BDELYCLEON Get up, get up.
SOSIAS Why, what’s in the wind?
BDELYCLEON Some voice seems circling me round and round.
SOSIAS Is the old man slipping away thro’ a hole?
BDELYCLEON No, by Zeus, but he lets himself down to the ground Tied on to the rope.
SOSIAS You infamous wretch! what, won’t you be quiet and not come down?
BDELYCLEON Climb up by the other window-sill, and wallop him well with the harvest crown. I warrant he’ll speedily back stern first, when he’s thrashed with the branch of autumnal fruits.
PHILOCLEON Help! help! all those whoever propose this year to busy themselves with suits. Smicythion, help! Tisiades, help! Pheredeipnus, Chremon, the fray begin: O now or never assist your friend, before I’m carried away within
CHORUS Wherefore slumbers, wherefore slumbers, that resentment in our breast, Such as when a rash assailant dares provoke our hornets-nest? Now protruding, now protruding, Comes the fierce and dreadful sting, Which we wield for punishing.
CHORUS These be frightful things to see! This is open Tyranny! Rouse the State! Rouse the great God-abhorred—Sneak Theorus! And whoe’er Else is there, Fawning lord Ruling o’er us.
XANTHIAS Heracles! they’ve stings beside them! Master master, don’t you see?
BDELYCLEON Ay, which slew the son of Gorgias, Philip, with their sharp decree.
CHORUS You we’ll also slay directly! Wheel about him, every one, Draw your stings, and, all together, in upon the fellow run. Close your ranks, collect your forces, brimming full of rage and hate, He shall know the sort of wasps-nest he has dared to irritate. Now with such as these to combat is, by Zeus, a serious thing: Verily I quake and tremble, but to look upon their sting.
CHORUS Let him go!—Loose your hold! If you don’t I declare You shall bless Tortoise-backs For the shells Which they wear.
PHILOCLEON On then, on, my fellow-dicasts, brother wasps of heart severe, Some fly in with angry buzzings, and attack them in the rear, Some surround them in a ring, and both their eyes and fingers sting.
BDELYCLEON Ho there! Midas! Phryx! Masyntias! hither! hither! haste to me!
BDELYCLEON Take my father, guard him safely: suffer none to set him free Else you both shall lunch off nothing, clapped in fetters strong and stout. There’s a sound of many fig-leaves (well I know it) buzzed about. This shall stand infixed within you if you will not let him go.
PHILOCLEON Mighty Cecrops! King and hero! Dragon-born and -shaped below, Wilt thou let these rude barbarians vex and maul me at their pleasure, Me who heretofore have made them weep in full imperial measure?
CHORUS Truly, of abundant evils, age is evermore the source: Only see how these two scoundrels hold their ancient lord perforce, Clean forgetting how, aforetime, he their daily wants supplied, Bought them little sleeveless jackets, bought them caps and coats of hide, Clean forgetting all the kindness shown their feet in wintry weather, How from chill and cold he kept them: ah! but these have altogether Banished from their eyes the reverence owing to those dear old brogues.
PHILOCLEON Won’t you even now unhand me, shameless villain, worst of rogues? When the grapes I caught you stealing, O remember, if you can, How I tied you to the olive, and I flogged you like a man,
PHILOCLEON So that all beheld with envy: but a grateful soul you lack! Oh, unhand me, you, and you, at once, before my son come back.
CHORUS But a famous retribution ye for this shall undergo, One that will not lag nor linger; so that ye betimes shall know, Know the mood of angry-tempered, righteous, mustard-glancing men.
BDELYCLEON Beat them, Xanthias, from the door-way; beat the wasps away again.
XANTHIAS That I will, sir.
BDELYCLEON Fume them, Sosias, drive the smoke in dense and thick. Shoo there, shoo! be off, confound you. At them, Xanthias, with the stick! Smoke them, Sosias, smoke, infusing Aeschines, Selartius’ son.
SOSIAS So then we at last were going, as it seems, to make you run.
BDELYCLEON But you never would have managed thus to beat them off with ease, Had it chanced that they had eaten of the songs of Philocles.
CHORUS Creeping o’er us, creeping o’er us, Here at least the poor can see Stealthy-creeping TYRANNY! If you from the laws debar us, which the city has ordained, You, a curly-haired Amynias, you, a rascal double-grained, Not by words of wit persuading, Not for weighty reasons shown,
CHORUS
But because, forsooth, you WILL it, Like an autocrat, alone.
Cite This Text