Listen, Clotho, to something that I have to say to you in private, with nobody else listening. (Yo the others.) You people stand aside a moment. (Yo ctoruo) If you let me run away, I promise to give you a thousand talents of coined gold to-day.
What, you ridiculous creature, have you gold and talents still on the brain ?
And I'll give you also, if you wish, the two winebowls that I got when I put Cleocritus to death ;
they are of refined gold and weigh a hundred talents
each.
I call you all to witness, the town wall and the docks remain unfinished. I could have finished them if I had lived only five days longer.
Never mind ; someone else will build the wall.
But this request at all events is reasonable.
What request ?
To live only long enough to subdue the Pisidians and subject the Lydians to tribute, and to build myself a huge mausoleum and inscribe on it all the great military exploits of my life.
Why, man, you are no longer asking for this one day, but for a stay of nearly twenty years !
But I tell you I am ready to give bail for my speedy return. If you wish, I’ll even surrender you my beloved as a substitute for myself.
Vile wretch! Have not you often prayed that he night outlast you on earth?
That was long ago, but now I perceive whawi is for
the best.
Well, at all events don't refuse me this, Lady of Destiny. ,
What ?
I want to know how things will turn out after my death.
Listen, for it will vex you all the more to know. Midas, your slave, will have your wife ; indeed, he has been her lover a long time.
Curse him, I set him free at her request !
Your daughter will be enrolled among the concubines of the present tyrant, and the busts and statues which the city long ago set up in your honour will all be pulled down and will make everyone who looks at them laugh.
Tell meé, will none of my friends get angry at these doings ?
Why, what friend did you have, and how did you
make him? Don’t you know that all those who
bowed the knee and praised your every word and
deed did so either from hope or from fear, being
But as they poured their libations at our drinking parties they used to pray at the top of their voices that many blessings might descend upon me, saying every one of them that he was ready to die for me if so might be ; in a word, they swore by me.
Consequently, you died after dining with one of them yesterday : it was that last drink he gave you that sent you down here.
Then that is why I noticed a bitter taste. But what was his object in doing it?
You are asking me many questions when you ought to get aboard.
There is one thing that sticks in my throat above all, Clotho, and on account of it I longed to slip back again to the light of day, if only for a moment.
What is that? It must be something tremendous.
As soon as Cario, my valet, saw that I was dead,
toward evening he came into the room where I lay,
having nothing to do, for nobody was doing anything,
not even guarding me, and brought in my mistress
Glycerium; they had been on good terms a long time,