TRYGAEUS With good wine, no doubt?
SON OF LAMACHUS "...with armour and rushed forth from the towers, and a
terrible shout arose."
TRYGAEUS Get you gone, you little scapegrace, you and your battles! You
sing of nothing but warfare. Who is your father then?
SON OF LAMACHUS My father?
TRYGAEUS Why yes, your father.
SON OF LAMACHUS I am Lamachus' son.
TRYGAEUS Oh! oh! I could indeed have sworn, when I was listening to you,
that you were the son of some warrior who dreams of nothing but wounds
and bruises, of some Boulomachus or Clausimachus;(1) go and sing your
plaguey songs to the spearmen.... Where is the son of Cleonymus? Sing me
something before going back to the feast. I am at least certain he will
not sing of battles, for his father is far too careful a man.
f(1) Boulomachus is derived from (two Greek words meaning)
to wish for battle; Clausimachus from (two others), the
tears that battles cost. The same root (for) 'battle' is
also contained in the name Lamachus.
SON OF CLEONYMUS "An inhabitant of Sais is parading with the spotless
shield which I regret to say I have thrown into a thicket."(1)
f(1) A distich borrowed from Archilochus, a celebrated poet
of the seventh century B.C., born at Paros, and the author
of odes, satires, epigrams and elegies. He sang his own
shame. 'Twas in an expedition against Sais, not the town in
Egypt as the similarity in name might lead one to believe,
but in Thrace, that he had cast away his buckler. "A might
calamity truly!" he says without shame. "I shall buy
another."
TRYGAEUS Tell me, you little good-for-nothing, are you singing that for
your father?