Saturnalia

Cronus Oh, they are not to be sneezed at; it does not come to so very little, if you make allowance for my general limitations, Perhaps you think it a trifle always to win at dice, and be able to count on the sice when the ace is the best the others can throw? Anyhow, there are plenty who get as much as they can eat just because the die likes them and does what it can for them. Others you may see naked, swimming for their lives; and what was the reef that wrecked them, pray? that little die. Or again, to enjoy your wine, to sing the best song at table, at the slaves’ feast to see the other waiters[*](See Saturnalia in Notes.) ducked for incompetence, while you are acclaimed victor and carry off the sausage prize,—is all that nothing? Or you find yourself absolute monarch by favour of the knucklebone, can have no ridiculous commands! laid on you, and can lay them on the rest: one must shout out a libel on himself, another dance naked, or pick up the flute-girl and carry her thrice round the house; how is that for a sample of my open-handedness? If you complain that the sovereignty is not real nor lasting, that is unreasonable of you; you see that I, the giver of it, have a short-lived tenure myself. Well, anything that is in my power —draughts, monarchy, song, and the rest I have mentioned— you can ask, and welcome; I will not scare you with aegis and thunderbolt.