Cistellaria, or The Casket (70-89b)

inasmuch as it produces sweetness in a mere taste, but causes bitterness even to repletion.

Of that character is the malady that afflicts me, my dear Gymnasium.

Love is full of treachery.

He’s taking his spoils of me, then.

Be of good courage, you’ll get the better of this malady.

I trust it will be so, if the physician comes that can administer the medicine to this malady.

He will come.

A hard expression is that to one in love, He will come, unless he does come. But by my own fault and foolishness, am I, wretched creature, more afflicted, because for him alone have I longed for myself, with whom to pass my life.

That is more suitable to a married woman, my dear Silenium, to love but one, and with him to pass her life, to whom she has once been married;

but, indeed, a Courtesan is most like a flourishing city; she cannot alone increase her fortunes without a multitude of men.

I want you to give heed to this matter; the thing on account of which you have been sent for to me, I’ll disclose. Now, my mother, because I don’t wish myself to be called a Courtesan, complied with my desire; in that matter she indulged myself who have been obedient to her;

to allow me to live with him alone whom I so ardently loved.

I’ faith, she acted foolishly. But look, have you ever kept company with any man?

With no one, indeed, except Alcesimarchus; nor has any other person whatever committed an infringement on my chastity.

Prithee, by what means did this man gain your good graces?

At the festival of Bacchus