difice firmly based [35] on solid ground, fail to discover fair and
fitting places, easy of access for our several goods! Would not that
argue great lack of understanding in our two selves? Well then! how good
a thing it is to have a fixed and orderly arrangement of all furniture
and gear; how easy also in a dwelling-house to find a place for every
sort of goods, in which to stow them as shall suit each best--needs no
further comment. Rather let me harp upon the string of beauty--image a
fair scene: the boots and shoes and sandals, and so forth, all laid in
order row upon row; the cloaks, the mantles, and the rest of the apparel
stowed in their own places; the coverlets and bedding; the copper
cauldrons; and all the articles for table use! Nay, though it well may
raise a smile of ridicule (not on the lips of a grave man perhaps, but
of some facetious witling) to hear me say it, a beauty like the cadence
of sweet music [36] dwells even in pots and pans set out in neat
array: and so, in general, fair things ever show more fair when orderly
bestowed. The separate atoms shape themselves to form a choir, and all
the space between gains beauty by their banishment. Even so some sacred
chorus, [37] dancing a roundelay in honour of Dionysus, not only is
a thing of beauty in itself, but the whole interspace swept clean of
dancers owns a separate charm. [38]

[34] Or, "coffers," "cupboards," "safes."

[35] Cf. "Anab." III. ii. 19, "firmly planted on terra firma."

[36] Or, "like the rhythm of a song," {euruthmon}. See Mr. Ruskin's
most appropriate note ("Bib. Past." i. 59), "A remarkable word, as
significant of the complete rhythm ({ruthmos}) whether of sound or
motion, that was so great a characteristic of the Greek ideal (cf.
xi. 16, {metarruthmizo})," and much more equally to the point.

[37] "Just as a chorus, the while its dancers weave a circling dance."

[38] Or, "contrasting with the movement and the mazes of the dance, a
void appears serene and beautiful."

"The truth of what I say, we easily can test, my wife," I added, "by
direct experiment, and that too without cost at all or even serious
trouble. [39] Nor need you now distress yourself, my wife, to think how
hard it will be to discover some one who has wit enough to learn the
places for the several things and memory to take and place them there.
We know, I fancy, that the goods of various sorts contained in the whole
city far outnumber ou