."

[9] Cf. Aristoph. "Ach." 1029.

[10] {andreikelon}. Cf. Plat. "Rep." 501 B, "the human complexion";
"Crat." 424 E.

"Frankly," she answered, "it would not please me better to touch paste
than your true self. Rather would I see your own 'true flesh colour'
than any pigment of that name; would liefer look into your eyes and see
them radiant with health than washed with any wash, or dyed with any
ointment there may be."

"Believe the same, my wife, of me then," Ischomachus continued (so he
told me); "believe that I too am not better pleased with white enamel
or with alkanet than with your own natural hue; but as the gods have
fashioned horses to delight in horses, cattle in cattle, sheep in their
fellow sheep, so to human beings the human body pure and undefiled is
sweetest; [11] and as to these deceits, though they may serve to cheat
the outside world without detection, yet if intimates try to deceive
each other, they must one day be caught; in rising from their beds,
before they make their toilet; by a drop of sweat they stand convicted;
tears are an ordeal they cannot pass; the bath reveals them as they
truly are."

[11] See "Mem." II. i. 22.

What answer (said I) did she make, in Heaven's name, to what you said?

What, indeed (replied the husband), save only, that thenceforward she
never once indulged in any practice of the sort, but has striven
to display the natural beauty of her person in its purity. She did,
however, put to me a question: Could I advise her how she might become
not in false show but really fair to look upon?

This, then, was the counsel which I gave her, Socrates: Not to be for
ever seated like a slave; [12] but, with Heaven's help, to assume the
attitude of a true mistress standing before the loom, and where her
knowledge gave her the superiority, bravely to give the aid of her
instruction; where her knowledge failed, as bravely try to learn. I
counselled her to oversee the baking woman as she made the bread; to
stand beside the housekeeper as she measured out her stores; to go tours
of inspection to see if all things were in order as they should be.
For, as it seemed to me, this would at once be walking exercise and
supervision. And, as an excellent gymnastic, I recommended her to knead
the dough and roll the paste; to shake the coverlets and make the beds;
adding, if she trained herself in exercise of this sort she would enjoy
her food, grow vigorous in health, and her compl