HER. Ho there! why dost thou look so grave and thoughtful? The servant
ought not to be of woeful countenance before guests, but should receive
them with an affable mind. But thou, though thou seest a companion of thy
lord present, receivest him with a morose and clouded countenance, fixing
thy attention on a calamity that thou hast nothing to do with. Come hither,
that thou mayst become more wise. Knowest thou mortal affairs, of what
nature they are? I think not; from whence should you? but hear me. Death is
a debt that all mortals must pay: and there is not of them one, who knows
whether he shall live the coming morrow: for what depends on fortune is
uncertain how it will turn out, and is not to be learned, neither is it
detected by art. Having heard these things then, and learned them from me,
make thyself merry, drink, and think the life allowed from day to day thine
own, but the rest Fortune's. And honor also Venus, the most sweet of
deities to mortals, for she is a kind deity. But let go these other things,
and obey my words, if I appear to speak rightly: I think so indeed. Wilt
thou not then leave off thy excessive grief, and drink with me, crowned
with garlands, having thrown open these gates? And well know I that the
trickling of the cup falling down _thy throat_ will change thee from thy
present cloudy and pent state of mind. But we who are mortals should think
as mortals. Since to all the morose, indeed, and to those of sad
countenance, if they take me as judge at least, life is not truly life, but
misery.
SERV. I know this; but now we are in circumstances not such as are fit for
revel and mirth.
HER. The lady that is dead is a stranger; grieve not too much, for the
lords of this house live.
SERV. What live! knowest thou not the misery within the house?
HER. Unless thy lord hath told me any thing falsely.
SERV. He is too, too hospitable.
HER. Is it unmeet that I should be well treated, because a stranger is
dead?
SERV. Surely however she was very near.
HER. Has he forborne to tell me any calamity that there is?
SERV. Depart and farewell; we have a care for the evils of our lords.
HER. This speech is the beginning of no foreign loss.
SERV. For I should not, _had it been foreign_, have been grieved at seeing
thee reveling.
HER. What! have I received so great an injury from mine host?
SERV. Thou camest not in a fit time for the house to receive thee, for
there is grief to us, and thou seest that we are shorn, and our black
garments.
HER. But who is it that is dead? Has either any of his children died, or
his aged father?
SERV. The wife indeed of Admetus is dead, O stranger.
HER. What sayst thou? and yet did ye receive me?
SERV. _Yes_, for he had too much respect to turn thee from his house.
HER. O unhappy man, what a wife hast thou lost!
SERV. We all are lost, not she alone.
HER. But I did perceive it indeed, when I saw his eye streaming with tears,
and his shorn hair, and his countenance; but he persuaded me, saying, that
he was conducting the funeral of a stranger to the tomb: but spite of my
inclination having passed over these gates, I drank in the house of the
hospitable man, while he was in this case, and reveled, crowned as to my
head with garlands. But 'twas thine to tell me not _to do it_, when such an
evil was upon the house. Where is he burying her? whither going can I find
her?
SERV. By the straight road that leads to Larissa, thou wilt see the
polished tomb beyond the suburbs.