LAMACHUS Whence came the cry of battle to my ears? Where shall I charge? where cast the battle-din? Who roused the sleeping Gorgon? from its case?
DICAEOPOLIS O Lamachus hero, O those crests and cohorts! O Lamachus, here has this fellow been With frothy words abusing all the State.
LAMACHUS You dare, you beggar, say such things as those?
DICAEOPOLIS O Lamachus hero, grant me pardon true If I, a beggar, spake or chattered aught.
LAMACHUS What said you? Hey?
DICAEOPOLIS I can’t remember yet. I get so dizzy at the sight of arms. I pray you lay that terrible shield aside.
LAMACHUS There then.
DICAEOPOLIS Now set it upside down before me.
LAMACHUS ’Tis done.
DICAEOPOLIS Now give me from your crest that plume.
LAMACHUS Here; take the feather. Now then, hold my head, And let me vomit. I so loathe those crests.
LAMACHUS What! use my feather, rogue, to make you vomit?
DICAEOPOLIS A feather is it, Lamachus? Pray what bird Produced it? Is it a Great Boastard’s plume?
LAMACHUS Death and Destruction!
DICAEOPOLIS No, no, Lamachus. That’s not for strength like yours. If strong you are Why don’t you circumcise me? You’re well armed.
LAMACHUS What! you, a beggar, beard the general so?
DICAEOPOLIS A beggar am I, Lamachus?
LAMACHUS What else?
DICAEOPOLIS An honest townsman, not an office-seekrian, Since war began, an active-service-seekrian,— But you’re, since war began, a full-pay-seekrian.
LAMACHUS The people chose me—
DICAEOPOLIS Aye, three cuckoo-birds. That’s what I loathe; that’s why I made my treaty, When grey-haired veterans in the ranks I saw, And boys like you, paltry malingering boys, Off, some to Thrace—their daily pay three drachmas— Phaenippuses, Hipparchidreprobatians, And some with Chares, to Chaonia some, Geretotheodores, Diomirogues, and some To Camarina, Gela, and Grineela.
LAMACHUS The people chose them—
DICAEOPOLIS And how comes it, pray, That you are always in receipt of pay, And these are NEVER? Come, Marilades, You are old and grey; when have you served as envoy? Never! Yet he’s a steady, active man. Well then, Euphorides, Prinides, Dracyllus, Have you Ecbatana or Chaonia seen? Never! But Coesyra’s son and Lamachus, They have; to whom, for debts and calls unpaid,
DICAEOPOLIS Their friends but now, like people throwing out Their slops at eve, were crying “Stand away!”
LAMACHUS O me! Democracy! can this be borne?
DICAEOPOLIS No, not if Lamachus receive no pay.
LAMACHUS But I with all the Peloponnesian folk Will always fight, and vex them everyway, By land, by sea, with all my might and main. [Exit]
DICAEOPOLIS And I to all the Peloponnesian folk, Megarians and Boeotians, give full leave To trade with me; but not to Lamachus. [Exit]
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