Page:Comedies of Aristophanes (Hickie 1853) vol2.djvu/78

This page needs to be proofread.
454
THE THESMOPHORIAZUSÆ.
42—62.

my master's house, composing lyric poems. And let the breathless[1] Ether check its blasts, and the azure wave of the sea not roar—

Mnes. Oh my!

Eur. Be silent! What are you saying?[2]

Serv.—and let the race of birds be put to sleep, and the feet of savage wild beasts that roam the woods not be put in motion.

Mnes. Oh my gracious !

Serv. For the beautifully-speaking Agathon our chief[3] is about—

Mnes. To be debauched?

Serv. Who's he that spoke?

Mnes. Breathless Ether.

Serv.—to lay the stocks,[4] the beginning of a drama. And he is bending new felloes for verses: others he is turning,[5] on the lathe, other verses he is patching together; and he is coining maxims, and speaking in tropes,[6] and is moulding as in wax, and is rounding, and is casting—

Mnes. And is wenching.

Serv. What rustic[7] approaches our eaves?

Mnes. One who is ready to turn and whirl round and cast this toe of mine in the eaves of[8] you and your beautifully-speaking poet.

  1. This use of the nominative may be compared with the similar use of the accusative mentioned in the note on Equit. 345.
  2. Fritzsche and Enger read τί λέγει; what is he saying? which seems more appropriate.
  3. "πρόμος is both an ancient word used by Homer, and a thoroughly tragic one. See Æsch. Ag. 193, 398. Eum. 377. Siippl. 882. Soph. Col. 884. Rex, 660." Fritzsche. Comp. Meineke, Com. Frag. ii. p. 16.
  4. "δρύοχοι are the upright timbers supporting the keel, upon which the keel is laid when the shipwrights commence budding a ship." Brunck.
  5. Hor. Ars Poet. 441, Et male tornatos incudi reddere versus. Comp. Epigr. ap. Schol. Equit. 753, Καλλιμάχου τὸ τορευτὸν ἕπος τόδε.
  6. "Et autonomasiis ornat." Kuster.
  7. Eur. Orest. 1271,

    τίς δ' ἀυφὶ μέλαθρου πολεῖ
    σὸν ἀγρότας ἀνήρ;

  8. "The genitives σοῦ and τῦ ποιήτου depend on θριγκοῦ." Fritzsche. Cf. Lys. 975.