What country gave
birth to such an audacious woman?
birth to such an audacious woman?
Aristophanes
And when we eat
garlic early in the morning after a night of wantonness, so that our
husband, who has been keeping guard upon the city wall, may be reassured
by the smell and suspect nothing,[590] has Euripides ever breathed a word
of this? Tell me. Neither has he spoken of the woman who spreads open a
large cloak before her husband's eyes to make him admire it in full
daylight to conceal her lover by so doing and afford him the means of
making his escape. I know another, who for ten whole days pretended to be
suffering the pains of labour until she had secured a child; the husband
hurried in all directions to buy drugs to hasten her deliverance, and
meanwhile an old woman brought the infant in a stew-pot; to prevent its
crying she had stopped up its mouth with honey. With a sign she told the
wife that she was bringing a child for her, who at once began exclaiming,
"Go away, friend, go away, I think I am going to be delivered; I can feel
him kicking his heels in the belly . . . of the stew-pot. "[591] The husband
goes off full of joy, and the old wretch quickly picks the honey out of
the child's mouth, which sets a-crying; then she seizes the babe, runs to
the father and tells him with a smile on her face, "'Tis a lion, a lion,
that is born to you; 'tis your very image. Everything about it is like
you, even to its little tool, which is all twisty like a fir-cone. " Are
these not our everyday tricks? Why certainly, by Artemis, and we are
angry with Euripides, who assuredly treats us no worse than we deserve!
CHORUS. Great gods! where has she unearthed all that?
What country gave
birth to such an audacious woman? Oh! you wretch! I should not have
thought ever a one of us could have spoken in public with such impudence.
'Tis clear, however, that we must expect everything and, as the old
proverb says, must look beneath every stone, lest it conceal some
orator[592] ready to sting us. There is but one thing in the world worse
than a shameless woman, and that's another woman.
THIRD WOMAN. By Aglaurus! [593] you have lost your wits, friends! You must
be bewitched to suffer this plague to belch forth insults against us all.
Is there no one has any spirit at all? If not, we and our maid-servants
will punish her. Run and fetch coals and let's depilate her cunt in
proper style, to teach her not to speak ill of her sex.
MNESILOCHUS. Oh! no!
garlic early in the morning after a night of wantonness, so that our
husband, who has been keeping guard upon the city wall, may be reassured
by the smell and suspect nothing,[590] has Euripides ever breathed a word
of this? Tell me. Neither has he spoken of the woman who spreads open a
large cloak before her husband's eyes to make him admire it in full
daylight to conceal her lover by so doing and afford him the means of
making his escape. I know another, who for ten whole days pretended to be
suffering the pains of labour until she had secured a child; the husband
hurried in all directions to buy drugs to hasten her deliverance, and
meanwhile an old woman brought the infant in a stew-pot; to prevent its
crying she had stopped up its mouth with honey. With a sign she told the
wife that she was bringing a child for her, who at once began exclaiming,
"Go away, friend, go away, I think I am going to be delivered; I can feel
him kicking his heels in the belly . . . of the stew-pot. "[591] The husband
goes off full of joy, and the old wretch quickly picks the honey out of
the child's mouth, which sets a-crying; then she seizes the babe, runs to
the father and tells him with a smile on her face, "'Tis a lion, a lion,
that is born to you; 'tis your very image. Everything about it is like
you, even to its little tool, which is all twisty like a fir-cone. " Are
these not our everyday tricks? Why certainly, by Artemis, and we are
angry with Euripides, who assuredly treats us no worse than we deserve!
CHORUS. Great gods! where has she unearthed all that?
What country gave
birth to such an audacious woman? Oh! you wretch! I should not have
thought ever a one of us could have spoken in public with such impudence.
'Tis clear, however, that we must expect everything and, as the old
proverb says, must look beneath every stone, lest it conceal some
orator[592] ready to sting us. There is but one thing in the world worse
than a shameless woman, and that's another woman.
THIRD WOMAN. By Aglaurus! [593] you have lost your wits, friends! You must
be bewitched to suffer this plague to belch forth insults against us all.
Is there no one has any spirit at all? If not, we and our maid-servants
will punish her. Run and fetch coals and let's depilate her cunt in
proper style, to teach her not to speak ill of her sex.
MNESILOCHUS. Oh! no!
