Part 20

HIEROCLES Come, cut off the first offering(1) and make the oblation.

f(1) This was the part that belonged to the priests and diviners. As one of the latter class, Hierocles is in haste to see this piece cut off.

TRYGAEUS 'Tis not roasted enough.

HIEROCLES Yea, truly, 'tis done to a turn.

TRYGAEUS Mind your own business, friend! (TO THE SERVANT.) Cut away. Where is the table? Bring the libations.

HIEROCLES The tongue is cut separately.

TRYGAEUS We know all that. But just listen to one piece of advice.

HIEROCLES And that is?

TRYGAEUS Don't talk, for 'tis divine Peace to whom we are sacrificing.

HIEROCLES Oh! wretched mortals, oh, you idiots!

TRYGAEUS Keep such ugly terms for yourself.

HIEROCLES What! you are so ignorant you don't understand the will of the gods and you make a treaty, you, who are men, with apes, who are full of malice?(1)

f(1) The Spartans.

TRYGAEUS Ha, ha, ha!

HIEROCLES What are you laughing at?

TRYGAEUS Ha, ha! your apes amuse me!

HIEROCLES You simple pigeons, you trust yourselves to foxes, who are all craft, both in mind and heart.

TRYGAEUS Oh, you trouble-maker! may your lungs get as hot as this meat!

HIEROCLES Nay, nay! if only the Nymphs had not fooled Bacis, and Bacis mortal men; and if the Nymphs had not tricked Bacis a second time...(1)

f(1) Emphatic pathos, incomprehensible even to the diviner himself; this is a satire on the obscure style of the oracles. Bacis was a famous Boeotian diviner.

TRYGAEUS May the plague seize you, if you don't stop wearying us with your Bacis!

HIEROCLES ...it would not have been written in the book of Fate that the bends of Peace must be broken; but first...

TRYGAEUS The meat must be dusted with salt.

HIEROCLES ...it does not please the blessed gods that we should stop the War until the wolf uniteth with the sheep.

TRYGAEUS How, you cursed animal, could the wolf ever unite with the sheep?

HIEROCLES As long as the wood-bug gives off a fetid odour, when it flies; as long as the noisy bitch is forced by nature to litter blind pups, so long shall peace be forbidden.

TRYGAEUS Then what should be done? Not to stop War would be to leave it to the decision of chance which of the two people should suffer the most, whereas by uniting under a treaty, we share the empire of Greece.

HIEROCLES You will never make the crab walk straight.