The Frogs | Page 9

while he is tipsy and reeling, some robber his cloak should be stealing.
Often has it crossed my fancy, that the city loves to deal With the very best and noblest members of her commonweal, Just as with our ancient coinage, and the newly-minted gold. Yea for these, our sterling pieces, all of pure Athenian mould, All of perfect die and metal, all the fairest of the fair, All of workmanship unequalled, proved and valued every-where
Both amongst our own Hellenes and Barbarians far away, These we use not: but the worthless pinchbeck coins of yesterday, Vilest die and basest metal, now we always use instead. Even so, our sterling townsmen, nobly born and nobly bred, Men of worth and rank and metal, men of honourable fame, Trained in every liberal science, choral dance and manly game, These we treat with scorn and insult, but the strangers newliest come, Worthless sons of worthless fathers, pinchbeck townsmen, yellowy scum, Whom in earlier days the city hardly would have stooped to use Even for her scapegoat victims, these for every task we choose. O unwise and foolish people, yet to mend your ways begin; Use again the good and useful: so hereafter, if ye win 'Twill be due to this your wisdom: if ye fall, at least 'twill be Not a fall that brings dishonour, falling from a worthy tree.
AEAC. By Zeus the Saviour, quite the gentleman Your master is.
XAN. Gentleman? I believe you. He's all for wine and women, is my master.
AEAC. But not to have flogged you, when the truth came out That you, the slave, were passing off as master!
XAN. He'd get the worst of that.
AEAC. Bravo! that's spoken Like a true slave: that's what I love myself.
XAN. You love it, do you?
AEAC. Love it? I'm entranced When I can curse my lord behind his back.
XAN. How about grumbling, when you have felt the stick, And scurry out of doors?
AEAC. That's jolly too.
XAN. How about prying?
AEAC. That beats everything!
XAN. Great Kin-god Zeus! And what of overhearing Your master's secrets?
AEAC. What? I'm mad with joy.
XAN. And blabbing them abroad?
AEAC. O heaven and earth! When I do that, I can't contain myself.
XAN. Phoebus Apollo! clap your hand in mine, Kiss and be kissed: and prithee tell me this, Tell me by Zeus, our rascaldom's own god, What's all that noise within? What means this hubbub And row?
AEAC. That's Aeschylus and Euripides.
XAN. Eh?
AEAC. Wonderful, wonderful things are going on. The dead are rioting, taking different sides.
XAN. Why, what's the matter?
AEAC. There's a custom here With all the crafts, the good and noble crafts, That the chief master of his art in each Shall have his dinner in the assembly hall, And sit by Pluto's side.
XAN. I understand.
AEAC. Until another comes, more wise than he In the same art: then must the first give way.
XAN. And how has this disturbed our Aeschylus?
AEAC. 'Twas he that occupied the tragic chair, As, in his craft, the noblest.
XAN. Who does now?
AEAC. But when Euripides came down, he kept Flourishing off before the highwaymen, Thieves, burglars, parricides--these form our mob In Hades--till with listening to his twists And turns, and pleas and counterpleas, they went Mad on the man, and hailed him first and wisest: Elate with this, he claimed the tragic chair Where Aeschylus was seated.
XAN. Wasn't he pelted?
AEAC. Not he: the populace clamoured out to try Which of the twain was wiser in his art.
XAN. You mean the rascals?
AEAC. Aye, as high as heaven!
XAN. But were there none to side with Aeschylus?
AEAC. Scanty and sparse the good, (Regards the audience) the same as here.
XAN. And what does Pluto now propose to do?
AEAC. He means to hold a tournament, and bring Their tragedies to the proof.
XAN. But Sophocles, How came not he to claim the tragic chair?
AEAC. Claim it? Not he! When he came down, he kissed With reverence Aeschylus, and clasped his hand, And yielded willingly the chair to him. But now he's going, says Cleidemides, To sit third-man: and then if Aeschylus win, He'll stay content: if not, for his art's sake, He'll fight to the death against Euripides.
XAN. Will it come off?
AEAC. O yes, by Zeus, directly. And then, I hear, will wonderful things be done, The art poetic will be weighed in scales.
XAN. What! weigh out tragedy, like butcher's meat?
AEAC. Levels they'll bring, and measuring-tapes for words, And moulded oblongs.
XAN. Is it bricks they are making?
AEAC. Wedges and compasses: for Euripides Vows that he'll test the dramas, word by word.
XAN. Aeschylus chafes at this, I fancy.
AEAC. Well, He lowered his brows, upglaring like a bull.
XAN. And who's to be the judge?
AEAC. There came the rub. Skilled men were hard to find: for with the Athenians Aeschylus, somehow, did not hit it off.
XAN. Too many burglars, I expect, he thought.
AEAC. And all the rest, he