me. You must ride at the Panathenæa on a horse fit for the great king: four acres of my best vines went for that folly. nothing to eat. You must retrench, or you will have his other discoveries, that when a man has nothing to eat he dies? SPEUSIPpus. You are deceived. My friends CALLIDEMUS. Oh, yes! your friends will notice you, doubtless, when you are squeezing through the crowd, on a winter's day, to warm yourself at the fire of the baths ; or when you are fighting with beggars and beggars' dogs for the scraps of a sacrifice; or when you are glad to earn three wretched obols1 by listening all dav to lying speeches and crying children. SPEUSIPPUS. There are other means of support. CALLIDEMUS. What! I suppose you will wander from house to house, like that wretched buffoon Philippus 2, and beg every body who has asked a supper-party to be so kind as to feed you and laugh at you; or you will turn sycophant; you will get a bunch of grapes, or a pair of shoes, now and then, by frightening some rich coward with a mock prosecution. Well! that is a task for which your studies under the sophists may have fitted you. SPEUSIPPUS. You are wide of the mark. 1 The stipend of an Athenian juryman. 2 Xenophon, Convivium CALLIDEMUS. Then what, in the name of Juno, is your scheme? Do you intend to join Orestes,1 and rob on the highway? Take care Take care; beware of the eleven; 2 beware of the hemlock. It may be very pleasant to live at other people's expense; but not very pleasant, I should think, to hear the pestle give its last bang against the mortar, when the cold dose is ready. Pah! SPEUSIPPUs. Hemlock! Orestes! folly !—I aim at nobler objects. What say you to politics, the general assembly? CALLIDEMUS. You an orator! oh no! no! Cleon was worth twenty such fools as you. You have succeeded, I grant, to his impudence, for which, if there be justice in Tartarus, he is now soaking up to the eyes in his own tan-pickle. But the Paphlagonian had parts. SPEUSIPPus. And you mean to imply CALLIDEMUS. Not I. You are a Pericles in embryo, doubtless. Well and when are you to make your first speech? oh Pallas! SPEUSIPpus. I thought of speaking, the other day, on the Sicilian expedition; but Nicias3 got up before me. 1 A celebrated highwayman of Attica. See Aristophanes; Aves, 711 and in several other passages. 8 See Thucydides, vi. 8. 2 The police officers of Athens. CALLIDEMUS. Nicias, poor honest man, might just as well have sate still; his speaking did but little good. The loss of your oration is, doubtless, an irreparable public calamity. SPEUSIPPUS. Why, not so; I intend to introduce it at the next assembly; it will suit any subject. CALLIDEMUS. That is to say, it will suit none. But pray, if it be not too presumptuous a request, indulge me with specimen. SPEUSIPPus. Well; suppose the agora crowded; - an important subject under discussion; an ambassador from Argos, or from the great king; the tributes from the islands ; — an impeachment ; — in short, anything you please. The crier makes proclamation. zen above fifty years old may speak not disqualified may speak." Then I rise: a great murmur of curiosity while I am mounting the stand. CALLIDEMUS. "Any citi any citizen Of curiosity! yes, and of something else too. You will infallibly be dragged down by main force, like toor Glaucon1 last year. SPEUSIPPUS. Never fear. I shall begin in this style: "When I consider, Athenians, the importance of when I consider the extent of its power, par city; 1 See Xenophon; Memorabilia, iii. the wisdom of its laws, the elegance of its decorations when I consider by what names and by what exploits its annals are adorned; when I think on Harmodius and Aristogiton, on Themistocles and Miltiades, on Cimon and Pericles; when I contemplate our pre-eminence in arts and letters; when I observe so many flourishing states and islands compelled to own the dominion, and purchase the protection, of the City of the Violet Crown 1 CALLIDEMUS. I shall choke with rage. Oh, all ye gods and goddesses, what sacrilege, what perjury have I ever committed, that I should be singled out from among all the citizens of Athens to be the father of this fool? SPEUSIPpus. What now? By Bacchus, old man, I would not advise you to give way to such fits of passion in the streets. If Aristophanes were to see you, you would infallibly be in a comedy next spring. CALLIDEMUS. You have more reason to fear Aristophanes than any fool living. Oh, that he could but hear you trying to imitate the slang of Straton2 and the lisp of Alcibiades ! 3 You would be an inexhaustible subject. You would console him for the loss of Cleon. SPEUSIPPUS, No, no. I may perhaps figure at the dramatic repre sentations before long; but in a very different way. 1 A favourite epithet of Athens. See Aristophanes; Acharn. 637. * See Aristophanes; Equites, 1375. 8 See Aristophanes; Vespæ, 44. Oh Hercules! Oh Bacchus! This is too much. Here is an universal genius; sophist, orator, poet. To what a three-headed monster have I given birth! a perfect Cerberus of intellect! And pray what may your piece be about? Or will your tragedy, like your speech, serve equally for any subject? SPEUSIPPUS. I thought of several plots; - Edipus, Eteocles and Polynices, the war of Troy, the murder of Agamemnon. CALLIDEMUS. And what have you chosen? SPEUSIPPUS. You know there is a law which permits any modern poct to retouch a play of Eschylus, and bring it for ward as his own composition. And, as there is an absurd prejudice, among the vulgar, in favour of his extravagant pieces, I have selected one of them, and altered it. |