if he sees you, calls you up and asks you a
casual question, then, ah! then you sweat profusely,
your head swims confusedly, you tremble inopportunely, and the company laughs at you for your
embarrassment. Many a time, when you should
reply to the question: “Who was the king of the
Achaeans,” you say, “They had a thousand ships!”
Good men call this modesty, forward men cowardice,
and unkind men lack of breeding. So, having found
the beginning of friendly relations very unstable
footing, you go away doomed by your own verdict
to great despair. 
When “many a sleepless night you have pillowed”
and have lived through “many a blood-stained day,” Iliad9, 325. 
not for the sake of Helen or of Priam’s Trojan
citadel, but the five obols that you hope for, and
when you have secured the backing of a tragedy
god, Some person, as opportune and powerful as a deus ex machina, to press your suit. there follows an examination to see if you are
learned in the arts. For the rich man that way of



 

passing time is not unpleasant, since he is praised
and felicitated, but you feel that you have then
before you the struggle for your life and for your
entire existence, for the thought of course steals into
your mind that no one else would receive you if you
were rejected by his predecessor and considered
unacceptable. So you cannot help being infinitely
distracted then; for you are jealous of your rivals
(let us suppose that there are others competing with
you for the same object); you think that everything you yourself have said has been inadequate,
you fear, you hope, you watch his face with straining
eyes; if he scouts anything you say, you are in distress, but if he smiles as he listens, you rejoice and
become hopeful.

 
No doubt there are many who side
against you and favour others in your stead, and
each of them stealthily shoots at you, so to speak,
from ambush. Then too imagine a man with a long
beard and grey hair undergoing examination to see
if he knows anything worth while, and some thinking that he does, others that he does not! 
Then a period intervenes, and your whole past life
is pried into. If a fellow-countryman. out of jealousy
or a neighbour offended for some insignificant reason
says, when questioned, that you are a follower of
women or boys, there they have it ! the witness speaks
by the book of Zeus; but if all with one accord
commend you, they are considered questionable,
dubious, and suborned. You must have great good
fortune, then, and no opposition at all; for that is
the only way in which you can win. 
Well, suppose you have been fortunate in everything beyond your fondest hopes. The master himself has commended your discussions, and those of


 

his friends whom he holds in the highest esteem
and trusts most implicitly in such matters have not
advised him against you. Besides, his wife is willing,
and neither his attorney nor his steward objects, nor
has anyone criticized your past; everything is
propitious and from every point of view the omens
are good.

 
You have won, then, lucky man, and
have gained the Olympic crown—nay, you have
taken Babylon or stormed the citadel of Sardis ; you
shall have the horn of Plenty and fill your pails with
pigeon’s milk. It is indeed fitting that in return for
all your labours you should have the very greatest of
blessings, in order that your crown may not be mere
leaves ; that your salary should be set at a considerable figure and paid you when you need it, without
ado; that in other ways you should be honoured
beyond ordinary folk; that you should get respite
from your former exertions and muddiness and
running about and loss of sleep, and that in accordance
with your prayer you should “sleep with your legs
stretched out,” A proverbial expression for ‘“taking it easy.” doing only what you were engaged
for at the outset and what you are paid for. That
ought to be the way of it, Timocles, and there would
be no great harm in stooping and bearing the yoke
if it were light and comfortable and, best of all, gilded'
But the case is very different—yes, totally different.
There are thousands of things insupportable to a free
man that take place even after one has entered the
household. Consider for yourself, as you hear a list
of them, whether anyone could put up with them
who is even to the slightest degree cultured.


 
I shall
begin, if you like, with the first dinner which will be


 

given you, no doubt, as a formal prelude to your
future intimacy. 
Very soon, then, someone calls, bringing an invitation to the dinner, a servant not unfamiliar with
the world, whom you must first propitiate by slipping
at least five drachmas into his hand casually so as not
to appear awkward. He puts on airs and murmurs:
“Tut, tut ! I take money from you?” ane : “Heracles!
I hope it may never come to that !"; but in the end
he is prevailed upon and goes away with a broad grin
at your expense. Providing yourself with clean
clothing and dressing yourself as neatly as you can,
you pay your visit to the bath and go, afraid of
getting there before the rest, for that would be
gauche, just as to come last would be ill-mannered. So
you wait until the middle moment of the right time,
and then go in. He receives you with much distinction, and someone takes you in charge and gives
you a place at table a little above the rich man, with
perhaps two of his old friends.

 
As though you had
entered the mansion of Zeus, you admire everything
and are amazed at all that is done, for everything is
strange and unfamiliar to you. The servants stare
at you, and everybody in the company keeps an eye
on you to see what you are going to do. Even the
rich man himself is not without concern on this score ;
he has previously directed some of the servants to
watch whether you often gaze from afar at his sons
or his wife. The attendants of your fellow-guests,
seeing that you are impressed, crack jokes about
your unfamiliarity with what is doing and conjecture

 

that you have never before dined anywhere because
your napkin is new. Guests brought their own napkins. 
As is natural, then, you inevitably break out in a
cold sweat for perplexity ; you do not dare to ask for
something to drink when you are thirsty for fear of
being thought a toper, and you do not know which
of the dishes that have been put before you in great
variety, made to be eaten in a definite order, you should
put out your hand to get first, or which second ; so you
will be obliged to cast stealthy glances at your neighbour, copy him, and find out the proper sequence of
the dinner.