f(1) This was the name of the wall surrounding the Acropolis.
EPOPS One of us, a bird of Persian strain, who is everywhere proclaimed
to be the bravest of all, a true chick of Ares.(1)
f(1) i.e. the fighting cock.
EUELPIDES Oh! noble chick! What a well-chosen god for a rocky home!
PISTHETAERUS Come! into the air with you to help the workers who are
building the wall; carry up rubble, strip yourself to mix the mortar,
take up the hod, tumble down the ladder, an you like, post sentinels,
keep the fire smouldering beneath the ashes, go round the walls, bell in
hand,(1) and go to sleep up there yourself; then d(i)spatch two heralds,
one to the gods above, the other to mankind on earth and come back here.
f(1) To waken the sentinels, who might else have fallen asleep.--There
are several merry contradictions in the various parts of this list of
injunctions.
EUELPIDES As for yourself, remain here, and may the plague take you for
a troublesome fellow!
PISTHETAERUS Go, friend, go where I send you, for without you my orders
cannot be obeyed. For myself, I want to sacrifice to the new god, and I
am going to summon the priest who must preside at the ceremony. Slaves!
slaves! bring forward the basket and the lustral water.
CHORUS I do as you do, and I wish as you wish, and I implore you to
address powerful and solemn prayers to the gods, and in addition to
immolate a sheep as a token of our gratitude. Let us sing the Pythian
chant in honour of the god, and let Chaeris accompany our voices.
PISTHETAERUS (TO THE FLUTE-PLAYER) Enough! but, by Heracles! what is
this? Great gods! I have seen many prodigious things, but I never saw a
muzzled raven.(1)
f(1) In allusion to the leather strap which flute-players wore to
constrict the cheeks and add to the power of the breath. The performer
here no doubt wore a raven's mask.
EPOPS Priest! 'tis high time! Sacrifice to the new gods.
PRIEST I begin, but where is he with the basket? Pray to the Vesta of
the birds, to the kite, who presides over the hearth, and to all the god
and goddess-birds who dwell in Olympus.
CHORUS Oh! Hawk, the sacred guardian of Sunium, oh, god of the storks!
PRIEST Pray to the swan of Delos, to Latona the mother of the quails,
and to Artemis, the goldfinch.
PISTHETAERUS 'Tis no longer Artemis Colaenis, but Artemis the
goldfinch.(1)
f(1) Hellanicus, the Mitylenian historian, tells that this surname of
Artemis is derived from Colaenus, King of Athens before Cecrops and a
descendant of Hermes. In obedience to an oracle he erected a temple to
the goddess, invoking her as Artemis Colaenis (the Artemis of Colaenus).
PRIEST And to Bacchus, the finch and Cybele, the ostrich and mother of
the gods and mankind.
CHORUS Oh! sovereign ostrich, Cybele, The mother of Cleocritus,(1) grant
health and safety to the Nephelococcygians as well as to the dwellers in
Chios...
f(1) This Cleocritus, says the scholiast, was long-necked and strutted
like an ostrich.
PISTHETAERUS The dwellers in Chios! Ah! I am delighted they should be
thus mentioned on all occasions.(1)
f(1) The Chians were the most faithful allies of Athens, and hence their
name was always mentioned in prayers, decrees, etc.
CHORUS ...to the heroes, the birds, to the sons of heroes, to the
porphyrion, the pelican, the spoon-bill, the redbreast, the grouse, the
peacock, the horned-owl, the teal, the bittern, the heron, the stormy
petrel, the fig-pecker, the titmouse...
PISTHETAERUS Stop! stop! you drive me crazy with your endless list.
Why, wretch, to what sacred feast are you inviting the vultures and the
sea-eagles? Don't you see that a single kite could easily carry off the
lot at once? Begone, you and your fillets and all; I shall know how to
complete the sacrifice by myself.
PRIEST It is imperative that I sing another sacred chant for the rite of
the lustral water, and that I invoke the immortals, or at least one of
them, provided always that you have some suitable food to offer him;
from what I see here, in the shape of gifts, there is naught whatever
but horn and hair.
PISTHETAERUS Let us address our sacrifices and our prayers to the winged
gods.
A POET Oh, Muse! celebrate happy Nephelococcygia in your hymns.
PISTHETAERUS What have we here? Where did you come from, tell me? Who
are you?
POET I am he whose language is sweeter than honey, the zealous slave of
the Muses, as Homer has it.
PISTHETAERUS You a slave! and yet you wear your hair long?
POET No, but the fact is all we poets are the assiduous slaves of the
Muses, according to Homer.
PISTHETAERUS In truth your little cloak is quite holy too through zeal!
But, poet, what ill wind drove you here?
POET I have composed verses in honour of your Nephelococcygia, a host of
splendid dithyrambs and parthenians(1) worthy of Simonides himself.
f(1) Verses sung by maidens.
PISTHETAERUS And when did you compose them? How long since?
POET Oh! 'tis long, aye, very long, that I have sung in honour of this
city.
PISTHETAERUS But I am only celebrating its foundation with this
sacrifice;(1) I have only just named it, as is done with little babies.
f(1) This ceremony took place on the tenth day after birth, and may be
styled the pagan baptism.
POET "Just as the chargers fly with the speed of the wind, so does the
voice of the Muses take its flight. Oh! thou noble founder of the town
of Aetna,(1) thou, whose name recalls the holy sacrifices,(2) make us
such gift as thy generous heart shall suggest."
f(1) Hiero, tyrant of Syracuse.--This passage is borrowed from Pindar.
f(2) (Hiero) in Greek means 'sacrifice.'
PISTHETAERUS He will drive us silly if we do not get rid of him by some
present. Here! you, who have a fur as well as your tunic, take it off
and give it to this clever poet. Come, take this fur; you look to me to
be shivering with cold.
POET My Muse will gladly accept this gift; but engrave these verses of
Pindar's on your mind.
PISTHETAERUS Oh! what a pest! 'Tis impossible then to be rid of him!
POET "Straton wanders among the Scythian nomads, but has no linen
garment. He is sad at only wearing an animal's pelt and no tunic." Do
you conceive my bent?
PISTHETAERUS I understand that you want me to offer you a tunic. Hi!
you (TO EUELPIDES), take off yours; we must help the poet.... Come, you,
take it and begone.
POET I am going, and these are the verses that I address to this city:
"Phoebus of the golden throne, celebrate this shivery, freezing city;
I have travelled through fruitful and snow-covered plains. Tralala!
Tralala!"(1)
f(1) A parody of poetic pathos, not to say bathos.
PISTHETAERUS What are you chanting us about frosts? Thanks to the tunic,
you no longer fear them. Ah! by Zeus! I could not have believed this
cursed fellow could so soon have learnt the way to our city. Come,
priest, take the lustral water and circle the altar.
PRIEST Let all keep silence!