Birds (113-161)

We wish to pay you a visit.

What for?

Because you formerly were a man, like we are,

formerly you had debts, as we have, formerly you did not want to pay them, like ourselves; furthermore, being turned into a bird, you have when flying seen all lands and seas. Thus you have all human knowledge as well as that of birds.

And hence we have come to you to beg you to direct us to some cosy town, in which one can repose as if on thick coverlets.

And are you looking for a greater city than Athens?

No, not a greater, but one more pleasant to live in.

Then you are looking for an aristocratic country.

I? Not at all! I hold the son of Scellias in horror.

But, after all, what sort of city would please you best?

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.

Ah! that's what may be called being fond of hardships! To Pisthetaerus. And what say you?

My tastes are similar.

And they are?

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 kissed him, nor took him with you, nor ever once felt his balls. Would anyone call you an old friend of mine?

Ah! wag, I see you are fond of suffering. But there is a city of delights such as you want.

It's on the Red Sea.

Oh, no. Not a sea-port, where some fine morning the Salaminian galley can appear, bringing a process-server along. Have you no Greek town you can propose to us?

Why not choose Lepreum in Elis for your settlement?

By Zeus! I could not look at Lepreum without disgust, because of Melanthius.

Then, again, there is the Opuntian Locris, where you could live.

I would not be Opuntian for a talent.

But come, what is it like to live with the birds? You should know pretty well.

Why, it's not a disagreeable life. In the first place, one has no purse.

That does away with a lot of roguery.

For food the gardens yield us white sesame,

myrtle-berries, poppies and mint.

Why, 'tis the life of the newly-wed indeed.