpides and Pisthetaerus, two old Athenians,
disgusted with the litigiousness, wrangling and sycophancy of their
countrymen, resolve upon quitting Attica. Having heard of the fame of
Epops (the hoopoe), sometime called Tereus, and now King of the Birds,
they determine, under the direction of a raven and a jackdaw, to seek
from him and his subject birds a city free from all care and strife."
Arrived at the Palace of Epops, they knock, and Trochilus (the wren), in
a state of great flutter, as he mistakes them for fowlers, opens the door
and informs them that his Majesty is asleep. When he awakes, the
strangers appear before him, and after listening to a long and eloquent
harangue on the superior attractions of a residence among the birds, they
propose a notable scheme of their own to further enhance its advantages
and definitely secure the sovereignty of the universe now exercised by
the gods of Olympus.

The birds are summoned to meet in general council. They come flying up
from all quarters of the heavens, and after a brief misunderstanding,
during which they come near tearing the two human envoys to pieces, they
listen to the exposition of the latters' plan. This is nothing less than
the building of a new city, to be called Nephelococcygia, or
'Cloud-cuckoo-town,' between earth and heaven, to be garrisoned and
guarded by the birds in such a way as to intercept all communication of
the gods with their worshippers on earth. All steam of sacrifice will be
prevented from rising to Olympus, and the Immortals will very soon be
starved into an acceptance of any terms proposed.

The new Utopia is duly constructed, and the daring plan to secure the
sovereignty is in a fair way to succeed. Meantime various quacks and
charlatans, each with a special scheme for improving things, arrive from
earth, and are one after the other exposed and dismissed. Presently
arrives Prometheus, who informs Epops of the desperate straits to which
the gods are by this time reduced, and advises him to push his claims and
demand the hand of Basileia (Dominion), the handmaid of Zeus. Next an
embassy from the Olympians appears on the scene, consisting of Heracles,
Posidon and a god from the savage regions of the Triballians. After some
disputation, it is agreed that all reasonable demands of the birds are to
be granted, while Pisthetaerus is to have Basileia as his bride. The
comedy winds up with the epithalamium in honour of the nuptials.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE BIRDS


DRAMATIS PERSONAE

EUELPIDES.
PISTHETAERUS.
EPOPS (the Hoopoe).
TROCHILUS, Servant to Epops.
PHOENICOPTERUS.
HERALDS.
A PRIEST.
A POET.
A PROPHET.
METON, a Geometrician.
A COMMISSIONER.
A DEALER IN DECREES.
IRIS.
A PARRICIDE.
CINESIAS, a Dithyrambic Bard.
AN INFORMER.
PROMETHEUS.
POSIDON.
TRIBALLUS.
HERACLES.
SERVANT of PISTHETAERUS.
MESSENGERS.
CHORUS OF BIRDS.

SCENE: A wild, desolate tract of open country; broken rocks and brushwood
occupy the centre of the stage.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE BIRDS


EUELPIDES (_to his jay_).[175] Do you think I should walk straight for
yon tree?

PISTHETAERUS (_to his crow_). Cursed beast, what are you croaking to
me?... to retrace my steps?

EUELPIDES. Why, you wretch, we are wandering at random, we are exerting
ourselves only to return to the same spot; 'tis labour lost.

PISTHETAERUS. To think that I should trust to this crow, which has made
me cover more than a thousand furlongs!

EUELPIDES. And I to this jay, who has torn every nail from my fingers!

PISTHETAERUS. If only I knew where we were. . . .

EUELPIDES. Could you find your country again from here?

PISTHETAERUS. No, I feel quite sure I could not, any more than could
Execestides[176] find his.

EUELPIDES. Oh dear! oh dear!

PISTHETAERUS. Aye, aye, my friend, 'tis indeed the road of "oh dears" we
are following.

EUELPIDES. That Philocrates, the bird-seller, played us a scurvy trick,
when he pretended these two guides could help us to find Tereus,[177] the
Epops, who is a bird, without being born of one. He has indeed sold us
this jay, a true son of Tharelides,[178] for an obolus, and this crow for
three, but what can they do? Why, nothing whatever but bite and
scratch!--What's the matter with you then, that you keep opening your
beak? Do you want us to fling ourselves headlong down these rocks? There
is no road that way.

PISTHETAERUS. Not even the vestige of a track in any direction.

EUELPIDES. And what does the crow say about the road to follow?

PISTHETAERUS. By Zeus, it no longer croaks the same thing it did.

EUELPIDES. And which way does it tell us to go now?

PISTHETAERUS. It says that, by dint of gnawing, it will devour my
fingers.

EUELPIDES. What misfortune is ours! we strain every nerve to get to the
birds,[179] do everything we can to that end, and we cannot find our way!
Yes, spectators, our madness is quite different to that of Sacas. He is
not a citizen, and would fain be one at any cost; we, on the contrary,
born of an honourable tribe and family and living in the midst of our
fellow-citizens, we have fled from our country as hard as ever we could
go. 'Tis not that we hate it; we recognize it to be great and rich,
likewise that everyone has the right to ruin himself; but the crickets
only chirrup among the fig-trees for a month or two, whereas the
Athenians spend their whole lives in chanting forth judgments from their
law courts.[180] That is why we started off with a basket, a stew-pot and
some myrtle boughs[181] and have come to seek a quiet country in which to
settle. We are going to Tereus, the Epops, to learn from him, whether, in
his aerial flights, he has noticed some town of this kind.

PISTHETAERUS. Here! look!

EUELPIDES. What's the matter?

PISTHETAERUS. Why, the crow has been pointing me to something up there
for some time now.

EUELPIDES. And the jay is also opening its beak and craning its neck to
show me I know not what. Clearly, there are some birds about here. We
shall soon know, if we kick up a noise to start them.

PISTHETAERUS. Do you know what to do? Knock your leg against this rock.

EUELPIDES. And you your head to double the noise.

PISTHETAERUS. Well then use a stone instead; take one and hammer with it.

EUELPIDES. Good idea! Ho there, within! Slave! slave!

PISTHETAERUS. What's that, friend! You say, "slave," to summon Epops!
'Twould be much better to shout, "Epops, Epops!"

EUELPIDES. Well then, Epops! Must I knock again? Epops!

TROCHILUS. Who's there? Who calls my master?

EUELPIDES. Apollo the Deliverer! what an enormous beak![182]

TROCHILUS. Good god! they are bird-catchers.

EUELPIDES. The mere sight of him petrifies me with terror. What a
horrible monster!

TROCHILUS. Woe to you!

EUELPIDES. But we are not men.

TROCHILUS. What are you, then?

EUELPIDES. I am the Fearling, an African bird.

TROCHILUS. You talk nonsense.

EUELPIDES. Well, then, just ask it of my feet.[183]

TROCHILUS. And this other one, what bird is it?

PISTHETAERUS. I? I am a Cackling,[184] from the land of the pheasants.

EUELPIDES. But you yourself, in the name of the gods! what animal are
you?

TROCHILUS. Why, I am a slave-bird.

EUELPIDES. Why, have you been conquered by a cock?

TROCHILUS. No, but when my master was turned into a peewit, he begged me
to become a bird too, to follow and to serve him.

EUELPIDES. Does a bird need a servant, then?

TROCHILUS. 'Tis no doubt because he was a man. At times he wants to eat a
dish of loach from Phalerum; I seize my dish and fly to fetch him some.
Again he wants some pea-soup; I seize a ladle and a pot and run to get
it.

EUELPIDES. This is, then, truly a running-bird.[185] Come, Trochilus, do
us the kindness to call your master.

TROCHILUS. Why, he has just fallen asleep after a feed of myrtle-berries
and a few grubs.

EUELPIDES. Never mind; wake him up.

TROCHILUS. I am certain he will be angry. However, I will wake him to
please you.

PISTHETAERUS. You cursed brute! why, I am almost dead with terror!

EUELPIDES. Oh! my god! 'twas sheer fear that made me lose my jay.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! you great coward! were you so frightened that you let
go your jay?

EUELPIDES. And did you not lose your crow, when you fell sprawling on the
ground? Pray tell me that.

PISTHETAERUS. No, no.

EUELPIDES. Where is it, then?

PISTHETAERUS. It has flown away.

EUELPIDES. Then you did not let it go! Oh! you brave fellow!

EPOPS. Open the forest,[186] that I may go out!

EUELPIDES. By Heracles! what a creature! what plumage! What means this
triple crest?

EPOPS. Who wants me?

EUELPIDES. The twelve great gods have used you ill, meseems.

EPOPS. Are you chaffing me about my feathers? I have been a man,
strangers.

EUELPIDES. 'Tis not you we are jeering at.

EPOPS. At what, then?

EUELPIDES. Why, 'tis your beak that looks so odd to us.

EPOPS. This is how Sophocles outrages me in his tragedies. Know, I once
was Tereus.[187]

EUELPIDES. You were Tereus, and what are you now? a bird or a
peacock?[188]

EPOPS. I am a bird.

EUELPIDES. Then where are your feathers? For I don't see them.

EPOPS. They have fallen off.

EUELPIDES. Through illness.

EPOPS. No. All birds moult their feathers, you know, every winter, and
others grow in their place. But tell me, who are you?

EUELPIDES. We? We are mortals.

EPOPS. From what country?

EUELPIDES. From the land of the beautiful galleys.[189]

EPOPS. Are you dicasts?[190]

EUELPIDES. No, if anything, we are anti-dicasts.

EPOPS. Is that kind of seed sown among you?[191]

EUELPIDES. You have to look hard to find even a little in our fields.

EPOPS. What brings you here?

EUELPIDES. We wish to pay you a visit.

EPOPS. What for?

EUELPIDES. Because you formerly were a man, like we are, formerly you had
debts, as we have, formerly you did not want to pay them, like ourselves;
furthermore, being turned into a bird, you have when flying seen all
lands and seas. Thus you have all human knowledge as well as that of
birds. And hence we have come to you to beg you to direct us to some cosy
town, in which one can repose as if on thick coverlets.

EPOPS. And are you looking for a greater city than Athens?

EUELPIDES. No, not a greater, but one more pleasant to dwell in.

EPOPS. Then you are looking for an aristocratic country.

EUELPIDES. I? Not at all! I hold the son of Scellias in horror.[192]

EPOPS. But, after all, what sort of city would please you best?

EUELPIDES. A place where the following would be the most important
business transacted.--Some friend would come knocking at the door quite
early in the morning saying, "By Olympian Zeus, be at my house early, as
soon as you have bathed, and bring your children too. I am giving a
nuptial feast, so don't fail, or else don't cross my threshold when I am
in distress."

EPOPS. Ah! that's what may be called being fond of hardships. And what
say you?

PISTHETAERUS. My tastes are similar.

EPOPS. And they are?

