Miles Gloriosus

Plautus, Titus Maccius

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

  1. to a servant SERVANT. Put fire on the altar, that in my joy I may return praises and thanks to Diana of Ephesus, and that I may send up for her a grateful smoke with odours of Arabia: she who has preserved me in the realms of Neptune and amid the boisterous temples[*](Boisterous temples: In the language of the Poets, Neptune and the inferior Sea Divinities are supposed to have their temples and abodes in the sea and rivers.), where with raging billows I have been so recently dismayed.
SCELEDRUS
  1. discovering her. Palaestrio! O Palaestrio!
PALAESTRIO
  1. Sceledrus! O Sceledrus! What is it you want?
SCELEDRUS
  1. This lady that has come out of that house just now—is she Philocomasium, our master’s lady, or is she not?
PALAESTRIO
  1. I’ faith, I think, it seems to be she. But ’tis a wondrous thing how she could pass from our house to next door; if, indeed, it is she.
SCELEDRUS
  1. And have you any doubt that this is she?
PALAESTRIO
  1. It seems to be she.
SCELEDRUS
  1. Let us approach her, and accost her. Hallo! how’s this, Philocomasium? What is there owing to you in that house? What is your business there? Why are you silent now? I am speaking to you.
PALAESTRIO
  1. No, faith, you are talking to yourself; for nothing at all does she answer.
SCELEDRUS
  1. I am addressing you, woman, brimful of viciousness and disgrace, who are roaming about among your neighbours.
PHILOCOMASIUM
  1. To whom are you talking?
SCELEDRUS
  1. To whom but to yourself?
PHILOCOMASIUM
  1. What person are you? Or what business have you with me?
SCELEDRUS
  1. O, you ask me who I am, do you?
PHILOCOMASIUM
  1. Why shouldn’t I ask that which I don’t know?
PALAESTRIO
  1. Who am I, then, if you don’t know him?
PHILOCOMASIUM
  1. You are an annoyance to me, whoever you are, both you and he.
SCELEDRUS
  1. What? don’t you know us?
PHILOCOMASIUM
  1. No, neither of you.