MNESIPPUS 
They are very dramatic, Toxaris, and quite like
fables. May Glaive and Wind, by whom you swore,
be good to me, but really, if one were to disbelieve
them, one would not seem very open to criticism.
 TOXARIS 
But see to it, my gallant adversary, that your
disbelief is not jealousy! Nevertheless, I am not
the man to let your disbelieving me deter me from
telling you other such deeds that I know to have
been done by Scythians.
 MNESIPPUS 
Only don’t let them be too protracted, my
excellent friend, and don’t use such an unembarrassed
flow of speech; for as it is, by running hither and
thither through Scythia and Machlyene, and by
going off to Bosporus and then coming back again,
you have taken very liberal advantage of my silence.
 TOXARIS 
In this too I must obey your dictates; I must
speak briefly so that I shall not have you getting
completely tired out by following me all about with
your attention.
 
No, rather let me tell you how I
myself was assisted by a friend named Sisinnes.



 
 
When I was going away from home to Athens by
reason of my desire for Greek culture, I put in at
Amastris, on the Black Sea; the city is a port of call
for those sailing this way from Scythia, not far distant
from Carambis. I was accompanied by Sisinnes,
who had been my companion from childhood.
After looking out a lodging near the port and transferring our effects to it from the vessel, we went
shopping, without suspecting any mischief. In
the meantime thieves pried the door open and
carried off everything, so as not to leave even enough
to suffice for that day.
 When we returned home and found out what had
happened, we did not think it best to proceed against
the neighbours, who were numerous, or against our
host, fearing that we should be accounted blackmailers in public opinion if we said that someone
had robbed us of four hundred darics, a great deal
of clothing, some rugs, and all the other things
that we had.

 
So we discussed the situation to see
what we should do, now that we had become
absolutely penniless in a strange country. My
own thought was to plunge my sword into my side
forthwith, and make my exit from life before enduring any unseemly experience under the pressure of
hunger or thirst, but Sisinnes encouraged me and
begged me not to do anything of that sort, for he
himself would discover a means of our having enough
to live on. 
That day, therefore, he carried lumber in from the
port and came back with supplies for us which he
had procured with his wages. But the next morning, while going about in the market-place he saw a
sort of procession, as he put it, of high-spirited,

 

handsome young men. These had been enrolled
to fight duels for hire and were to settle their combats
on the next day but one. Well, he found out all
about them, and then came to me, saying:

“Toxaris, you need not call yourself a poor man any
longer; on the day after to-morrow I shall make
you rich.”
 
Those were his words; accordingly, we eked out a
wretched existence during the interval, and when
at length the spectacle began we were there looking
on, for taking me with him on the pretext of going
to see a Greek show that would be enjoyable and
novel, he had brought me to the theatre. We
took our seats, and first we saw wild beasts brought
down with javelins, hunted with dogs, and loosed
upon men in chains—criminals, we conjectured.
Then the gladiators entered, and the herald, bringing
in a tall youth, said that whoever wanted to fight
with that man should come forward, and would
receive ten thousand drachmas in payment for the
encounter. Thereupon Sisinnes arose, and, leaping
down, undertook to fight and requested arms. On
receiving his pay, the ten thousand drachmas, he
promptly put it in my hands, saying: “If I win,
Toxaris, we shall go away together, with all that we
need; but if I fall, bury me and go back to Scythia.”
 
While I was lamenting over this, he was given
his armour and fastened it on, except that he did
not put on the helmet but took position bareheaded
and fought that way. He himself received the first
wound, an under-cut in the back of the thigh, dealt
with a curved sword, so that blood flowed copiously.
For my part, I was already as good as dead in my
fright. But he waited until his opponent rushed

 

upon him too confidently; then he stabbed him in
the breast and ran him through, so that on the instant
he fell at his feet. Himself labouring under his
wound, he sat down upon the body and his life
almost left him, but I, running up, revived and inspirited him. When at length he was dismissed
as victor, I picked him up and carried him to our
lodgings. After long treatment he survived and still
lives in Scythia, with my sister as his wife; he is
lame, however, from his wound. 
That, Mnesippus, did not happen either in
Machlyene or among the Alans, so as to be unattested and possible to disbelieve; there are
many Amastrians here who remember the fight of
Sisinnes.