PISTHETAERUS. I want a town where the father of a handsome lad will stop
in the street and say to me reproachfully as if I had failed him, "Ah! Is
this well done, Stilbonides! You met my son coming from the bath after
the gymnasium and you neither spoke to him, nor embraced him, nor took
him with you, nor ever once twitched his testicles. Would anyone call you
an old friend of mine?"

EPOPS. Ah! wag, I see you are fond of suffering. But there is a city of
delights, such as you want. 'Tis on the Red Sea.

EUELPIDES. Oh, no. Not a sea-port, where some fine morning the
Salaminian[193] galley can appear, bringing a writ-server along. Have you
no Greek town you can propose to us?

EPOPS. Why not choose Lepreum in Elis for your settlement?

EUELPIDES. By Zeus! I could not look at Lepreum without disgust, because
of Melanthius.[194]

EPOPS. Then, again, there is the Opuntian, where you could live.

EUELPIDES. I would not be Opuntian[195] for a talent. But come, what is
it like to live with the birds? You should know pretty well.

EPOPS. Why, 'tis not a disagreeable life. In the first place, one has no
purse.

EUELPIDES. That does away with much roguery.

EPOPS. For food the gardens yield us white sesame, myrtle-berries,
poppies and mint.

EUELPIDES. Why, 'tis the life of the newly-wed indeed.[196]

PISTHETAERUS. Ha! I am beginning to see a great plan, which will transfer
the supreme power to the birds, if you will but take my advice.

EPOPS. Take your advice? In what way?

PISTHETAERUS. In what way? Well, firstly, do not fly in all directions
with open beak; it is not dignified. Among us, when we see a thoughtless
man, we ask, "What sort of bird is this?" and Teleas answers, "'Tis a man
who has no brain, a bird that has lost his head, a creature you cannot
catch, for it never remains in any one place."

EPOPS. By Zeus himself! your jest hits the mark. What then is to be done?

PISTHETAERUS. Found a city.

EPOPS. We birds? But what sort of city should we build?

PISTHETAERUS. Oh, really, really! 'tis spoken like a fool! Look down.

EPOPS. I am looking.

PISTHETAERUS. Now look upwards.

EPOPS. I am looking.

PISTHETAERUS. Turn your head round.

EPOPS. Ah! 'twill be pleasant for me, if I end in twisting my neck!

PISTHETAERUS. What have you seen?

EPOPS. The clouds and the sky.

PISTHETAERUS. Very well! is not this the pole of the birds then?

EPOPS. How their pole?

PISTHETAERUS. Or, if you like it, the land. And since it turns and passes
through the whole universe, it is called, 'pole.'[197] If you build and
fortify it, you will turn your pole into a fortified city.[198] In this
way you will reign over mankind as you do over the grasshoppers and cause
the gods to die of rabid hunger.

EPOPS. How so?

PISTHETAERUS. The air is 'twixt earth and heaven. When we want to go to
Delphi, we ask the Boeotians[199] for leave of passage; in the same way,
when men sacrifice to the gods, unless the latter pay you tribute, you
exercise the right of every nation towards strangers and don't allow the
smoke of the sacrifices to pass through your city and territory.

EPOPS. By earth! by snares! by network![200] I never heard of anything
more cleverly conceived; and, if the other birds approve, I am going to
build the city along with you.

PISTHETAERUS. Who will explain the matter to them?

EPOPS. You must yourself. Before I came they were quite ignorant, but
since I have lived with them I have taught them to speak.

PISTHETAERUS. But how can they be gathered together?

EPOPS. Easily. I will hasten down to the coppice to waken my dear
Procné;[201] as soon as they hear our voices, they will come to us hot
wing.

PISTHETAERUS. My dear bird, lose no time, I beg. Fly at once into the
coppice and awaken Procné.

EPOPS. Chase off drowsy sleep, dear companion. Let the sacred hymn gush
from thy divine throat in melodious strains; roll forth in soft cadence
your refreshing melodies to bewail the fate of Itys,[202] which has been
the cause of so many tears to us both. Your pure notes rise through the
thick leaves of the yew-tree right up to the throne of Zeus, where
Phoebus listens to you, Phoebus with his golden hair. And his ivory lyre
responds to your plaintive accents; he gathers the choir of the gods and
from their immortal lips rushes a sacred chant of blessed voices. (_The
flute is played behind the scene._)

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! by Zeus! what a throat that little bird possesses. He
has filled the whole coppice with honey-sweet melody!

EUELPIDES. Hush!

PISTHETAERUS. What's the matter?

EUELPIDES. Will you keep silence?

PISTHETAERUS. What for?

EUELPIDES. Epops is going to sing again.

EPOPS (_in the coppice_). Epopoi, poi, popoi, epopoi, popoi, here, here,
quick, quick, quick, my comrades in the air; all you, who pillage the
fertile lands of the husbandmen, the numberless tribes who gather and
devour the barley seeds, the swift flying race who sing so sweetly. And
you whose gentle twitter resounds through the fields with the little cry
of tio, tio, tio, tio, tio, tio, tio, tio; and you who hop about the
branches of the ivy in the gardens; the mountain birds, who feed on the
wild olive berries or the arbutus, hurry to come at my call, trioto,
trioto, totobrix; you also, who snap up the sharp-stinging gnats in the
marshy vales, and you who dwell in the fine plain of Marathon, all damp
with dew, and you, the francolin with speckled wings; you too, the
halcyons, who flit over the swelling waves of the sea, come hither to
hear the tidings; let all the tribes of long-necked birds assemble here;
know that a clever old man has come to us, bringing an entirely new idea
and proposing great reforms. Let all come to the debate here, here, here,
here. Torotorotorotorotix, kikkobau, kikkobau, torotorotorotorolililix.

PISTHETAERUS. Can you see any bird?

EUELPIDES. By Phoebus, no! and yet I am straining my eyesight to scan the
sky.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Twas really not worth Epops' while to go and bury himself
in the thicket like a plover when a-hatching.

PHOENICOPTERUS. Torotina, torotina.

PISTHETAERUS. Hold, friend, here is another bird.

EUELPIDES. I' faith, yes! 'tis a bird, but of what kind? Isn't it a
peacock?

PISTHETAERUS. Epops will tell us. What is this bird?

EPOPS. 'Tis not one of those you are used to seeing; 'tis a bird from the
marshes.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! oh! but he is very handsome with his wings as crimson
as flame.

EPOPS. Undoubtedly; indeed he is called flamingo.[203]

EUELPIDES. Hi! I say! You!

PISTHETAERUS. What are you shouting for?

EUELPIDES. Why, here's another bird.

PISTHETAERUS. Aye, indeed; 'tis a foreign bird too. What is this bird
from beyond the mountains with a look as solemn as it is stupid?

EPOPS. He is called the Mede.[204]

PISTHETAERUS. The Mede! But, by Heracles! how, if a Mede, has he flown
here without a camel?

EUELPIDES. Here's another bird with a crest.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! that's curious. I say, Epops, you are not the only one
of your kind then?

EPOPS. This bird is the son of Philocles, who is the son of Epops;[205]
so that, you see, I am his grandfather; just as one might say,
Hipponicus,[206] the son of Callias, who is the son of Hipponicus.

PISTHETAERUS. Then this bird is Callias! Why, what a lot of his feathers
he has lost![207]

EPOPS. That's because he is honest; so the informers set upon him and the
women too pluck out his feathers.

PISTHETAERUS. By Posidon, do you see that many-coloured bird? What is his
name?

EPOPS. This one? 'Tis the glutton.

PISTHETAERUS. Is there another glutton besides Cleonymus? But why, if he
is Cleonymus, has he not thrown away his crest?[208] But what is the
meaning of all these crests? Have these birds come to contend for the
double stadium prize?[209]

EPOPS. They are like the Carians, who cling to the crests of their
mountains for greater safety.[210]

PISTHETAERUS. Oh, Posidon! do you see what swarms of birds are gathering
here?

EUELPIDES. By Phoebus! what a cloud! The entrance to the stage is no
longer visible, so closely do they fly together.

PISTHETAERUS. Here is the partridge.

EUELPIDES. Faith! there is the francolin.

PISTHETAERUS. There is the poachard.

EUELPIDES. Here is the kingfisher. And over yonder?

EPOPS. 'Tis the barber.

EUELPIDES. What? a bird a barber?

PISTHETAERUS. Why, Sporgilus is one.[211] Here comes the owl.

EUELPIDES. And who is it brings an owl to Athens?[212]

PISTHETAERUS. Here is the magpie, the turtle-dove, the swallow, the
horned owl, the buzzard, the pigeon, the falcon, the ring-dove, the
cuckoo, the red-foot, the red-cap, the purple-cap, the kestrel, the
diver, the ousel, the osprey, the wood-pecker.

EUELPIDES. Oh! oh! what a lot of birds! what a quantity of blackbirds!
how they scold, how they come rushing up! What a noise! what a noise! Can
they be bearing us ill-will? Oh! there! there! they are opening their
beaks and staring at us.

PISTHETAERUS. Why, so they are.

CHORUS. Popopopopopopopoi. Where is he who called me? Where am I to find
him?

EPOPS. I have been waiting for you this long while; I never fail in my
word to my friends.

CHORUS. Titititititititi. What good thing have you to tell me?

EPOPS. Something that concerns our common safety, and that is just as
pleasant as it is to the purpose. Two men, who are subtle reasoners, have
come here to seek me.

CHORUS. Where? What? What are you saying?

EPOPS. I say, two old men have come from the abode of men to propose a
vast and splendid scheme to us.

CHORUS. Oh! 'tis a horrible, unheard-of crime! What are you saying?

EPOPS. Nay! never let my words scare you.

CHORUS. What have you done then?

EPOPS. I have welcomed two men, who wish to live with us.

CHORUS. And you have dared to do that!

EPOPS. Aye, and am delighted at having done so.

CHORUS. Where are they?

EPOPS. In your midst, as I am.

CHORUS. Ah! ah! we are betrayed; 'tis sacrilege! Our friend, he who
picked up corn-seeds in the same plains as ourselves, has violated our
ancient laws; he has broken the oaths that bind all birds; he has laid a
snare for me, he has handed us over to the attacks of that impious race
which, throughout all time, has never ceased to war against us. As for
this traitorous bird, we will decide his case later, but the two old men
shall be punished forthwith; we are going to tear them to pieces.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis all over with us.

EUELPIDES. You are the sole cause of all our trouble. Why did you bring
me from down yonder?

PISTHETAERUS. To have you with me.

EUELPIDES. Say rather to have me melt into tears.

PISTHETAERUS. Go to! you are talking nonsense.

EUELPIDES. How so?

PISTHETAERUS. How will you be able to cry when once your eyes are pecked
out?

CHORUS. Io! io! forward to the attack, throw yourselves upon the foe,
spill his blood; take to your wings and surround them on all sides. Woe
to them! let us get to work with our beaks, let us devour them. Nothing
can save them from our wrath, neither the mountain forests, nor the
clouds that float in the sky, nor the foaming deep. Come, peck, tear to
ribbons. Where is the chief of the cohort? Let him engage the right wing.

