No More Learning

[226] As already shown, the Athenians were addicted to carrying small
coins in their mouths. --This obolus was for the purpose of buying flour
to fill the bag he was carrying.

[227] In Phoenicia and Egypt the cuckoo makes its appearance about
harvest-time.

[228] This was an Egyptian proverb, meaning, _When the cuckoo sings we go
harvesting_. Both the Phoenicians and the Egyptians practised
circumcision.

[229] The staff, called a sceptre, generally terminated in a piece of
carved work, representing a flower, a fruit, and most often a bird.

[230] A general accused of treachery. The bird watches Lysicrates,
because, according to Pisthetaerus, he had a right to a share of the
presents.

[231] It is thus that Phidias represents his Olympian Zeus.

[232] One of the diviners sent to Sybaris (in Magna Graecia, S. Italy)
with the Athenian colonists, who rebuilt the town under the new name of
Thurium.

[233] As if he were saying, "Oh, gods! " Like Lampon, he swears by the
birds, instead of swearing by the gods. --The names of these birds are
those of two of the Titans.

[234] Alcmena, wife of Amphitryon, King of Thebes and mother of
Heracles.
--Semele, the daughter of Cadmus and Hermione and mother of
Bacchus; both seduced by Zeus. --Alope, daughter of Cercyon, a robber, who
reigned at Eleusis and was conquered by Perseus. Alope was honoured with
Posidon's caresses; by him she had a son named Hippothous, at first
brought up by shepherds but who afterwards was restored to the throne of
his grandfather by Theseus.

[235] Because the bald patch on the coot's head resembles the shaven and
depilated 'motte. '

[236] Because water is the duck's domain, as it is that of Posidon.

[237] Because the gull, like Heracles, is voracious.

[238] The Germans still call it _Zaunkonig_ and the French _roitelet_,
both names thus containing the idea of _king_.

[239] The Scholiast draws our attention to the fact that Homer says this
of Here and not of Iris (Iliad, V. 778); it is only another proof that
the text of Homer has reached us in a corrupted form, or it may be that
Aristophanes was liable, like other people, to occasional mistakes of
quotation.

[240] In sacrifices.

[241] An Athenian proverb.

[242] A celebrated temple to Zeus in an oasis of Libya.

[243] Nicias was commander, along with Demosthenes, and later on
Alcibiades, of the Athenian forces before Syracuse, in the ill-fated
Sicilian Expedition, 415-413 B. C. He was much blamed for dilatoriness and
indecision.

[244] Servants of Pisthetaerus and Euelpides.