Deipnosophistae
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Original / primary: Perseus Eng2
7.3
He lay within the cave stretch'd o'er the sheep (διὰ μήλων);
7.5
A chorus too of voiceless fish rush'd on,
7.5
Making a noise with their quick moving tails.
7.5
There was a mighty mass of the sea-born herd—
7.5
A spectacle which fill'd the wat'ry waste,
7.5
Breaking the silence with their rapid tails;)
7.5
Whoever buys some ὄψον for his supper,
7.5
And, when he might get real genuine fish,
7.5
Contents himself with radishes, is mad.
7.5
He gave him to the ἐλλοὶ ἰχθύες to eat;
7.5
In it did swim the gold-faced ἐλλοὶ ἰχθύες,
7.5
And sported in the sea's ambrosial depths.
7.6
But when you were eating the fat amiæ.
7.6
A. In the morning early, at the break of day,
7.6
We roasted plump anchovies,
7.6
Cutlets of well-fed pork, and polypi;
7.6
And then we drank sweet wine.
7.6
B. Alack! alack! my silly wife detain'd me,
7.6
Chattering near the monument.
7.6
A. I'm sorry for you. Then, too, there were mullets
7.6
And large plump amiæ—
7.6
A noble pair i' the middle of the table,
7.6
And eke a pair of pigeons,
7.6
A scorpion and a lobster.
7.7
But towards the end of autumn, when the Pleiad
7.7
Has hidden its light, then dress the amiæ
7.7
Whatever way you please. Why need I teach you?
7.7
For then you cannot spoil it, if you wish.
7.7
But if you should desire, Moschus my friend,
7.7
To know by what recipe you best may dress it;
7.7
Take the green leaves of fig-trees, and some marjoram,
7.7
But not too much; no cheese or other nonsense,
7.7
But merely wrap it up in the fig leaves,
7.7
And tie it round with a small piece of string,
7.7
Then bury it beneath the glowing ashes,
7.7
Judging by instinct of the time it takes
7.7
To be completely done without being burnt.
7.7
And if you wish to have the best o' their kind,
7.7
Take care to get them from Byzantium;
7.7
Or if they come from any sea near that
7.7
They'll not be bad: but if you go down lower,
7.7
And pass the straits into the Aegæan sea,
7.7
They're quite a different thing, in flavour worse
7.7
As well as size, and merit far less praise.
7.8
A horse from Thessaly, a wife from Sparta,
7.8
And men who drink at Arethusa's fount.
7.9
A. You've taken this my son, and ruin'd him,
7.9
You scoundrel; you've persuaded him to choose
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A mode of life quite foreign to his nature
7.9
And disposition; taught by your example,
7.9
He drinks i' the morning, which he ne'er was used to do.
7.9
B. Do you blame me, master, that your son
7.9
Has learnt to live?
7.9
A. But do you call that living?
7.9
B. Wise men do call it so. And Epicurus
7.9
Tells us that pleasure is the only good.
7.9
A. Indeed; I never heard that rule before.
7.9
Does pleasure come then from no other source?
7.9
Is not a virtuous life a pleasure now?
7.9
Will you not grant me that?—Tell me, I pray you,
7.9
Did you e'er see a grave philosopher
7.9
Drunk, or devoted to these joys you speak of?
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B. Yes; all of them.-All those who raise their brows,
7.9
Who walk about the streets for wise men seeking,
7.9
As if they had escaped their eyes and hid:
7.9
Still when a turbot once is set before them,
7.9
Know how to help themselves the daintiest bits.
7.9
They seek the head and most substantial parts,
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As if they were an argument dissecting,
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So that men marvel at their nicety.
7.9
The man who has a chance to pay his court
7.9
To a fair woman, and at eve to drink
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Two bottles full of richest Lesbian wine,
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Must be a wise man; these are real goods.
7.9
These things I speak of are what Epicurus
7.9
Tells us are real joys; and if the world
7.9
All lived the happy life I live myself,
7.9
There would not be one wicked man on earth.
7.9
That wisest Epicurus, when a man
7.9
Once ask'd him what was the most perfect good
7.9
Which men should constantly be seeking for,
7.9
Said pleasure is that good. Wisest and best
7.9
Of mortal men, full truly didst thou speak:
7.9
For there is nothing better than a dinner,
7.9
And every good consists in every pleasure.
7.11
Seeking at all times to indulge his stomach,
7.11
Than which there's no more greedy thing on earth.
7.12
For when a man contemns and ceases thus
7.12
To seek for pleasure, I do not esteem
7.12
That such an one doth live; I only deem him
7.12
A breathing corpse:—he may, indeed, perhaps
7.12
Have store of wealth within his joyless house;
7.12
He may keep up a kingly pomp and state;
7.12
But if these things be not with joy attended,
7.12
They are mere smoke and shadow, and contribute,
7.12
No, not one jot, to make life enviable.
