Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches Volume I Part 6

ALCIBIADES. My life, my sweet soul, it is but for a short time. In a year we conquer Sicily. In another, we humble Carthage. (See Thucydides, vi. 90.) I will bring back such robes, such necklaces, elephants' teeth by thousands, ay, and the elephants themselves, if you wish to see them.

Nay, smile, my Chariclea, or I shall talk nonsense to no purpose.

HIPPOMACHUS. The largest elephant that I ever saw was in the grounds of Teribazus, near Susa. I wish that I had measured him.

ALCIBIADES. I wish that he had trod upon you. Come, come, Chariclea, we shall soon return, and then--

CHARICLEA. Yes; then indeed.

ALCIBIADES.

Yes, then-- Then for revels; then for dances, Tender whispers, melting glances.

Peasants, pluck your richest fruits: Minstrels, sound your sweetest flutes: Come in laughing crowds to greet us, Dark-eyed daughters of Miletus; Bring the myrtles, bring the dice, Floods of Chian, hills of spice.

SPEUSIPPUS. Whose lines are those, Alcibiades?

ALCIBIADES. My own. Think you, because I do not shut myself up to meditate, and drink water, and eat herbs, that I cannot write verses?

By Apollo, if I did not spend my days in politics, and my nights in revelry, I should have made Sophocles tremble. But now I never go beyond a little song like this, and never invoke any Muse but Chariclea. But come, Speusippus, sing. You are a professed poet. Let us have some of your verses.

SPEUSIPPUS. My verses! How can you talk so? I a professed poet!

ALCIBIADES. Oh, content you, sweet Speusippus. We all know your designs upon the tragic honours. Come, sing. A chorus of your new play.

SPEUSIPPUS. Nay, nay--

HIPPOMACHUS. When a guest who is asked to sing at a Persian banquet refuses--

SPEUSIPPUS. In the name of Bacchus--

ALCIBIADES. I am absolute. Sing.

SPEUSIPPUS. Well, then, I will sing you a chorus, which, I think, is a tolerable imitation of Euripides.

CHARICLEA. Of Euripides?--Not a word.

ALCIBIADES. Why so, sweet Chariclea?

CHARICLEA. Would you have me betray my s.e.x? Would you have me forget his Phaedras and Sthen.o.boeas? No if I ever suffer any lines of that woman-hater, or his imitators, to be sung in my presence, may I sell herbs (The mother of Euripides was a herb-woman. This was a favourite topic of Aristophanes.) like his mother, and wear rags like his Telephus. (The hero of one of the lost plays of Euripides, who appears to have been brought upon the stage in the garb of a beggar. See Aristophanes; Acharn. 430; and in other places.)

ALCIBIADES. Then, sweet Chariclea, since you have silenced Speusippus, you shall sing yourself.

CHARICLEA. What shall I sing?

ALCIBIADES. Nay, choose for yourself.

CHARICLEA. Then I will sing an old Ionian hymn, which is chanted every spring at the feast of Venus, near Miletus. I used to sing it in my own country when I was a child; and--ah, Alcibiades!

ALCIBIADES. Dear Chariclea, you shall sing something else. This distresses you.

CHARICLEA. No hand me the lyre:--no matter. You will hear the song to disadvantage. But if it were sung as I have heard it sung:--if this were a beautiful morning in spring, and if we were standing on a woody promontory, with the sea, and the white sails, and the blue Cyclades beneath us,--and the portico of a temple peeping through the trees on a huge peak above our heads,--and thousands of people, with myrtles in their hands, thronging up the winding path, their gay dresses and garlands disappearing and emerging by turns as they pa.s.sed round the angles of the rock,--then perhaps--

ALCIBIADES. Now, by Venus herself, sweet lady, where you are we shall lack neither sun, nor flowers, nor spring, nor temple, nor G.o.ddess.

CHARICLEA. (Sings.)

Let this sunny hour be given, Venus, unto love and mirth: Smiles like thine are in the heaven; Bloom like thine is on the earth; And the tinkling of the fountains, And the murmurs of the sea, And the echoes from the mountains, Speak of youth, and hope, and thee.

By whate'er of soft expression Thou hast taught to lovers' eyes, Faint denial, slow confession, Glowing cheeks and stifled sighs; By the pleasure and the pain, By the follies and the wiles, Pouting fondness, sweet disdain, Happy tears and mournful smiles;

Come with music floating o'er thee; Come with violets springing round: Let the Graces dance before thee, All their golden zones unbound; Now in sport their faces hiding, Now, with slender fingers fair, From their laughing eyes dividing The long curls of rose-crowned hair.

ALCIBIADES. Sweetly sung; but mournfully, Chariclea; for which I would chide you, but that I am sad myself. More wine there. I wish to all the G.o.ds that I had fairly sailed from Athens.

CHARICLEA. And from me, Alcibiades?

ALCIBIADES. Yes, from you, dear lady. The days which immediately precede separation are the most melancholy of our lives.

CHARICLEA. Except those which immediately follow it.

ALCIBIADES. No; when I cease to see you, other objects may compel my attention; but can I be near you without thinking how lovely you are, and how soon I must leave you?

HIPPOMACHUS. Ay; travelling soon puts such thoughts out of men's heads.

CALLICLES. A battle is the best remedy for them.

CHARICLEA. A battle, I should think, might supply their place with others as unpleasant.

CALLICLES. No. The preparations are rather disagreeable to a novice.

But as soon as the fighting begins, by Jupiter, it is a n.o.ble time;--men trampling,--shields clashing,--spears breaking,--and the poean roaring louder than all.

CHARICLEA. But what if you are killed?

CALLICLES. What indeed? You must ask Speusippus that question. He is a philosopher.

ALCIBIADES. Yes, and the greatest of philosophers, if he can answer it.

SPEUSIPPUS. Pythagoras is of opinion--

HIPPOMACHUS. Pythagoras stole that and all his other opinions from Asia and Egypt. The transmigration of the soul and the vegetable diet are derived from India. I met a Brachman in Sogdiana--

CALLICLES. All nonsense!

CHARICLEA. What think you, Alcibiades?

ALCIBIADES. I think that, if the doctrine be true, your spirit will be transfused into one of the doves who carry (Homer's Odyssey, xii.

63.) ambrosia to the G.o.ds or verses to the mistresses of poets. Do you remember Anacreon's lines? How should you like such an office?

CHARICLEA. If I were to be your dove, Alcibiades, and you would treat me as Anacreon treated his, and let me nestle in your breast and drink from your cup, I would submit even to carry your love-letters to other ladies.