Zeus Rants (48)

Among the sailors themselves you will see that one who is lazy and lubberly and has no heart for his work has a warrant or evena commission, while another who is fearless at diving and handy in manning the yards and best acquainted with everything that needs to be done, is set to pumping ship. So too with the passengers: you'll see some gallows-bird or other sitting on the quarter deck beside the captain and receiving attentions, and another, a profligate, a parricide or a temple-robber, getting inordinate honour and taking up the whole deck of the ship, while a lot of good fellows are crowded into a corner of the hold and trampled on by men who are really their inferiors. Just think, for example, what a voyage Socrates and Aristides and Phocion had, without biscuits enough to eat and without even room to stretch their legs on the bare boards alongside the bilgewater, and on the other hand what favours Callias and Midias and Sardanapalus enjoyed, rolling in luxury and spitting on those beneath them!