how your mother was a courtesan, and that you strangled your brother and you run after women and corrupt the young, you height of all that's lewd and shameless? Don't run away! Take a thrashing from me before you go! I'll brain you right now with this brickbat, dirty miscreant that you are! ZEUS One is going away laughing, gods, and the other is following him up with abuse, because he can't stand the mockery of Damis; it looks as if he would hit him on the head with the brickbat. But what It seems to me that the comic poet hit it right when he said: "No harm's been done you if you none admit." 1 What very great harm is it if a few men go away convinced of all this? The people who think differently are in large majority, not only the rank and file of the Greeks, but the barbarians to a man. ZEUS Yes, Hermes, but what Darius said about Zopyrus is very much in point too. I myself had rather have this man Damis alone on my side than possess a thousand Babylons.2 1 Menander, Epitrepontes (179 Kock). THE DREAM, OR THE COCK A Cynic sermon in praise of poverty, cast in the form of a dialogue between Micyllus the cobbler, who figures also in The Downward Journey, and his cock, who is Pythagoras reincarnated. ΟΝΕΙΡΟΣ Η ΑΛΕΚΤΡΥΩΝ ΜΙΚΥΛΛΟΣ 1 ̓Αλλὰ σέ, κάκιστε ἀλεκτρυών, ὁ Ζεὺς αὐτὸς ἐπιτρίψειε φθονερὸν οὕτω καὶ ὀξύφωνον ὄντα, ὅς με πλουτοῦντα καὶ ἡδίστῳ ὀνείρῳ συνόντα καὶ θαυμαστὴν εὐδαιμονίαν εὐδαιμονοῦντα διάτορόν τι καὶ γεγωνὸς ἀναβοήσας ἐπήγειρας, ὡς μηδὲ νύκτωρ γοῦν τὴν πολὺ σοῦ μιαρωτέραν πενίαν διαφύγοιμι. καίτοι εἴ γε χρὴ τεκμαίρεσθαι τῇ τε ἡσυχίᾳ πολλῇ ἔτι οὔσῃ καὶ τῷ κρύει μηδέπω με τὸ ὄρθριον ὥσπερ εἴωθεν ἀποπηγνύντι-γνώμων γὰρ οὗτος ἀψευδέστατός μοι προσελαυνούσης ἡμέρας—οὐδέπω μέσαι νύκτες εἰσίν, ὁ δὲ ἄϋπνος οὗτος ὥσπερ τὸ χρυσοῦν ἐκεῖνο κώδιον φυλάττων ἀφ' ἑσπέρας εὐθὺς ἤδη κέκραγεν, ἀλλ ̓ οὔτι χαίρων γε· ἀμυνοῦμαι γὰρ ἀμέλει σε, ἢν μόνον ἡμέρα γένηται, συντρίβων τῇ βακτηρίᾳ· νῦν δέ μοι πράγματα παρέξεις μεταπηδῶν ἐν τῷ σκότῳ. ΑΛΕΚΤΡΥΩΝ Μίκυλλε δέσποτα, ᾤμην τι χαριεῖσθαί σοι φθάνων τῆς νυκτὸς ὁπόσον δυναίμην, ὡς ἔχοις ὀρθρευόμενος προανύειν τὰ πολλὰ τῶν ἔργων· εἰ1 γοῦν πρὶν ἀνατεῖλαι ἥλιον μίαν κρηπῖδα ἐξεργά 1 εἰ Α.Μ.Η. : ἢ (or ή) γ; ἢν (and ἐργάσῃ) β. THE DREAM, OR THE COCK MICYLLUS WHY, you scurvy cock, may Zeus himself annihilate you for being so envious and shrill-voiced! I was rolling in wealth and having a most delightful dream and enjoying wonderful happiness when you uplifted your voice in a piercing, full-throated crow and waked me up. Even at night you won't let me escape my poverty, which is much more of a nuisance than you are. And yet to judge from the fact that the silence is still profound and the cold has not yet stiffened me as it always does in the morning—which is the surest indicator that I have of the approach of day-it is not yet midnight, and this bird, who is as sleepless as if he were guarding the golden fleece, has started crowing directly after dark. He shall suffer for it, though! I'll pay you back, never fear, as soon as it is daylight, by whacking the life out of you with my stick; but if I tried it now, you would bother me by hopping about in the dark. COCK Master Micyllus, I thought I should do you a favour by cheating the night as much as I could, so that you might make use of the morning hours and finish the greater part of your work early; you see, if you get a single sandal done before the sun rises, |