No More Learning

I am not astonished at your introducing
cripples on the stage. [208] And why dress in these miserable tragic rags?
I do not wonder that your heroes are beggars. But, Euripides, on my knees
I beseech you, give me the tatters of some old piece: for I have to treat
the Chorus to a long speech, and if I do it ill it is all over with me.

EURIPIDES. What rags do you prefer? Those in which I rigged out
Aeneus[209] on the stage, that unhappy, miserable old man?

DICAEOPOLIS. No, I want those of some hero still more unfortunate.

EURIPIDES. Of Phoenix, the blind man?

DICAEOPOLIS. No, not of Phoenix, you have another hero more unfortunate
than him.

EURIPIDES. Now, what tatters _does_ he want?
Do you mean those of the
beggar Philoctetes?

DICAEOPOLIS. No, of another far more the mendicant.

EURIPIDES. Is it the filthy dress of the lame fellow, Bellerophon?

DICAEOPOLIS. No, 'tis not Bellerophon; he, whom I mean, was not only lame
and a beggar, but boastful and a fine speaker.

EURIPIDES. Ah! I know, it is Telephus, the Mysian.

DICAEOPOLIS. Yes, Telephus. Give me his rags, I beg of you.

EURIPIDES. Slave! give him Telephus' tatters; they are on top of the rags
of Thyestes and mixed with those of Ino.