stopped-up nose, for there is no work more disgusting than to mix food
for a beetle and to carry it to him. A pig or a dog will at least pounce
upon our excrement without more ado, but this foul wretch affects the
disdainful, the spoilt mistress, and won't eat unless I offer him a cake
that has been kneaded for an entire day.... But let us open the door
a bit ajar without his seeing it. Has he done eating? Come, pluck up
courage, cram yourself till you burst! The cursed creature! It wallows
in its food! It grips it between its claws like a wrestler clutching
his opponent, and with head and feet together rolls up its paste like
a rope-maker twisting a hawser. What an indecent, stinking, gluttonous
beast! I know not what angry god let this monster loose upon us, but of
a certainty it was neither Aphrodite nor the Graces.

FIRST SERVANT Who was it then?

SECOND SERVANT No doubt the Thunderer, Zeus.

FIRST SERVANT But perhaps some spectator, some beardless youth, who
thinks himself a sage, will say, "What is this? What does the beetle
mean?" And then an Ionian,(1) sitting next him, will add, "I think
'tis an allusion to Cleon, who so shamelessly feeds on filth all by
himself."--But now I'm going indoors to fetch the beetle a drink.

f(1) 'Peace' was no doubt produced at the festival of the
Apaturia, which was kept at the end of October, a period
when strangers were numerous in Athens.

SECOND SERVANT As for me, I will explain the matter to you all,
children, youths, grownups and old men, aye, even to the decrepit
dotards. My master is mad, not as you are, but with another sort of
madness, quite a new kind. The livelong day he looks open-mouthed
towards heaven and never stops addressing Zeus. "Ah! Zeus," he cries,
"what are thy intentions? Lay aside thy besom; do not sweep Greece
away!"

TRYGAEUS Ah! ah! ah!

SECOND SERVANT Hush, hush! Mehinks I hear his voice!

TRYGAEUS Oh! Zeus, what art thou going to do for our people? Dost thou
not see this, that our cities will soon be but empty husks?

SECOND SERVANT As I told you, that is his form of madness. There you
have a sample of his follies. When his trouble first began to seize him,
he said to himself, "By what means could I go straight to Zeus?" Then
he made himself very slender little ladders and so clambered up towards
heaven; but he soon came hurtling down again and broke his head.
Yesterday, to our misfortune, he went out and brought us back this