EUELPIDES. This is the fatal moment. Where shall I fly to, unfortunate
wretch that I am?

PISTHETAERUS. Stay!  stop here!

EUELPIDES. That they may tear me to pieces?

PISTHETAERUS. And how do you think to escape them?

EUELPIDES. I don't know at all.

PISTHETAERUS. Come, I will tell you. We must stop and fight them. Let us
arm ourselves with these stew-pots.

EUELPIDES. Why with the stew-pots?

PISTHETAERUS. The owl will not attack us.[213]

EUELPIDES. But do you see all those hooked claws?

PISTHETAERUS. Seize the spit and pierce the foe on your side.

EUELPIDES. And how about my eyes?

PISTHETAERUS. Protect them with this dish or this vinegar-pot.

EUELPIDES. Oh! what cleverness! what inventive genius! You are a great
general, even greater than Nicias,[214] where stratagem is concerned.

CHORUS. Forward, forward, charge with your beaks! Come, no delay. Tear,
pluck, strike, flay them, and first of all smash the stew-pot.

EPOPS. Oh, most cruel of all animals, why tear these two men to pieces,
why kill them? What have they done to you? They belong to the same tribe,
to the same family as my wife.[215]

CHORUS. Are wolves to be spared? Are they not our most mortal foes? So
let us punish them.

EPOPS. If they are your foes by nature, they are your friends in heart,
and they come here to give you useful advice.

CHORUS. Advice or a useful word from their lips, from them, the enemies
of my forbears!

EPOPS. The wise can often profit by the lessons of a foe, for caution is
the mother of safety. 'Tis just such a thing as one will not learn from a
friend and which an enemy compels you to know. To begin with, 'tis the
foe and not the friend that taught cities to build high walls, to equip
long vessels of war; and 'tis this knowledge that protects our children,
our slaves and our wealth.

CHORUS. Well then, I agree, let us first hear them, for 'tis best; one
can even learn something in an enemy's school.

PISTHETAERUS. Their wrath seems to cool. Draw back a little.

EPOPS. 'Tis only justice, and you will thank me later.

CHORUS. Never have we opposed your advice up to now.

PISTHETAERUS. They are in a more peaceful mood; put down your stew-pot
and your two dishes; spit in hand, doing duty for a spear, let us mount
guard inside the camp close to the pot and watch in our arsenal closely;
for we must not fly.

EUELPIDES. You are right. But where shall we be buried, if we die?

PISTHETAERUS. In the Ceramicus;[216] for, to get a public funeral, we
shall tell the Strategi that we fell at Orneae,[217] fighting the
country's foes.

CHORUS. Return to your ranks and lay down your courage beside your wrath
as the Hoplites do. Then let us ask these men who they are, whence they
come, and with what intent. Here, Epops, answer me.

EPOPS. Are you calling me? What do you want of me?

CHORUS. Who are they? From what country?

EPOPS. Strangers, who have come from Greece, the land of the wise.

CHORUS. And what fate has led them hither to the land of the birds?

EPOPS. Their love for you and their wish to share your kind of life; to
dwell and remain with you always.

CHORUS. Indeed, and what are their plans?

EPOPS. They are wonderful, incredible, unheard of.

CHORUS. Why, do they think to see some advantage that determines them to
settle here? Are they hoping with our help to triumph over their foes or
to be useful to their friends?

EPOPS. They speak of benefits so great it is impossible either to
describe or conceive them; all shall be yours, all that we see here,
there, above and below us; this they vouch for.

CHORUS. Are they mad?

EPOPS. They are the sanest people in the world.

CHORUS. Clever men?

EPOPS. The slyest of foxes, cleverness its very self, men of the world,
cunning, the cream of knowing folk.

CHORUS. Tell them to speak and speak quickly; why, as I listen to you, I
am beside myself with delight.

EPOPS. Here, you there, take all these weapons and hang them up inside
close to the fire, near the figure of the god who presides there and
under his protection;[218] as for you, address the birds, tell them why I
have gathered them together.

PISTHETAERUS. Not I, by Apollo, unless they agree with me as the little
ape of an armourer agreed with his wife, not to bite me, nor pull me by
the testicles, nor shove things up my....

CHORUS. You mean the.... (_Puts finger to bottom._) Oh! be quite at ease.

PISTHETAERUS. No, I mean my eyes.

CHORUS. Agreed.

PISTHETAERUS. Swear it.

CHORUS. I swear it and, if I keep my promise, let judges and spectators
give me the victory unanimously.

PISTHETAERUS. It is a bargain.

CHORUS. And if I break my word, may I succeed by one vote only.

HERALD. Hearken, ye people! Hoplites, pick up your weapons and return to
your firesides; do not fail to read the decrees of dismissal we have
posted.

CHORUS. Man is a truly cunning creature, but nevertheless explain.
Perhaps you are going to show me some good way to extend my power, some
way that I have not had the wit to find out and which you have
discovered. Speak! 'tis to your own interest as well as to mine, for if
you secure me some advantage, I will surely share it with you. But what
object can have induced you to come among us? Speak boldly, for I shall
not break the truce,--until you have told us all.

PISTHETAERUS. I am bursting with desire to speak; I have already mixed
the dough of my address and nothing prevents me from kneading it....
Slave! bring the chaplet and water, which you must pour over my hands. Be
quick![219]

EUELPIDES. Is it a question of feasting? What does it all mean?

PISTHETAERUS. By Zeus, no! but I am hunting for fine, tasty words to
break down the hardness of their hearts.--I grieve so much for you, who
at one time were kings....

CHORUS. We kings! Over whom?

PISTHETAERUS. ... of all that exists, firstly of me and of this man, even
of Zeus himself. Your race is older than Saturn, the Titans and the
Earth.

CHORUS. What, older than the Earth!

PISTHETAERUS. By Phoebus, yes.

CHORUS. By Zeus, but I never knew that before!

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis because you are ignorant and heedless, and have never
read your Aesop. 'Tis he who tells us that the lark was born before all
other creatures, indeed before the Earth; his father died of sickness,
but the Earth did not exist then; he remained unburied for five days,
when the bird in its dilemma decided, for want of a better place, to
entomb its father in its own head.

EUELPIDES. So that the lark's father is buried at Cephalae.[220]

EPOPS. Hence, if we existed before the Earth, before the gods, the
kingship belongs to us by right of priority.

EUELPIDES. Undoubtedly, but sharpen your beak well; Zeus won't be in a
hurry to hand over his sceptre to the woodpecker.

PISTHETAERUS. It was not the gods, but the birds, who were formerly the
masters and kings over men; of this I have a thousand proofs. First of
all, I will point you to the cock, who governed the Persians before all
other monarchs, before Darius and Megabyzus.[221] 'Tis in memory of his
reign that he is called the Persian bird.

EUELPIDES. For this reason also, even to-day, he alone of all the birds
wears his tiara straight on his head, like the Great King.[222]

PISTHETAERUS. He was so strong, so great, so feared, that even now, on
account of his ancient power, everyone jumps out of bed as soon as ever
he crows at daybreak. Blacksmiths, potters, tanners, shoemakers, bathmen,
corn-dealers, lyre-makers and armourers, all put on their shoes and go to
work before it is daylight.

EUELPIDES. I can tell you something anent that. 'Twas the cock's fault
that I lost a splendid tunic of Phrygian wool. I was at a feast in town,
given to celebrate the birth of a child; I had drunk pretty freely and
had just fallen asleep, when a cock, I suppose in a greater hurry than
the rest, began to crow. I thought it was dawn and set out for
Alimos.[223] I had hardly got beyond the walls, when a footpad struck me
in the back with his bludgeon; down I went and wanted to shout, but he
had already made off with my mantle.

PISTHETAERUS. Formerly also the kite was ruler and king over the Greeks.

EPOPS. The Greeks?

PISTHETAERUS. And when he was king, 'twas he who first taught them to
fall on their knees before the kites.[224]

EUELPIDES. By Zeus! 'tis what I did myself one day on seeing a kite; but
at the moment I was on my knees, and leaning backwards[225] with mouth
agape, I bolted an obolus and was forced to carry my bag home empty.[226]

PISTHETAERUS. The cuckoo was king of Egypt and of the whole of Phoenicia.
When he called out "cuckoo," all the Phoenicians hurried to the fields to
reap their wheat and their barley.[227]

EUELPIDES. Hence no doubt the proverb, "Cuckoo! cuckoo! go to the fields,
ye circumcised."[228]

PISTHETAERUS. So powerful were the birds, that the kings of Grecian
cities, Agamemnon, Menelaus, for instance, carried a bird on the tip of
their sceptres, who had his share of all presents.[229]

EUELPIDES. That I didn't know and was much astonished when I saw Priam
come upon the stage in the tragedies with a bird, which kept watching
Lysicrates[230] to see if he got any present.

PISTHETAERUS. But the strongest proof of all is, that Zeus, who now
reigns, is represented as standing with an eagle on his head as a symbol
of his royalty;[231] his daughter has an owl, and Phoebus, as his
servant, has a hawk.

EUELPIDES. By Demeter, 'tis well spoken. But what are all these birds
doing in heaven?

PISTHETAERUS. When anyone sacrifices and, according to the rite, offers
the entrails to the gods, these birds take their share before Zeus.
Formerly the men always swore by birds and never by the gods; even now
Lampon[232] swears by the goose, when he wants to lie.... Thus 'tis clear
that you were great and sacred, but now you are looked upon as slaves, as
fools, as Helots; stones are thrown at you as at raving madmen, even in
holy places. A crowd of bird-catchers sets snares, traps, limed-twigs and
nets of all sorts for you; you are caught, you are sold in heaps and the
buyers finger you over to be certain you are fat. Again, if they would
but serve you up simply roasted; but they rasp cheese into a mixture of
oil, vinegar and laserwort, to which another sweet and greasy sauce is
added, and the whole is poured scalding hot over your back, for all the
world as if you were diseased meat.

CHORUS. Man, your words have made my heart bleed; I have groaned over the
treachery of our fathers, who knew not how to transmit to us the high
rank they held from their forefathers. But 'tis a benevolent Genius, a
happy Fate, that sends you to us; you shall be our deliverer and I place
the destiny of my little ones and my own in your hands with every
confidence. But hasten to tell me what must be done; we should not be
worthy to live, if we did not seek to regain our royalty by every
possible means,

PISTHETAERUS. First I advise that the birds gather together in one city
and that they build a wall of great bricks, like that at Babylon, round
the plains of the air and the whole region of space that divides earth
from heaven.

EPOPS. Oh, Cebriones! oh, Porphyrion![233] what a terribly strong place!

