beggar; so that
though he used to be my friend and close acquaintance, I had two minds
about speaking to him.

"How now, friend Socrates!" said I: "what does this mean? Why are you
tricked out like this? What crime have you been guilty of? Why, you
look as though your family had given you up for dead and held your
funeral long ago, the probate judge had appointed guardians for your
children, and your wife, disfigured by her long mourning, having cried
herself almost blind, was being worried by her parents to sit up and
take notice of things, and look for a new marriage. Yet now, all of a
sudden, here you come before us like a wretched ghost from the dead, to
turn everything upside down.'"

"O Aristomenes!" said he, "it's clear that you don't know the slippery
turns, the freaks, and the never-ending tricks of fortune."

As he said this, he hid his face, crimson with shame, in his one garment
of patches and tatters. I could not bear such a miserable sight, and
tried to raise him from the ground. But he kept saying with his head all
covered up, "Let me alone! let me alone! let Fortune have her way
with me!"

However, I finally persuaded him to go with me; and at the same time
pulling off one of my own garments, I speedily clothed him, or at any
rate covered him. I next took him to a bath, scrubbed and oiled him
myself, and laboriously rubbed the matted dirt off him. Having done all
I could, though tired out myself, I supported his feeble steps, and with
great difficulty brought him to my inn. There I made him lie down on a
bed, gave him plenty of food, braced him up with wine, and entertained
him with the news of the day. Pretty soon our conversation took a merry
turn; we cracked jokes, and grew noisy as we chattered. All of a sudden,
heaving a bitter sigh from the bottom of his chest, and striking his
forehead violently with his right hand, he said:--

"Miserable wretch that I am, to have got into such a predicament while
having a good time at a gladiatorial show! As you know, I went to
Macedonia on business; it took me ten months; I was on my way home with
a very neat sum of money, and had nearly reached Larissa, which I
included in my route in order to see the show I mentioned, when I was
attacked by robbers in a lonely valley, and only escaped after losing
everything I had. In my distress I betook myself to a certain woman
named Meroe, who kept a tavern (and who, though rather old, was very
good-looking), and to