The Birds | Page 7

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 parts. 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[1] galley can appear, bringing a writ-server along. Have
you no Greek town you can propose to us?
f[1] The State galley, which carried the officials of the Athenian
republic to their several departments and brought back those whose
time had expired; it was this galley that was sent to Sicily to fetch back
Alcibiades, who was accused of sacrilege.
EPOPS Why not choose Lepreum in Elis for your settlement?
EUELPIDES By Zeus! I could not look at Lepreum without disgust,
because of Melanthius.[1]
f[1] A tragic poet, who was a leper; there is a play, of course, on the
word Lepreum.

EPOPS Then, again, there is the Opuntian, where you could live.
EUELPIDES I would not be Opuntian[1] for a talent. But come, what
is it like to live with the birds? You should know pretty well.
f[1] An allusion to Opuntius, who was one-eyed.
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.[1]
f[1] The newly-married ate a sesame-cake, decorated with garlands of
myrtle, poppies and mint.
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.'[1] If you build

and fortify it, you will turn your pole into a fortified city.[2] In this way
you will reign over mankind as you do over the grasshoppers and cause
the gods to die of rabid hunger
f[1] From [the word meaning] 'to turn.' f[2] The Greek words for 'pole'
and 'city' only differ by a single letter.
EPOPS How so?
PISTHETAERUS The air is 'twixt earth and heaven. When we want to
go to Delphi, we ask the Boeotians[1] 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.
f[1] Boeotia separated Attica from Phocis.
EPOPS By earth! by snares! by network![1] I never heard of anything
more cleverly conceived; and, if the other birds approve, I am going to
build the city along with you.
f[1] He swears by the powers that are to