PISTHETAERUS. This, this being well done and completed, you demand back
the empire from Zeus; if he will not agree, if he refuses and does not at
once confess himself beaten, you declare a sacred war against him and
forbid the gods henceforward to pass through your country with standing
organ, as hitherto, for the purpose of fondling their Alcmenas, their
Alopés, or their Semelés;[234] if they try to pass through, you
infibulate them with rings so that they can fuck no longer. You send
another messenger to mankind, who will proclaim to them that the birds
are kings, that for the future they must first of all sacrifice to them,
and only afterwards to the gods; that it is fitting to appoint to each
deity the bird that has most in common with it. For instance, are they
sacrificing to Aphrodité, let them at the same time offer barley to the
coot;[235] are they immolating a sheep to Posidon, let them consecrate
wheat in honour of the duck;[236] is a steer being offered to Heracles,
let honey-cakes be dedicated to the gull;[237] is a goat being slain for
King Zeus, there is a King-Bird, the wren,[238] to whom the sacrifice of
a male gnat is due before Zeus himself even.

EUELPIDES. This notion of an immolated gnat delights me! And now let the
great Zeus thunder!

EPOPS. But how will mankind recognize us as gods and not as jays? Us, who
have wings and fly?

PISTHETAERUS. You talk rubbish! Hermes is a god and has wings and flies,
and so do many other gods. First of all, Victory flies with golden wings,
Eros is undoubtedly winged too, and Iris is compared by Homer to a
timorous dove.[239] If men in their blindness do not recognize you as
gods and continue to worship the dwellers in Olympus, then a cloud of
sparrows greedy for corn must descend upon their fields and eat up all
their seeds; we shall see then if Demeter will mete them out any wheat.

EUELPIDES. By Zeus, she'll take good care she does not, and you will see
her inventing a thousand excuses.

PISTHETAERUS. The crows too will prove your divinity to them by pecking
out the eyes of their flocks and of their draught-oxen; and then let
Apollo cure them, since he is a physician and is paid for the
purpose.[240]

EUELPIDES. Oh! don't do that! Wait first until I have sold my two young
bullocks.

PISTHETAERUS. If on the other hand they recognize that you are God, the
principle of life, that you are Earth, Saturn, Posidon, they shall be
loaded with benefits.

EPOPS Name me one of these then.

PISTHETAERUS. Firstly, the locusts shall not eat up their vine-blossoms;
a legion of owls and kestrels will devour them. Moreover, the gnats and
the gall-bugs shall no longer ravage the figs; a flock of thrushes shall
swallow the whole host down to the very last.

EPOPS. And how shall we give wealth to mankind? This is their strongest
passion.

PISTHETAERUS. When they consult the omens, you will point them to the
richest mines, you will reveal the paying ventures to the diviner, and
not another shipwreck will happen or sailor perish.

EPOPS. No more shall perish? How is that?

PISTHETAERUS. When the auguries are examined before starting on a voyage,
some bird will not fail to say, "Don't start! there will be a storm," or
else, "Go! you will make a most profitable venture."

EUELPIDES. I shall buy a trading-vessel and go to sea. I will not stay
with you.

PISTHETAERUS. You will discover treasures to them, which were buried in
former times, for you know them. Do not all men say, "None know where my
treasure lies, unless perchance it be some bird."[241]

EUELPIDES. I shall sell my boat and buy a spade to unearth the vessels.

EPOPS. And how are we to give them health, which belongs to the gods?

PISTHETAERUS. If they are happy, is not that the chief thing towards
health? The miserable man is never well.

EPOPS. Old Age also dwells in Olympus. How will they get at it? Must they
die in early youth?

PISTHETAERUS. Why, the birds, by Zeus, will add three hundred years to
their life.

EPOPS. From whom will they take them?

PISTHETAERUS. From whom? Why, from themselves. Don't you know the cawing
crow lives five times as long as a man?

EUELPIDES. Ah! ah! these are far better kings for us than Zeus!

PISTHETAERUS. Far better, are they not? And firstly, we shall not have to
build them temples of hewn stone, closed with gates of gold; they will
dwell amongst the bushes and in the thickets of green oak; the most
venerated of birds will have no other temple than the foliage of the
olive tree; we shall not go to Delphi or to Ammon to sacrifice;[242] but
standing erect in the midst of arbutus and wild olives and holding forth
our hands filled with wheat and barley, we shall pray them to admit us to
a share of the blessings they enjoy and shall at once obtain them for a
few grains of wheat.

CHORUS. Old man, whom I detested, you are now to me the dearest of all;
never shall I, if I can help it, fail to follow your advice. Inspirited
by your words, I threaten my rivals the gods, and I swear that if you
march in alliance with me against the gods and are faithful to our just,
loyal and sacred bond, we shall soon have shattered their sceptre. 'Tis
our part to undertake the toil, 'tis yours to advise.

EPOPS. By Zeus! 'tis no longer the time to delay and loiter like
Nicias;[243] let us act as promptly as possible.... In the first place,
come, enter my nest built of brushwood and blades of straw, and tell me
your names.

PISTHETAERUS. That is soon done; my name is Pisthetaerus.

EPOPS. And his?

PISTHETAERUS. Euelpides, of the deme of Thria.

EPOPS. Good! and good luck to you.

PISTHETAERUS. We accept the omen.

EPOPS. Come in here.

PISTHETAERUS. Very well, 'tis you who lead us and must introduce us.

EPOPS. Come then.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! my god! do come back here. Hi! tell us how we are to
follow you. You can fly, but we cannot.

EPOPS. Well, well.

PISTHETAERUS. Remember Aesop's fables. It is told there, that the fox
fared very ill, because he had made an alliance with the eagle.

EPOPS. Be at ease. You shall eat a certain root and wings will grow on
your shoulders.

PISTHETAERUS. Then let us enter. Xanthias and Manes,[244] pick up our
baggage.

CHORUS. Hi! Epops!  do you hear me?

EPOPS. What's the matter?

CHORUS. Take them off to dine well and call your mate, the melodious
Procné, whose songs are worthy of the Muses; she will delight our leisure
moments.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! I conjure you, accede to their wish; for this
delightful bird will leave her rushes at the sound of your voice; for the
sake of the gods, let her come here, so that we may contemplate the
nightingale.[245]

EPOPS. Let it be as you desire. Come forth, Procné, show yourself to
these strangers.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! great Zeus! what a beautiful little bird! what a dainty
form! what brilliant plumage![246]

EUELPIDES. Do you know how dearly I should like to split her legs for
her?

PISTHETAERUS. She is dazzling all over with gold, like a young girl.[247]

EUELPIDES. Oh! how I should like to kiss her!

PISTHETAERUS. Why, wretched man, she has two little sharp points on her
beak.

EUELPIDES. I would treat her like an egg, the shell of which we remove
before eating it; I would take off her mask and then kiss her pretty
face.

EPOPS. Let us go in.

PISTHETAERUS. Lead the way, and may success attend us.

CHORUS. Lovable golden bird, whom I cherish above all others, you, whom I
associate with all my songs, nightingale, you have come, you have come,
to show yourself to me and to charm me with your notes. Come, you, who
play spring melodies upon the harmonious flute,[248] lead off our
anapaests.[249]

Weak mortals, chained to the earth, creatures of clay as frail as the
foliage of the woods, you unfortunate race, whose life is but darkness,
as unreal as a shadow, the illusion of a dream, hearken to us, who are
immortal beings, ethereal, ever young and occupied with eternal thoughts,
for we shall teach you about all celestial matters; you shall know
thoroughly what is the nature of the birds, what the origin of the gods,
of the rivers, of Erebus, and Chaos; thanks to us, Prodicus[250] will
envy you your knowledge.

At the beginning there was only Chaos, Night, dark Erebus, and deep
Tartarus. Earth, the air and heaven had no existence. Firstly,
black-winged Night laid a germless egg in the bosom of the infinite deeps
of Erebus, and from this, after the revolution of long ages, sprang the
graceful Eros with his glittering golden wings, swift as the whirlwinds
of the tempest. He mated in deep Tartarus with dark Chaos, winged like
himself, and thus hatched forth our race, which was the first to see the
light. That of the Immortals did not exist until Eros had brought
together all the ingredients of the world, and from their marriage
Heaven, Ocean, Earth and the imperishable race of blessed gods sprang
into being. Thus our origin is very much older than that of the dwellers
in Olympus. We are the offspring of Eros; there are a thousand proofs to
show it. We have wings and we lend assistance to lovers. How many
handsome youths, who had sworn to remain insensible, have not been
vanquished by our power and have yielded themselves to their lovers when
almost at the end of their youth, being led away by the gift of a quail,
a waterfowl, a goose, or a cock.[251]

And what important services do not the birds render to mortals! First of
all, they mark the seasons for them, springtime, winter, and autumn. Does
the screaming crane migrate to Libya,--it warns the husbandman to sow,
the pilot to take his ease beside his tiller hung up in his
dwelling,[252] and Orestes[253] to weave a tunic, so that the rigorous
cold may not drive him any more to strip other folk. When the kite
reappears, he tells of the return of spring and of the period when the
fleece of the sheep must be clipped. Is the swallow in sight? All hasten
to sell their warm tunic and to buy some light clothing. We are your
Ammon, Delphi, Dodona, your Phoebus Apollo.[254] Before undertaking
anything, whether a business transaction, a marriage, or the purchase of
food, you consult the birds by reading the omens, and you give this name
of omen[255] to all signs that tell of the future. With you a word is an
omen, you call a sneeze an omen, a meeting an omen, an unknown sound an
omen, a slave or an ass an omen.[256] Is it not clear that we are a
prophetic Apollo to you? If you recognize us as gods, we shall be your
divining Muses, through us you will know the winds and the seasons,
summer, winter, and the temperate months. We shall not withdraw ourselves
to the highest clouds like Zeus, but shall be among you and shall give to
you and to your children and the children of your children, health and
wealth, long life, peace, youth, laughter, songs and feasts; in short,
you will all be so well off, that you will be weary and satiated with
enjoyment.

Oh, rustic Muse of such varied note, tio, tio, tio, tiotinx, I sing with
you in the groves and on the mountain tops, tio, tio, tio, tio,
tiotinx.[257] I pour forth sacred strains from my golden throat in honour
of the god Pan,[258] tio, tio, tio, tiotinx, from the top of the thickly
leaved ash, and my voice mingles with the mighty choirs who extol Cybelé
on the mountain tops,[259] tototototototototinx. 'Tis to our concerts
that Phrynicus comes to pillage like a bee the ambrosia of his songs, the
sweetness of which so charms the ear, tio, tio, tio, tio, tinx.

