ts slily twit each
other." When the cups flowed, and the conversation sparkled, men
indulged in repartee, or capped each other in verses. One man, for
instance, would quote or compose a line beginning and ending with a
certain letter, and another person was called upon for a similar one to
complete the couplet. Sometimes the line commenced with the first
syllable of a word, and ended with the last, and a corresponding conceit
was to be formed to answer it. The successful competitors at these games
were to be kissed and crowned with flowers; the unsuccessful to drink a
bowl of brine. These verbal devices were too simple and far-fetched to
be humorous, but were, to a certain extent, amusing, and no doubt the
forfeits and rewards occasioned some merriment.

A coarser kind of humour originated in the market-place, where professed
wags of a low class were wont to congregate, and amuse themselves by
chaffing and insulting passers-by. Such men are mentioned centuries
afterwards by St. Paul as "lewd fellows of the baser sort,"--an
expression which would be more properly rendered "men of the
market-place." Such centres of trade do not seem to have been improving
to the manners, for we read of people "railing like bread-women," and of
the "rude jests" of the young men of the market.[15] Lysistratus was
one of these fellows in Aristophanes' days, and his condition seems to
have been as miserable as his humour, for his garment had "shed its
leaves,"[16] and he was shivering and starving "more than thirty days in
the month."

By degrees, as wealth increased, there came a greater demand for
amusement. Jesters obtained patrons, and a distinct class of men grew
up, who, having more humour than means were glad to barter their
pleasantries for something more substantial. Wit has as little tendency
to enrich its possessor as genius--the mind being turned to gay and idle
rather than remunerative pursuits, and into a destructive rather than a
constructive channel. Talent does not imply industry, and where the
stock in trade consists of luxuries of small money value, men make but a
precarious livelihood. One of them says that he will give as a fortune
to his daughter "six hundred _bon mots_--all pure Attic," which seems to
suggest that they were to be puns. No doubt it was the demand that led
to the supply, for jesters were in request at convivial meetings, and
the jealousy of their equally poor, but less amusing neighbours, not
improbably