Against Diogeiton (26-29)

To set the reckoning before you in detail, gentlemen of the jury, would be a lengthy affair; but when with some trouble I had got him to hand over the balance-sheet, in the presence of witnesses I asked Aristodicus, brother of Alexis,—the latter being now dead—whether he had the account for the equipment of a warship. He told me that he had, and we went to his house and found that Diogeiton had paid Alexis a contribution of twenty-four minae towards equipping the warship.

But the expenditure that he showed was forty-eight minae, so that the children have been charged exactly the total of what he has spent.[*] Now, what do you suppose he has done in cases of which nobody else has had cognizance, and where he managed the business alone, when in those which were conducted through others and of which information could easily be obtained he did not shrink from falsehood in mulcting his own daughter’s children to an amount of twenty-four minae? Please come forward, witnesses, in support of this.

Witnesses

For eight years, that amounts to eight thousand drachmae; and we are left with a balance of six talents and twenty minae. For he will not be able to show that he has either had losses by pirates, or met with failure or paid off debts.⋯