If there be one of you spectators who wishes to spend the rest of his
life quietly among the birds, let him come to us. All that is disgraceful
and forbidden by law on earth is on the contrary honourable among us, the
birds. For instance, among you 'tis a crime to beat your father, but with
us 'tis an estimable deed; it's considered fine to run straight at your
father and hit him, saying, "Come, lift your spur if you want to
fight."[260] The runaway slave, whom you brand, is only a spotted
francolin with us.[261] Are you Phrygian like Spintharus?[262] Among us
you would be the Phrygian bird, the goldfinch, of the race of
Philemon.[263] Are you a slave and a Carian like Execestides? Among us
you can create yourself forefathers;[264] you can always find relations.
Does the son of Pisias want to betray the gates of the city to the foe?
Let him become a partridge, the fitting offspring of his father; among us
there is no shame in escaping as cleverly as a partridge.

So the swans on the banks of the Hebrus, tio, tio, tio, tio, tiotinx,
mingle their voices to serenade Apollo, tio, tio, tio, tio, tiotinx,
flapping their wings the while, tio, tio, tio, tio, tiotinx; their notes
reach beyond the clouds of heaven; all the dwellers in the forests stand
still with astonishment and delight; a calm rests upon the waters, and
the Graces and the choirs in Olympus catch up the strain, tio, tio, tio,
tio, tiotinx.

There is nothing more useful nor more pleasant than to have wings. To
begin with, just let us suppose a spectator to be dying with hunger and
to be weary of the choruses of the tragic poets; if he were winged, he
would fly off, go home to dine and come back with his stomach filled.
Some Patroclides in urgent need would not have to soil his cloak, but
could fly off, satisfy his requirements, and, having recovered his
breath, return. If one of you, it matters not who, had adulterous
relations and saw the husband of his mistress in the seats of the
senators, he might stretch his wings, fly thither, and, having appeased
his craving, resume his place. Is it not the most priceless gift of all,
to be winged? Look at Diitrephes![265] His wings were only wicker-work
ones, and yet he got himself chosen Phylarch and then Hipparch; from
being nobody, he has risen to be famous; 'tis now the finest gilded cock
of his tribe.[266]

PISTHETAERUS. Halloa! What's this? By Zeus! I never saw anything so funny
in all my life.[267]

EUELPIDES. What makes you laugh?

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis your bits of wings. D'you know what you look like?
Like a goose painted by some dauber-fellow.

EUELPIDES. And you look like a close-shaven blackbird.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis ourselves asked for this transformation, and, as
Aeschylus has it, "These are no borrowed feathers, but truly our
own."[268]

EPOPS. Come now, what must be done?

PISTHETAERUS. First give our city a great and famous name, then sacrifice
to the gods.

EUELPIDES. I think so too.

EPOPS. Let's see. What shall our city be called?

PISTHETAERUS. Will you have a high-sounding Laconian name? Shall we call
it Sparta?

EUELPIDES. What! call my town Sparta? Why, I would not use esparto for my
bed,[269] even though I had nothing but bands of rushes.

PISTHETAERUS. Well then, what name can you suggest?

EUELPIDES. Some name borrowed from the clouds, from these lofty regions
in which we dwell--in short, some well-known name.

PISTHETAERUS. Do you like Nephelococcygia?[270]

EPOPS. Oh! capital! truly 'tis a brilliant thought!

EUELPIDES. Is it in Nephelococcygia that all the wealth of Theogenes[271]
and most of Aeschines'[272] is?

PISTHETAERUS. No, 'tis rather the plain of Phlegra,[273] where the gods
withered the pride of the sons of the Earth with their shafts.

EUELPIDES. Oh! what a splendid city! But what god shall be its patron?
for whom shall we weave the peplus?[274]

PISTHETAERUS. Why not choose Athené Polias?[275]

EUELPIDES. Oh! what a well-ordered town 'twould be to have a female deity
armed from head to foot, while Clisthenes[276] was spinning!

PISTHETAERUS. Who then shall guard the Pelargicon?[277]

EPOPS. One of ourselves, a bird of Persian strain, who is everywhere
proclaimed to be the bravest of all, a true chick of Ares.[278]

EUELPIDES. Oh! noble chick! what a well-chosen god for a rocky home!

PISTHETAERUS. Come! into the air with you to help the workers, who are
building the wall; carry up rubble, strip yourself to mix the mortar,
take up the hod, tumble down the ladder, an you like, post sentinels,
keep the fire smouldering beneath the ashes, go round the walls, bell in
hand,[279] and go to sleep up there yourself; then despatch two heralds,
one to the gods above, the other to mankind on earth and come back here.

EUELPIDES. As for yourself, remain here, and may the plague take you for
a troublesome fellow!

PISTHETAERUS. Go, friend, go where I send you, for without you my orders
cannot be obeyed. For myself, I want to sacrifice to the new god, and I
am going to summon the priest who must preside at the ceremony. Slaves!
slaves! bring forward the basket and the lustral water.

CHORUS. I do as you do, and I wish as you wish, and I implore you to
address powerful and solemn prayers to the gods, and in addition to
immolate a sheep as a token of our gratitude. Let us sing the Pythian
chant in honour of the god, and let Chaeris accompany our voices.

PISTHETAERUS (_to the flute-player_). Enough! but, by Heracles! what is
this? Great gods! I have seen many prodigious things, but I never saw a
muzzled raven.[280]

EPOPS. Priest! 'tis high time! Sacrifice to the new gods.

PRIEST. I begin, but where is he with the basket? Pray to the Vesta of
the birds, to the kite, who presides over the hearth, and to all the god
and goddess-birds who dwell in Olympus.

CHORUS. Oh! Hawk, the sacred guardian of Sunium, oh, god of the storks!

PRIEST. Pray to the swan of Delos, to Latona the mother of the quails,
and to Artemis, the goldfinch.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis no longer Artemis Colaenis, but Artemis the
goldfinch.[281]

PRIEST. And to Bacchus, the finch and Cybelé, the ostrich and mother of
the gods and mankind.

CHORUS. Oh! sovereign ostrich, Cybelé, the mother of Cleocritus,[282]
grant health and safety to the Nephelococcygians as well as to the
dwellers in Chios....

PISTHETAERUS. The dwellers in Chios! Ah! I am delighted they should be
thus mentioned on all occasions.[283]

CHORUS. ... to the heroes, the birds, to the sons of heroes, to the
porphyrion, the pelican, the spoon-bill, the redbreast, the grouse, the
peacock, the horned-owl, the teal, the bittern, the heron, the stormy
petrel, the fig-pecker, the titmouse....

PISTHETAERUS. Stop! stop! you drive me crazy with your endless list. Why,
wretch, to what sacred feast are you inviting the vultures and the
sea-eagles? Don't you see that a single kite could easily carry off the
lot at once? Begone, you and your fillets and all; I shall know how to
complete the sacrifice by myself.

PRIEST. It is imperative that I sing another sacred chant for the rite of
the lustral water, and that I invoke the immortals, or at least one of
them, provided always that you have some suitable food to offer him; from
what I see here, in the shape of gifts, there is naught whatever but horn
and hair.

PISTHETAERUS. Let us address our sacrifices and our prayers to the winged
gods.

A POET. Oh, Muse! celebrate happy Nephelococcygia in your hymns.

PISTHETAERUS. What have we here? Where do you come from, tell me? Who are
you?

POET. I am he whose language is sweeter than honey, the zealous slave of
the Muses, as Homer has it.

PISTHETAERUS. You a slave! and yet you wear your hair long?

POET. No, but the fact is all we poets are the assiduous slaves of the
Muses according to Homer.

PISTHETAERUS. In truth your little cloak is quite holy too through zeal!
But, poet, what ill wind drove you here?

POET. I have composed verses in honour of your Nephelococcygia, a host of
splendid dithyrambs and parthenians,[284] worthy of Simonides himself.

PISTHETAERUS. And when did you compose them? How long since?

POET. Oh! 'tis long, aye, very long, that I have sung in honour of this
city.

PISTHETAERUS. But I am only celebrating its foundation with this
sacrifice;[285] I have only just named it, as is done with little babies.

POET. "Just as the chargers fly with the speed of the wind, so does the
voice of the Muses take its flight. Oh! thou noble founder of the town of
Aetna,[286] thou, whose name recalls the holy sacrifices,[287] make us
such gift as thy generous heart shall suggest."

PISTHETAERUS. He will drive us silly if we do not get rid of him by some
present. Here! you, who have a fur as well as your tunic, take it off and
give it to this clever poet. Come, take this fur; you look to me to be
shivering with cold.

POET. My Muse will gladly accept this gift; but engrave these verses of
Pindar's on your mind.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! what a pest! 'Tis impossible then to be rid of him.

POET. "Straton wanders among the Scythian nomads, but has no linen
garment. He is sad at only wearing an animal's pelt and no tunic." Do you
conceive my bent?

PISTHETAERUS. I understand that you want me to offer you a tunic. Hi! you
(_to Euelpides_), take off yours; we must help the poet.... Come, you,
take it and begone.

POET. I am going, and these are the verses that I address to this city:
"Phoebus of the golden throne, celebrate this shivery, freezing city; I
have travelled through fruitful and snow-covered plains. Tralala!
Tralala!"[288]

PISTHETAERUS. What are you chanting us about frosts? Thanks to the tunic,
you no longer fear them. Ah! by Zeus! I could not have believed this
cursed fellow could so soon have learnt the way to our city. Come,
priest, take the lustral water and circle the altar.

PRIEST. Let all keep silence!

A PROPHET. Let not the goat be sacrificed.[289]

PISTHETAERUS. Who are you?

PROPHET. Who am I? A prophet.

PISTHETAERUS. Get you gone.

PROPHET. Wretched man, insult not sacred things. For there is an oracle
of Bacis, which exactly applies to Nephelococcygia.

PISTHETAERUS. Why did you not reveal it to me before I founded my city?

PROPHET. The divine spirit was against it.

PISTHETAERUS. Well, 'tis best to know the terms of the oracle.

PROPHET. "But when the wolves and the white crows shall dwell together
between Corinth and Sicyon...."[290]

PISTHETAERUS. But how do the Corinthians concern me?

PROPHET. 'Tis the regions of the air that Bacis indicated in this manner.
"They must first sacrifice a white-fleeced goat to Pandora, and give the
prophet, who first reveals my words, a good cloak and new sandals."

PISTHETAERUS. Are the sandals there?

PROPHET.

Read. "And besides this a goblet of wine and a good share of the entrails
of the victim."

PISTHETAERUS. Of the entrails--is it so written?

PROPHET. Read. "If you do as I command, divine youth, you shall be an
eagle among the clouds; if not, you shall be neither turtle-dove, nor
eagle, nor woodpecker."

PISTHETAERUS. Is all that there?

PROPHET. Read.

PISTHETAERUS. This oracle in no sort of way resembles the one Apollo
dictated to me: "If an impostor comes without invitation to annoy you
during the sacrifice and to demand a share of the victim, apply a stout
stick to his ribs."

PROPHET. You are drivelling.

