And Matreas, the strolling player of Alexandria, was admired by both Greeks and
 Romans; and he said that he was cherishing a beast which was eating itself. So
 that even now it is disputed what that beast of Matreas's was. He used to propose
 ridiculous questions in parody of the doubt raised by Aristotle, and then he read
 them in public; as Why is the sun said to set, and not
 to dive? 
 why are sponges said to suck up, and not to drink? and why
 do we say of a tetra-drachm that it καταλλάττεται, 
 This is a pun which cannot be rendered
 in English, καταλλάσσομαι meaning to be
 changed, of money; and to be reconciled, of enemies. when we never
 speak of its getting in a passion? And the Athenians gave Pothimos the
 puppet-master the use of the very stage on which Euripides had exhibited his noble
 dramas. And they also erected a statue of Euripides in the theatre next to the
 statue of Aeschylus. Xenophon the conjuror, too, was very popular among them, who
 left behind him a pupil of the name of Cratisthenes, a citizen of Phlias; a man
 who used to make fire spout up of its own accord, and who contrived many other
 extraordinary sights, so as almost to make men discredit the evidence of their own
 senses. And Nymphodorus the conjuror was another such; a man who having quarrelled
 with the people of Rhegium, as Duris relates, was the first man who turned them
 into ridicule as cowards. And Eudicus the buffoon gained great credit by imitating
 wrestlers and boxers, as Aristoxenus relates. Straton of Tarentum, also, had many
 admirers; he was a mimic of the dithyrambic poets; and so had Aenonas the Italian,
 who mimicked the harp-players; and who gave representations of the Cyclops trying
 to sing, and of Ulysses when shipwrecked, speaking in a clownish fashion. And
 Diopeithes the Locrian, according to the account of Phanodemus, when he came to
 Thebes, fastened round his waist bladders full of wine and milk, and then,
 squeezing them, pretended that he was drawing up those liquids out of his mouth.
 And Noëmon gained a great reputation for the same sort of tricks. There were also in Alexander's court the following jugglers, who had all a great
 name. Scymnus of Tarentum, and Philistides of Syracuse, and Heraclitus of
 Mitylene. And there were too some strolling players of high repute, such as
 Cephisodorus and Pantaleon. And Xenophon makes mention also of Philip the
 buffoon.