EUELPIDES. But do you see all those hooked claws?
PISTHETAERUS. Seize the spit and pierce the foe on your side.
EUELPIDES. And how about my eyes?
PISTHETAERUS. Protect them with this dish or this vinegar-pot.
EUELPIDES. Oh! what cleverness! what inventive genius! You are a great
general, even greater than Nicias,[214] where stratagem is concerned.
CHORUS. Forward, forward, charge with your beaks! Come, no delay. Tear,
pluck, strike, flay them, and first of all smash the stew-pot.
EPOPS. Oh, most cruel of all animals, why tear these two men to pieces,
why kill them? What have they done to you? They belong to the same tribe,
to the same family as my wife.[215]
CHORUS. Are wolves to be spared? Are they not our most mortal foes? So
let us punish them.
EPOPS. If they are your foes by nature, they are your friends in heart,
and they come here to give you useful advice.
CHORUS. Advice or a useful word from their lips, from them, the enemies
of my forbears!
EPOPS. The wise can often profit by the lessons of a foe, for caution is
the mother of safety. 'Tis just such a thing as one will not learn from a
friend and which an enemy compels you to know. To begin with, 'tis the
foe and not the friend that taught cities to build high walls, to equip
long vessels of war; and 'tis this knowledge that protects our children,
our slaves and our wealth.
CHORUS. Well then, I agree, let us first hear them, for 'tis best; one
can even learn something in an enemy's school.
PISTHETAERUS. Their wrath seems to cool. Draw back a little.
EPOPS. 'Tis only justice, and you will thank me later.
CHORUS. Never have we opposed your advice up to now.
PISTHETAERUS. They are in a more peaceful mood; put down your stew-pot
and your two dishes; spit in hand, doing duty for a spear, let us mount
guard inside the camp close to the pot and watch in our arsenal closely;
for we must not fly.
EUELPIDES. You are right. But where shall we be buried, if we die?
PISTHETAERUS. In the Ceramicus;[216] for, to get a public funeral, we
shall tell the Strategi that we fell at Orneae,[217] fighting the
country's foes.
CHORUS. Return to your ranks and lay down your courage beside your wrath
as the Hoplites do. Then let us ask these men who they are, whence they
come, and with what intent. Here, Epops, answer me.
EPOPS. Are you calling me? What do you want of me?
CHORUS. Who are they? From what country?
EPOPS. Strangers, who have come from Greece, the land of the wise.
CHORUS. And what fate has led them hither to the land of the birds?
EPOPS. Their love for you and their wish to share your kind of life; to
dwell and remain with you always.
CHORUS. Indeed, and what are their plans?
EPOPS. They are wonderful, incredible, unheard of.
CHORUS. Why, do they think to see some advantage that determines them to
settle here? Are they hoping with our help to triumph over their foes or
to be useful to their friends?
EPOPS. They speak of benefits so great it is impossible either to
describe or conceive them; all shall be yours, all that we see here,
there, above and below us; this they vouch for.
CHORUS. Are they mad?
EPOPS. They are the sanest people in the world.
CHORUS. Clever men?
EPOPS. The slyest of foxes, cleverness its very self, men of the world,
cunning, the cream of knowing folk.
CHORUS. Tell them to speak and speak quickly; why, as I listen to you, I
am beside myself with delight.
EPOPS. Here, you there, take all these weapons and hang them up inside
close to the fire, near the figure of the god who presides there and
under his protection;[218] as for you, address the birds, tell them why I
have gathered them together.
PISTHETAERUS. Not I, by Apollo, unless they agree with me as the little
ape of an armourer agreed with his wife, not to bite me, nor pull me by
the testicles, nor shove things up my....
CHORUS. You mean the.... (_Puts finger to bottom._) Oh! be quite at ease.
PISTHETAERUS. No, I mean my eyes.
CHORUS. Agreed.
PISTHETAERUS. Swear it.
CHORUS. I swear it and, if I keep my promise, let judges and spectators
give me the victory unanimously.
PISTHETAERUS. It is a bargain.
CHORUS. And if I break my word, may I succeed by one vote only.
HERALD. Hearken, ye people! Hoplites, pick up your weapons and return to
your firesides; do not fail to read the decrees of dismissal we have
posted.
CHORUS. Man is a truly cunning creature, but nevertheless explain.
Perhaps you are going to show me some good way to extend my power, some
way that I have not had the wit to find out and which you have
discovered. Speak! 'tis to your own interest as well as to mine, for if
you secure me some advantage, I will surely share it with you. But what
object can have induced you to come among us? Speak boldly, for I shall
not break the truce,--until you have told us all.
PISTHETAERUS. I am bursting with desire to speak; I have already mixed
the dough of my address and nothing prevents me from kneading it....
Slave! bring the chaplet and water, which you must pour over my hands. Be
quick![219]
EUELPIDES. Is it a question of feasting? What does it all mean?
PISTHETAERUS. By Zeus, no! but I am hunting for fine, tasty words to
break down the hardness of their hearts.--I grieve so much for you, who
at one time were kings....
CHORUS. We kings! Over whom?
PISTHETAERUS. ... of all that exists, firstly of me and of this man, even
of Zeus himself. Your race is older than Saturn, the Titans and the
Earth.
CHORUS. What, older than the Earth!
PISTHETAERUS. By Phoebus, yes.
CHORUS. By Zeus, but I never knew that before!
PISTHETAERUS. 'Tis because you are ignorant and heedless, and have never
read your Aesop. 'Tis he who tells us that the lark was born before all
other creatures, indeed before the Earth; his father died of sickness,
but the Earth did not exist then; he remained unburied for five days,
when the bird in its dilemma decided, for want of a better place, to
entomb its father in its own head.