Miles Gloriosus

Plautus, Titus Maccius

Plautus. The Comedies of Plautus, Volume 1. Riley, H. T., translator. London: G. Bell and Sons, Ltd., 1912.

  1. There are not many men, if I were to wish, whom I would rather now see and meet with than yourself.
PALAESTRIO
  1. What’s the matter? What disturbance have you with our family?
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. We are done for.
PALAESTRIO
  1. What’s the matter?
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. The thing’s discovered.
PALAESTRIO
  1. What thing’s discovered?
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. Some one just now of your household was looking in from the tiles through our skylight at Philocomasium and my guest as they were toying together.
PALAESTRIO
  1. What person saw it?
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. Your fellow-servant.
PALAESTRIO
  1. Which person was it?
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. I don’t know; he took himself off so suddenly—in an instant.
PALAESTRIO
  1. I suspect I’m ruined.
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. When he went away, I cried: Hallo! you sir! said I, what are you doing upon the tiles? As he went away he replied to me in these terms, that he was following a stray’d monkey.
PALAESTRIO
  1. Woe to wretched me! that I must be ruined for a worthless beast. But is Philocomasium there with you even still?
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. When I came out, she was there.
PALAESTRIO
  1. If she is, then bid her return to our house as soon as ever she can, that the servants may see that she is at home; unless, indeed, she wishes that we, who are slaves, her fellow- slaves[*](Her fellow-slaves: He seems to use the word contubernales, comrades, or fellow-slaves, as applying to the relation between Philocomasium and the other slaves in the house; since, falling into the hands of the Captain, she had become reduced to the condition of a slave. The cross was the instrument of a punishment among the Romans, which was especially inflicted upon slaves. It was usually in shape like the letter T or X, but there were various other forms of it. The condemned carried his own cross, and, being first stripped, was either nailed or bound to it, and in the latter ase was generally left to die of hunger. It must be remembered that in the time of the Roman Republic the laws did not protect the person or life of the slaves, who were sometimes very barbarously treated.), should all be given up together to tortures by the cross on account of her courting.
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. I bade her do so; unless you would aught else.
PALAESTRIO
  1. I would. Tell her this: that, by my troth, she must not hesitate at all to bring in play her skill and cleverness.
PERIPLECOMENUS
  1. In what way?