PISTHETAERUS. "And don't spare him, were he an eagle from out of the
clouds, were it Lampon himself[291] or the great Diopithes."[292]

PROPHET. Is all that there?

PISTHETAERUS. Here, read it yourself, and go and hang yourself.

PROPHET. Oh! unfortunate wretch that I am.

PISTHETAERUS. Away with you, and take your prophecies elsewhere.

METON.[293] I have come to you.

PISTHETAERUS. Yet another pest. What have you come to do? What's your
plan? What's the purpose of your journey? Why these splendid buskins?

METON. I want to survey the plains of the air for you and to parcel them
into lots.

PISTHETAERUS. In the name of the gods, who are you?

METON. Who am I? Meton, known throughout Greece and at Colonus.[294]

PISTHETAERUS. What are these things?

METON. Tools for measuring the air. In truth, the spaces in the air have
precisely the form of a furnace. With this bent ruler I draw a line from
top to bottom; from one of its points I describe a circle with the
compass. Do you understand?

PISTHETAERUS. Not the very least.

METON. With the straight ruler I set to work to inscribe a square within
this circle; in its centre will be the marketplace, into which all the
straight streets will lead, converging to this centre like a star, which,
although only orbicular, sends forth its rays in a straight line from all
sides.

PISTHETAERUS. Meton, you new Thales....[295]

METON. What d'you want with me?

PISTHETAERUS. I want to give you a proof of my friendship. Use your legs.

METON. Why, what have I to fear?

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis the same here as in Sparta. Strangers are driven away,
and blows rain down as thick as hail.

METON. Is there sedition in your city?

PISTHETAERUS. No, certainly not.

METON. What's wrong then?

PISTHETAERUS. We are agreed to sweep all quacks and impostors far from
our borders.

METON. Then I'm off.

PISTHETAERUS. I fear me 'tis too late. The thunder growls already.
(_Beats him._)

METON. Oh, woe! oh, woe!

PISTHETAERUS. I warned you. Now, be off, and do your surveying somewhere
else. (_Meton takes to his heels._)

AN INSPECTOR. Where are the Proxeni?[296]

PISTHETAERUS. Who is this Sardanapalus?[297]

INSPECTOR. I have been appointed by lot to come to Nephelococcygia as
inspector.[298]

PISTHETAERUS. An inspector! and who sends you here, you rascal?

INSPECTOR. A decree of Taleas.[299]

PISTHETAERUS. Will you just pocket your salary, do nothing, and be off?

INSPECTOR. I' faith! that I will; I am urgently needed to be at Athens to
attend the assembly; for I am charged with the interests of
Pharnaces.[300]

PISTHETAERUS. Take it then, and be off. See, here is your salary. (_Beats
him._)

INSPECTOR. What does this mean?

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis the assembly where you have to defend Pharnaces.

INSPECTOR. You shall testify that they dare to strike me, the inspector.

PISTHETAERUS. Are you not going to clear out with your urns. 'Tis not to
be believed; they send us inspectors before we have so much as paid
sacrifice to the gods.

A DEALER IN DECREES. "If the Nephelococcygian does wrong to the
Athenian...."

PISTHETAERUS. Now whatever are these cursed parchments?

DEALER IN DECREES. I am a dealer in decrees, and I have come here to sell
you the new laws.

PISTHETAERUS. Which?

DEALER IN DECREES. "The Nephelococcygians shall adopt the same weights,
measures and decrees as the Olophyxians."[301]

PISTHETAERUS. And you shall soon be imitating the Ototyxians. (_Beats
him._)

DEALER IN DECREES. Hullo! what are you doing?

PISTHETAERUS. Now will you be off with your decrees? For I am going to
let _you_ see some severe ones.

INSPECTOR (_returning_). I summon Pisthetaerus for outrage for the month
of Munychion.[302]

PISTHETAERUS. Ha! my friend! are you still there?

DEALER IN DECREES. "Should anyone drive away the magistrates and not
receive them, according to the decree duly posted..."

PISTHETAERUS. What! rascal! you are there too?

INSPECTOR. Woe to you! I'll have you condemned to a fine of ten thousand
drachmae.

PISTHETAERUS. And I'll smash your urns.[303]

INSPECTOR. Do you recall that evening when you stooled against the column
where the decrees are posted?

PISTHETAERUS. Here! here! let him be seized. (_The inspectors run off._)
Well! don't you want to stop any longer?

PRIEST. Let us get indoors as quick as possible; we will sacrifice the
goat inside.[304]

CHORUS. Henceforth it is to me that mortals must address their sacrifices
and their prayers. Nothing escapes my sight nor my might. My glance
embraces the universe, I preserve the fruit in the flower by destroying
the thousand kinds of voracious insects the soil produces, which attack
the trees and feed on the germ when it has scarcely formed in the calyx;
I destroy those who ravage the balmy terrace gardens like a deadly
plague; all these gnawing crawling creatures perish beneath the lash of
my wing. I hear it proclaimed everywhere: "A talent for him who shall
kill Diagoras of Melos,[305] and a talent for him who destroys one of the
dead tyrants."[306] We likewise wish to make our proclamation: "A talent
to him among you who shall kill Philocrates, the Strouthian;[307] four,
if he brings him to us alive. For this Philocrates skewers the finches
together and sells them at the rate of an obolus for seven. He tortures
the thrushes by blowing them out, so that they may look bigger, sticks
their own feathers into the nostrils of blackbirds, and collects pigeons,
which he shuts up and forces them, fastened in a net, to decoy others."
That is what we wish to proclaim. And if anyone is keeping birds shut up
in his yard, let him hasten to let them loose; those who disobey shall be
seized by the birds and we shall put them in chains, so that in their
turn they may decoy other men.

Happy indeed is the race of winged birds who need no cloak in winter!
Neither do I fear the relentless rays of the fiery dog-days; when the
divine grasshopper, intoxicated with the sunlight, when noon is burning
the ground, is breaking out into shrill melody, my home is beneath the
foliage in the flowery meadows. I winter in deep caverns, where I frolic
with the mountain nymphs, while in spring I despoil the gardens of the
Graces and gather the white, virgin berry on the myrtle bushes.

I want now to speak to the judges about the prize they are going to
award; if they are favourable to us, we will load them with benefits far
greater than those Paris[308] received. Firstly, the owls of
Laurium,[309] which every judge desires above all things, shall never be
wanting to you; you shall see them homing with you, building their nests
in your money-bags and laying coins. Besides, you shall be housed like
the gods, for we shall erect gables[310] over your dwellings; if you hold
some public post and want to do a little pilfering, we will give you the
sharp claws of a hawk. Are you dining in town, we will provide you with
crops.[311] But, if your award is against us, don't fail to have metal
covers fashioned for yourselves, like those they place over statues;[312]
else, look out! for the day you wear a white tunic all the birds will
soil it with their droppings.

PISTHETAERUS. Birds! the sacrifice is propitious. But I see no messenger
coming from the wall to tell us what is happening. Ah! here comes one
running himself out of breath as though he were running the Olympic
stadium.

MESSENGER. Where, where is he? Where, where, where is he? Where, where,
where is he? Where is Pisthetaerus, our leader?

PISTHETAERUS. Here am I.

MESSENGER. The wall is finished.

PISTHETAERUS. That's good news.

MESSENGER. 'Tis a most beautiful, a most magnificent work of art. The
wall is so broad, that Proxenides, the Braggartian, and Theogenes could
pass each other in their chariots, even if they were drawn by steeds as
big as the Trojan horse.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis wonderful!

MESSENGER. Its length is one hundred stadia; I measured it myself.

PISTHETAERUS. A decent length, by Posidon! And who built such a wall?

MESSENGER. Birds--birds only; they had neither Egyptian brickmaker, nor
stonemason, nor carpenter; the birds did it all themselves, I could
hardly believe my eyes. Thirty thousand cranes came from Libya with a
supply of stones,[313] intended for the foundations. The water-rails
chiselled them with their beaks. Ten thousand storks were busy making
bricks; plovers and other water fowl carried water into the air.

PISTHETAERUS. And who carried the mortar?

MESSENGER. Herons, in hods.

PISTHETAERUS. But how could they put the mortar into hods?

MESSENGER. Oh! 'twas a truly clever invention; the geese used their feet
like spades; they buried them in the pile of mortar and then emptied them
into the hods.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! to what use cannot feet be put?[314]

MESSENGER. You should have seen how eagerly the ducks carried bricks. To
complete the tale, the swallows came flying to the work, their beaks full
of mortar and their trowel on their back, just the way little children
are carried.

PISTHETAERUS. Who would want paid servants after this? But, tell me, who
did the woodwork?

MESSENGER. Birds again, and clever carpenters too, the pelicans, for they
squared up the gates with their beaks in such a fashion that one would
have thought they were using axes; the noise was just like a dockyard.
Now the whole wall is tight everywhere, securely bolted and well guarded;
it is patrolled, bell in hand; the sentinels stand everywhere and beacons
burn on the towers. But I must run off to clean myself; the rest is your
business.

CHORUS. Well! what do you say to it? Are you not astonished at the wall
being completed so quickly?

PISTHETAERUS. By the gods, yes, and with good reason. 'Tis really not to
be believed. But here comes another messenger from the wall to bring us
some further news! What a fighting look he has!

SECOND MESSENGER. Oh! oh! oh! oh! oh! oh!

PISTHETAERUS. What's the matter?

SECOND MESSENGER. A horrible outrage has occurred; a god sent by Zeus has
passed through our gates and has penetrated the realms of the air without
the knowledge of the jays, who are on guard in the daytime.

PISTHETAERUS. Tis an unworthy and criminal deed. What god was it?

SECOND MESSENGER. We don't know that. All we know is, that he has got
wings.

PISTHETAERUS. Why were not guards sent against him at once?

SECOND MESSENGER. We have despatched thirty thousand hawks of the legion
of mounted archers.[315] All the hook-clawed birds are moving against
him, the kestrel, the buzzard, the vulture, the great-horned owl; they
cleave the air, so that it resounds with the flapping of their wings;
they are looking everywhere for the god, who cannot be far away; indeed,
if I mistake not, he is coming from yonder side.

PISTHETAERUS. All arm themselves with slings and bows! This way, all our
soldiers; shoot and strike! Some one give me a sling!

CHORUS. War, a terrible war is breaking out between us and the gods!
Come, let each one guard the Air, the son of Erebus,[316] in which the
clouds float. Take care no immortal enters it without your knowledge.
Scan all sides with your glance. Hark! methinks I can hear the rustle of
the swift wings of a god from heaven.

PISTHETAERUS. Hi! you woman! where are you flying to? Halt, don't stir!
keep motionless! not a beat of your wing!--Who are you and from what
country? You must say whence you come.[317]

IRIS. I come from the abode of the Olympian gods.

PISTHETAERUS. What's your name, ship or cap?[318]

IRIS. I am swift Iris.

PISTHETAERUS. Paralus or Salaminia?[319]

IRIS. What do you mean?

