Cistellaria, or The Casket (131-160)

he is dying desperately in love for this young woman, who has just. now gone hence in tears; on the other hand, she is smitten with love.

I made a present of her to my friend, this Courtesan: who had often made mention of it to me

that somewhere I must find for her a boy or a girl, just born, that she herself might pass it off as her own. As soon as ever the opportunity befell me, I immediately granted her request in that which she had asked of me.

After she had received this female child from me, at once

she was brought to bed of the same female child which she had received from me, without the aid of a midwife and without pain, just as other women bring forth, who seek a trouble to themselves; but she said that her lover was a foreigner, and that by reason of that circumstance she was palming it off.

This, we two alone are aware of, I who gave the child to her, and she who received it from me; (to the AUDIENCE) except yourselves, indeed. Thus was this affair managed; if any occasion should arise, I wish you to remember this circumstance. I’m off home.

(To the AUDIENCE.) This old woman is both a much-talker and a much-tippler.

Isn’t it the fact that she has hardly left room to a Divinity for him to speak, so much has she forestalled him in talking about the substitution of this girl? But if she had held her tongue, still I was about to mention it—a God, who could do it better; for my name is Help. Now (to the AUDIENCE) lend your attention,

that I may clearly explain this plot to you. Some time since, at Sicyon, there was the Festival of Bacchus; a merchant of Lemnos[*] came hither to the games, and he, an ungovernable young man, ravished a maiden[*] in the dark, in the street, at the dead of night.

He, as he knew that he was deserving of a heavy punishment, at once found shelter with his heels, and made off for Lemnos, where he then lived. She whom he had ravished, the ninth ensuing month completed, brought forth a daughter here[*]. Since she did not know the person guilty of this deed, who he was,