f Ino.

SLAVE
Catch hold! here they are.

DICAEOPOLIS
Oh! Zeus, whose eye pierces everywhere and embraces all, permit me
to assume the most wretched dress on earth. Euripides, cap your
kindness by giving me the little Mysian hat, that goes so well with
these tatters. I must to-day have the look of a beggar; "be what I am,
but not appear to be";(1) the audience will know well who I am, but
the Chorus will be fools enough not to, and I shall dupe 'em with my
subtle phrases.

f(1)
Line borrowed from Euripides. A great number of verses are similarly
parodied in this scene.

EURIPIDES
I will give you the hat; I love the clever tricks of an ingenious
brain like yours.

DICAEOPOLIS
Rest happy, and may it befall Telephus as I wish. Ah! I already
feel myself filled with quibbles. But I must have a beggar's staff.

EURIPIDES
Here you are, and now get you gone from this porch.

DICAEOPOLIS
Oh, my soul! You see how you are driven from this house, when I
still need so many accessories. But let us be pressing, obstinate,
importunate. Euripides, give me a little basket with a lamp alight inside.

EURIPIDES
Whatever do you want such a thing as that for?

DICAEOPOLIS
I do not need it, but I want it all the same.

EURIPIDES
You importune me; get you gone!

DICAEOPOLIS
Alas! may the gods grant you a destiny as brilliant as your
mother's.(1)

f(1) Report said that Euripides' mother had sold vegetables on the market.

EURIPIDES
Leave me in peace.

DICAEOPOLIS
Oh, just a little broken cup.

EURIPIDES
Take it and go and hang yourself. What a tiresome fellow!

DICAEOPOLIS
Ah! you do not know all the pain you cause me. Dear, good
Euripides, nothing beyond a small pipkin stoppered with a sponge.

EURIPIDES
Miserable man! You are robbing me of an entire tragedy.(1) Here, take it
and be off.

f(1) Aristophanes means, of course, to imply that the whole talent of
Euripides lay in these petty details of stage property.

DICAEOPOLIS
I am going, but, great gods! I need one thing more; unless I
have it, I am a dead man. Hearken, my little Euripides, only give me
this and I go, never to return. For pity's sake, do give me a few
small herbs for my basket.

EURIPIDES
You wish to ruin me then. Here, take what you want; but it is
all over with my pieces!

DICAEOPOLIS
I won't ask another thing; I'm going. I am too importunate and
forget that