PISTHETAERUS. Let a buzzard rush at her and seize her.[320]

IRIS. Seize me! But what do all these insults betoken?

PISTHETAERUS. Woe to you!

IRIS. 'Tis incomprehensible.

PISTHETAERUS. By which gate did you pass through the wall, wretched
woman?

IRIS. By which gate? Why, great gods, I don't know.

PISTHETAERUS. You hear how she holds us in derision. Did you present
yourself to the officers in command of the jays? You don't answer. Have
you a permit, bearing the seal of the storks?

IRIS. Am I awake?

PISTHETAERUS. Did you get one?

IRIS. Are you mad?

PISTHETAERUS. No head-bird gave you a safe-conduct?

IRIS. A safe-conduct to me, you poor fool!

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! and so you slipped into this city on the sly and into
these realms of air-land that don't belong to you.

IRIS. And what other road can the gods travel?

PISTHETAERUS. By Zeus! I know nothing about that, not I. But they won't
pass this way. And you still dare to complain! Iris would ever have more
justly suffered death.

IRIS. I am immortal.

PISTHETAERUS. You would have died nevertheless.--Oh! 'twould be truly
intolerable! What! should the universe obey us and the gods alone
continue their insolence and not understand that they must submit to the
law of the strongest in their due turn? But tell me, where are you flying
to?

IRIS. I? The messenger of Zeus to mankind, I am going to tell them to
sacrifice sheep and oxen on the altars and to fill their streets with the
rich smoke of burning fat.

PISTHETAERUS. Of which gods are you speaking?

IRIS. Of which?  Why, of ourselves, the gods of heaven.

PISTHETAERUS. You, gods?

IRIS. Are there others then?

PISTHETAERUS. Men now adore the birds as gods, and 'tis to them, by Zeus,
that they must offer sacrifices, and not to Zeus at all!

IRIS. Oh! fool! fool! Rouse not the wrath of the gods, for 'tis terrible
indeed. Armed with the brand of Zeus, Justice would annihilate your race;
the lightning would strike you as it did Lycimnius and consume both your
body and the porticos of your palace.[321]

PISTHETAERUS. Here! that's enough tall talk. Just you listen and keep
quiet! Do you take me for a Lydian or a Phrygian[322] and think to
frighten me with your big words? Know, that if Zeus worries me again, I
shall go at the head of my eagles, who are armed with lightning, and
reduce his dwelling and that of Amphion to cinders.[323] I shall send
more than six hundred porphyrions clothed in leopards' skins[324] up to
heaven against him; and formerly a single Porphyrion gave him enough to
do. As for you, his messenger, if you annoy me, I shall begin by
stretching your legs asunder and so conduct myself, Iris though you be,
that despite my age, you will be astonished. I will show you a fine long
tool that will fuck you three times over.

IRIS. May you perish, you wretch, you and your infamous words!

PISTHETAERUS. Won't you be off quickly? Come, stretch your wings or look
out for squalls!

IRIS. If my father does not punish you for your insults....

PISTHETAERUS. Ha!... but just you be off elsewhere to roast younger folk
than us with your lightning.

CHORUS. We forbid the gods, the sons of Zeus, to pass through our city
and the mortals to send them the smoke of their sacrifices by this road.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis odd that the messenger we sent to the mortals has
never returned.

HERALD. Oh! blessed Pisthetaerus, very wise, very illustrious, very
gracious, thrice happy, very.... Come, prompt me, somebody, do.

PISTHETAERUS. Get to your story!

HERALD. All peoples are filled with admiration for your wisdom, and they
award you this golden crown.

PISTHETAERUS. I accept it. But tell me, why do the people admire me?

HERALD. Oh you, who have founded so illustrious a city in the air, you
know not in what esteem men hold you and how many there are who burn with
desire to dwell in it. Before your city was built, all men had a mania
for Sparta; long hair and fasting were held in honour, men went dirty
like Socrates and carried staves. Now all is changed. Firstly, as soon as
'tis dawn, they all spring out of bed together to go and seek their food,
the same as you do; then they fly off towards the notices and finally
devour the decrees. The bird-madness is so clear, that many actually bear
the names of birds. There is a halting victualler, who styles himself the
partridge; Menippus calls himself the swallow; Opontius the one-eyed
crow; Philocles the lark; Theogenes the fox-goose; Lycurgus the ibis;
Chaerephon the bat; Syracosius the magpie; Midias the quail;[325] indeed
he looks like a quail that has been hit heavily over the head. Out of
love for the birds they repeat all the songs which concern the swallow,
the teal, the goose or the pigeon; in each verse you see wings, or at all
events a few feathers. This is what is happening down there. Finally,
there are more than ten thousand folk who are coming here from earth to
ask you for feathers and hooked claws; so, mind you supply yourself with
wings for the immigrants.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! by Zeus, 'tis not the time for idling. Go as quick as
possible and fill every hamper, every basket you can find with wings.
Manes[326] will bring them to me outside the walls, where I will welcome
those who present themselves.

CHORUS. This town will soon be inhabited by a crowd of men.

PISTHETAERUS. If fortune favours us.

CHORUS. Folk are more and more delighted with it.

PISTHETAERUS. Come, hurry up and bring them along.

CHORUS. Will not man find here everything that can please him--wisdom,
love, the divine Graces, the sweet face of gentle peace?

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! you lazy servant! won't you hurry yourself?

CHORUS. Let a basket of wings be brought speedily. Come, beat him as I
do, and put some life into him; he is as lazy as an ass.

PISTHETAERUS. Aye, Manes is a great craven.

CHORUS. Begin by putting this heap of wings in order; divide them in
three parts according to the birds from whom they came; the singing, the
prophetic[327] and the aquatic birds; then you must take care to
distribute them to the men according to their character.

PISTHETAERUS (_to Manes_). Oh! by the kestrels! I can keep my hands off
you no longer; you are too slow and lazy altogether.

A PARRICIDE.[328] Oh! might I but become an eagle, who soars in the
skies! Oh! might I fly above the azure waves of the barren sea![329]

PISTHETAERUS. Ha! 'twould seem the news was true; I hear someone coming
who talks of wings.

PARRICIDE. Nothing is more charming than to fly; I burn with desire to
live under the same laws as the birds; I am bird-mad and fly towards you,
for I want to live with you and to obey your laws.

PISTHETAERUS. Which laws? The birds have many laws.

PARRICIDE. All of them; but the one that pleases me most is, that among
the birds it is considered a fine thing to peck and strangle one's
father.

PISTHETAERUS. Aye, by Zeus! according to us, he who dares to strike his
father, while still a chick, is a brave fellow.

PARRICIDE. And therefore I want to dwell here, for I want to strangle my
father and inherit his wealth.

PISTHETAERUS. But we have also an ancient law written in the code of the
storks, which runs thus, "When the stork father has reared his young and
has taught them to fly, the young must in their turn support the father."

PARRICIDE. 'Tis hardly worth while coming all this distance to be
compelled to keep my father!

PISTHETAERUS. No, no, young friend, since you have come to us with such
willingness, I am going to give you these black wings, as though you were
an orphan bird; furthermore, some good advice, that I received myself in
infancy. Don't strike your father, but take these wings in one hand and
these spurs in the other; imagine you have a cock's crest on your head
and go and mount guard and fight; live on your pay and respect your
father's life. You're a gallant fellow! Very well, then! Fly to Thrace
and fight.[330]

PARRICIDE. By Bacchus! 'Tis well spoken; I will follow your counsel.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis acting wisely, by Zeus.

CINESIAS.[331] "On my light pinions I soar off to Olympus; in its
capricious flight my Muse flutters along the thousand paths of poetry in
turn ..."

PISTHETAERUS. This is a fellow will need a whole shipload of wings.

CINESIAS. ... it is seeking fresh outlet."

PISTHETAERUS. Welcome, Cinesias, you lime-wood man![332] Why have you
come here a-twisting your game leg in circles?

CINESIAS. "I want to become a bird, a tuneful nightingale."

PISTHETAERUS. Enough of that sort of ditty. Tell me what you want.

CINESIAS. Give me wings and I will fly into the topmost airs to gather
fresh songs in the clouds, in the midst of the vapours and the fleecy
snow.

PISTHETAERUS. Gather songs in the clouds?

CINESIAS. 'Tis on them the whole of our latter-day art depends. The most
brilliant dithyrambs are those that flap their wings in void space and
are clothed in mist and dense obscurity. To appreciate this, just listen.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! no, no, no!

CINESIAS. By Hermes! but indeed you shall. "I shall travel through thine
ethereal empire like a winged bird, who cleaveth space with his long
neck...."

PISTHETAERUS. Stop! easy all, I say![333]

CINESIAS. ... as I soar over the seas, carried by the breath of the winds
...

PISTHETAERUS. By Zeus! but I'll cut your breath short.

CINESIAS. ... now rushing along the tracks of Notus, now nearing Boreas
across the infinite wastes of the ether." (_Pisthetaerus beats him._) Ah!
old man, that's a pretty and clever idea truly!

PISTHETAERUS. What! are you not delighted to be cleaving the air?[334]

CINESIAS. To treat a dithyrambic poet, for whom the tribes dispute with
each other, in this style![335]

PISTHETAERUS. Will you stay with us and form a chorus of winged birds as
slender as Leotrophides[336] for the Cecropid tribe?

CINESIAS. You are making game of me, 'tis clear; but know that I shall
never leave you in peace if I do not have wings wherewith to traverse the
air.

AN INFORMER. What are these birds with downy feathers, who look so
pitiable to me? Tell me, oh swallow with the long dappled wings.[337]

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! but 'tis a perfect invasion that threatens us. Here
comes another of them, humming along.

INFORMER. Swallow with the long dappled wings, once more I summon you.

PISTHETAERUS. It's his cloak I believe he's addressing; 'faith, it stands
in great need of the swallows' return.[338]

INFORMER. Where is he who gives out wings to all comers?

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis I, but you must tell me for what purpose you want
them.

INFORMER. Ask no questions. I want wings, and wings I must have.

PISTHETAERUS. Do you want to fly straight to Pellené?[339]

INFORMER. I? Why, I am an accuser of the islands,[340] an informer ...

PISTHETAERUS. A fine trade, truly!

INFORMER. ... a hatcher of lawsuits. Hence I have great need of wings to
prowl round the cities and drag them before justice.

PISTHETAERUS. Would you do this better if you had wings?

INFORMER. No, but I should no longer fear the pirates; I should return
with the cranes, loaded with a supply of lawsuits by way of ballast.

PISTHETAERUS. So it seems, despite all your youthful vigour, you make it
your trade to denounce strangers?

INFORMER. Well, and why not? I don't know how to dig.

PISTHETAERUS. But, by Zeus! there are honest ways of gaining a living at
your age without all this infamous trickery.

