No More Learning

And hence we have come to you to beg you to direct us to some cosy
town, in which one can repose as if on thick coverlets.

EPOPS. And are you looking for a greater city than Athens?

EUELPIDES. No, not a greater, but one more pleasant to dwell in.

EPOPS. Then you are looking for an aristocratic country.

EUELPIDES. I? Not at all! I hold the son of Scellias in horror. [192]

EPOPS. But, after all, what sort of city would please you best?

EUELPIDES. A place where the following would be the most important
business transacted.
--Some friend would come knocking at the door quite
early in the morning saying, "By Olympian Zeus, be at my house early, as
soon as you have bathed, and bring your children too. I am giving a
nuptial feast, so don't fail, or else don't cross my threshold when I am
in distress. "

EPOPS. Ah! that's what may be called being fond of hardships. And what
say you?

PISTHETAERUS. My tastes are similar.

EPOPS. And they are?

PISTHETAERUS. I want a town where the father of a handsome lad will stop
in the street and say to me reproachfully as if I had failed him, "Ah! Is
this well done, Stilbonides! You met my son coming from the bath after
the gymnasium and you neither spoke to him, nor embraced him, nor took
him with you, nor ever once twitched his testicles. Would anyone call you
an old friend of mine? "

EPOPS.