INFORMER. My friend, I am asking you for wings, not for words.

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis just my words that give you wings.

INFORMER. And how can you give a man wings with your words?

PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis thus that all first start.

INFORMER. All?

PISTHETAERUS. Have you not often heard the father say to young men in the
barbers' shops, "It's astonishing how Diitrephes' advice has made my son
fly to horse-riding."--"Mine," says another, "has flown towards tragic
poetry on the wings of his imagination."

INFORMER. So that words give wings?

PISTHETAERUS. Undoubtedly; words give wings to the mind and make a man
soar to heaven. Thus I hope that my wise words will give you wings to fly
to some less degrading trade.

INFORMER. But I do not want to.

PISTHETAERUS. What do you reckon on doing then?

INFORMER. I won't belie my breeding; from generation to generation we
have lived by informing. Quick, therefore, give me quickly some light,
swift hawk or kestrel wings, so that I may summon the islanders, sustain
the accusation here, and haste back there again on flying pinions.

PISTHETAERUS. I see. In this way the stranger will be condemned even
before he appears.

INFORMER. That's just it.

PISTHETAERUS. And while he is on his way here by sea, you will be flying
to the islands to despoil him of his property.

INFORMER. You've hit it, precisely; I must whirl hither and thither like
a perfect humming-top.

PISTHETAERUS. I catch the idea. Wait, i' faith, I've got some fine
Corcyraean wings.[341] How do you like them?

INFORMER. Oh! woe is me! Why, 'tis a whip!

PISTHETAERUS. No, no; these are the wings, I tell you, that set the top
a-spinning.

INFORMER. Oh! oh! oh!

PISTHETAERUS. Take your flight, clear off, you miserable cur, or you will
soon see what comes of quibbling and lying. Come, let us gather up our
wings and withdraw.

CHORUS. In my ethereal nights I have seen many things new and strange and
wondrous beyond belief. There is a tree called Cleonymus belonging to an
unknown species; it has no heart, is good for nothing and is as tall as
it is cowardly. In springtime it shoots forth calumnies instead of buds
and in autumn it strews the ground with bucklers in place of leaves.[342]

Far away in the regions of darkness, where no ray of light ever enters,
there is a country, where men sit at the table of the heroes and dwell
with them always--save always in the evening. Should any mortal meet the
hero Orestes at night, he would soon be stripped and covered with blows
from head to foot.[343]

PROMETHEUS. Ah! by the gods! if only Zeus does not espy me! Where is
Pisthetaerus?

PISTHETAERUS. Ha! what is this? A masked man!

PROMETHEUS. Can you see any god behind me?

PISTHETAERUS. No, none. But who are you, pray?

PROMETHEUS. What's the time, please?

PISTHETAERUS. The time? Why, it's past noon. Who are you?

PROMETHEUS. Is it the fall of day? Is it no later than that?[344]

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! 'pon my word! but you grow tiresome!

PROMETHEUS. What is Zeus doing? Is he dispersing the clouds or gathering
them?[345]

PISTHETAERUS. Take care, lest I lose all patience.

PROMETHEUS. Come, I will raise my mask.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! my dear Prometheus!

PROMETHEUS. Stop! stop! speak lower!

PISTHETAERUS. Why, what's the matter, Prometheus?

PROMETHEUS. H'sh, h'sh! Don't call me by my name; you will be my ruin, if
Zeus should see me here. But, if you want me to tell you how things are
going in heaven, take this umbrella and shield me, so that the gods don't
see me.

PISTHETAERUS. I can recognize Prometheus in this cunning trick. Come,
quick then, and fear nothing; speak on.

PROMETHEUS. Then listen.

PISTHETAERUS. I am listening, proceed!

PROMETHEUS. It's all over with Zeus.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! and since when, pray?

PROMETHEUS. Since you founded this city in the air. There is not a man
who now sacrifices to the gods; the smoke of the victims no longer
reaches us. Not the smallest offering comes! We fast as though it were
the festival of Demeter.[346] The barbarian gods, who are dying of
hunger, are bawling like Illyrians[347] and threaten to make an armed
descent upon Zeus, if he does not open markets where joints of the
victims are sold.

PISTHETAERUS. What! there are other gods besides you, barbarian gods who
dwell above Olympus?

PROMETHEUS. If there were no barbarian gods, who would be the patron of
Execestides?[348]

PISTHETAERUS. And what is the name of these gods?

PROMETHEUS. Their name? Why, the Triballi.[349]

PISTHETAERUS. Ah, indeed! 'tis from that no doubt that we derive the word
'tribulation.'[350]

PROMETHEUS. Most likely. But one thing I can tell you for certain,
namely, that Zeus and the celestial Triballi are going to send deputies
here to sue for peace. Now don't you treat, unless Zeus restores the
sceptre to the birds and gives you Basileia[351] in marriage.

PISTHETAERUS. Who is this Basileia?

PROMETHEUS. A very fine young damsel, who makes the lightning for Zeus;
all things come from her, wisdom, good laws, virtue, the fleet,
calumnies, the public paymaster and the triobolus.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! then she is a sort of general manageress to the god.

PROMETHEUS. Yes, precisely. If he gives you her for your wife, yours will
be the almighty power. That is what I have come to tell you; for you know
my constant and habitual goodwill towards men.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh, yes! 'tis thanks to you that we roast our meat.[352]

PROMETHEUS. I hate the gods, as you know.

PISTHETAERUS. Aye, by Zeus, you have always detested them.

PROMETHEUS. Towards them I am a veritable Timon;[353] but I must return
in all haste, so give me the umbrella; if Zeus should see me from up
there, he would think I was escorting one of the Canephori.[354]

PISTHETAERUS. Wait, take this stool as well.

CHORUS. Near by the land of the Sciapodes[355] there is a marsh, from the
borders whereof the odious Socrates evokes the souls of men.
Pisander[356] came one day to see his soul, which he had left there when
still alive. He offered a little victim, a camel,[357] slit his throat
and, following the example of Ulysses, stepped one pace backwards.[358]
Then that bat of a Chaerephon[359] came up from hell to drink the camel's
blood.

POSIDON.[360] This is the city of Nephelococcygia, Cloud-cuckoo-town,
whither we come as ambassadors. (_To Triballus_.) Hi! what are you up to?
you are throwing your cloak over the left shoulder. Come, fling it quick
over the right! And why, pray, does it draggle this fashion? Have you
ulcers to hide like Laespodias?[361] Oh! democracy![362] whither, oh!
whither are you leading us? Is it possible that the gods have chosen such
an envoy?

TRIBALLUS. Leave me alone.

POSIDON. Ugh! the cursed savage! you are by far the most barbarous of all
the gods.--Tell me, Heracles, what are we going to do?

HERACLES. I have already told you that I want to strangle the fellow who
has dared to block us in.

POSIDON. But, my friend, we are envoys of peace.

HERACLES. All the more reason why I wish to strangle him.

PISTHETAERUS. Hand me the cheese-grater; bring me the silphium for sauce;
pass me the cheese and watch the coals.[363]

HERACLES. Mortal! we who greet you are three gods.

PISTHETAERUS. Wait a bit till I have prepared my silphium pickle.

HERACLES. What are these meats?[364]

PISTHETAERUS. These are birds that have been punished with death for
attacking the people's friends.

HERACLES. And you are seasoning them before answering us?

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! Heracles! welcome, welcome! What's the matter?[365]

HERACLES. The gods have sent us here as ambassadors to treat for peace.

A SERVANT. There's no more oil in the flask.

PISTHETAERUS. And yet the birds must be thoroughly basted with it.[366]

HERACLES. We have no interest to serve in fighting you; as for you, be
friends and we promise that you shall always have rain-water in your
pools and the warmest of warm weather. So far as these points go we are
armed with plenary authority.

PISTHETAERUS. We have never been the aggressors, and even now we are as
well disposed for peace as yourselves, provided you agree to one
equitable condition, namely, that Zeus yield his sceptre to the birds. If
only this is agreed to, I invite the ambassadors to dinner.

HERACLES. That's good enough for me. I vote for peace.

POSIDON. You wretch! you are nothing but a fool and a glutton. Do you
want to dethrone your own father?

PISTHETAERUS. What an error! Why, the gods will be much more powerful if
the birds govern the earth. At present the mortals are hidden beneath the
clouds, escape your observation, and commit perjury in your name; but if
you had the birds for your allies, and a man, after having sworn by the
crow and Zeus, should fail to keep his oath, the crow would dive down
upon him unawares and pluck out his eye.

POSIDON. Well thought of, by Posidon![367]

HERACLES. My notion too.

PISTHETAERUS. (_to the Triballian_). And you, what's your opinion?

TRIBALLUS. Nabaisatreu.[368]

PISTHETAERUS. D'you see? he also approves. But hear another thing in
which we can serve you. If a man vows to offer a sacrifice to some god
and then procrastinates, pretending that the gods can wait, and thus does
not keep his word, we shall punish his stinginess.

POSIDON. Ah! ah! and how?

PISTHETAERUS. While he is counting his money or is in the bath, a kite
will relieve him, before he knows it, either in coin or in clothes, of
the value of a couple of sheep, and carry it to the god.

HERACLES. I vote for restoring them the sceptre.

POSIDON. Ask the Triballian.

HERACLES. Hi! Triballian, do you want a thrashing?

TRIBALLUS. Saunaka baktarikrousa.[368]

HERACLES. He says, "Right willingly."

POSIDON. If that be the opinion of both of you, why, I consent too.

HERACLES. Very well! we accord the sceptre.

PISTHETAERUS. Ah! I was nearly forgetting another condition. I will leave
Heré to Zeus, but only if the young Basileia is given me in marriage.

POSIDON. Then you don't want peace. Let us withdraw.

PISTHETAERUS. It matters mighty little to me. Cook, look to the gravy.

HERACLES. What an odd fellow this Posidon is! Where are you off to? Are
we going to war about a woman?

POSIDON. What else is there to do?

HERACLES. What else? Why, conclude peace.

POSIDON. Oh! the ninny! do you always want to be fooled? Why, you are
seeking your own downfall. If Zeus were to die, after having yielded them
the sovereignty, you would be ruined, for you are the heir of all the
wealth he will leave behind.

PISTHETAERUS. Oh! by the gods! how he is cajoling you. Step aside, that I
may have a word with you. Your uncle is getting the better of you, my
poor friend.[369] The law will not allow you an obolus of the paternal
property, for you are a bastard and not a legitimate child.

HERACLES. I a bastard! What's that you tell me?

PISTHETAERUS. Why, certainly; are you not born of a stranger woman?[370]
Besides, is not Athené recognized as Zeus' sole heiress? And no daughter
would be that, if she had a legitimate brother.

HERACLES. But what if my father wished to give me his property on his
death-bed, even though I be a bastard?

PISTHETAERUS. The law forbids it, and this same Posidon would be the
first to lay claim to his 

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