7.12
For what, I pray you, should a mortal do,
7.12
But seek for all appliances and means.
7.12
To make his life from day to day pass happily?
7.12
This should be all our object and our aim,
7.12
Reflecting on the chance of human life.
7.12
And never let us think about to-morrow,
7.12
Whether it will arrive at all or not.
7.12
It is a foolish trouble to lay up
7.12
Money which may become stale and useless.
7.12
But every man who lives but sparingly,
7.12
Having sufficient means, I call and think
7.12
Of all men the most truly miserable.
7.12
For when you're dead, you cannot then eat eels;
7.12
No wedding feasts are cook'd in Pluto's realms.
7.13
O men, whoe'er you are, why do you now
7.13
Scorn pleasant living, and turn all your thoughts
7.13
To do each other mischief in fierce war?
7.13
In God's name, tell me, does some odious fate,
7.13
Rude and unlettered, destitute of all
7.13
That can be knowledge call'd, or education,
7.13
Ignorant of what is bad and what is good,
7.13
Guide all your destiny?—a fate which settles
7.13
All your affairs at random by mere chance?
7.13
I think it must be so: for else, what deity
7.13
Who bears a Grecian heart, would ever choose
7.13
To see Greeks by each other thus despoil'd,
7.13
And falling dead in ghastly heaps of corpses,
7.13
When she might see them sportive, gay, and jesting,
7.13
Drinking full cups, and singing to the flute?
7.13
Tell me, my friend, I pray, and put to shame
7.13
This most unpolish'd clownish fortune.
7.13
Does not a life like this deserve the name
7.13
Of godlike?—Think how far more pleasant all
7.13
Affairs would be in all the towns of Greece
7.13
Than now they are, if we were but to change
7.13
Our fashions, and our habits, and our principles
7.13
One little bit. Why should we not proclaim,
7.13
"Whoe'er is more than thirty years of age,
7.13
Let him come forth and drink. Let all the cavalry
7.13
Go to a feast at Corinth, for ten days,
7.13
Crown'd with chaplets, and perfumed most sweetly.
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Let all who radishes have got to sell
7.13
Come in the morning here from Megara.
7.13
Bid all th' allies now hasten to the bath,
7.13
And mix in cups the rich Eubœan wine? "—
7.13
Sure this is real luxury and life,
7.13
But we are slaves to a most clownish fortune.
7.14
When it is time to set (δύνειν), he now begins
7.14
To sit at table (ἡδύνεσθαι). But there is a time
7.14
To love, a time to wed, a time to cease.
7.15
The fish that lives in seaweed, the alphestes,
7.15
The scorpion also with its rosy meat.
7.15
Mussels, alphetæ, and the girl-like fish,
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The dainty coracinus.
7.16
The sword-fish and the chromius too,
7.16
Who, as Ananius tells us,
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Is far the best of all in spring;
7.16
But th' anthias in the winter.
7.16
For spring the chromius is best;
7.16
The anthias in winter:
7.16
But of all fish the daintiest
7.16
Is a young shrimp in fig leaves.
7.16
In autumn there's a dainty dish,
7.16
The meat of the she-goat;
7.16
And when they pick and press the grapes,
7.16
Young pigs are dainty eating.
7.16
Then, too, young puppies you may eat,
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And hares, and also foxes.
7.16
But when the grasshopper does sing,
7.16
Just at the height of summer,
7.16
Is the best time for mutton fat;
7.16
Then, too, the sea-born tunny
7.16
Will many a savoury dish afford,
7.16
And beats his compeers all
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With garlic seasoning richly drest;
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Then, too, the fatted ox
7.16
Is sweet to eat both late at night,
7.16
And at a noon-day feast.
7.17
And then the high-priced ellops.
7.17
He was the fish of which great Jupiter
7.17
Once bought a pair for money, and enjoin'd
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His slaves to give him one, and Juno t'other.
7.18
The pompilus, who points the safest road
7.18
To anxious mariners who burn with love,
7.18
And without speaking warns them against danger.
7.18
Still did the pompilus direct the helm,
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Swimming behind, and guide it down the gulf,
7.18
The minister of the gods, the sacred pompilus.
7.18
The pompilus, whom all sea-faring men
7.18
Do call the sacred fish;
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The tench o' the sea, and then the pompili,
7.18
The holiest of fish.
7.18
O pompilus, thou fish who dost bestow
7.18
A prosp'rous voyage on the hardy sailor,
7.18
Conduct (πομπεύσαις) my dear companion safely home.
7.19
And join'd to him, the fairest of the nymphs,
7.19
The young and noble Chesias, bore a daughter,
7.19
The lovely maid Ocyrhoe—her whose beauty
7.19
Was the kind Hours' heaven-descended gift.
7.19
O Pompilus, to whose wise breast are known
7.19
The rapid depths of the hoarse roaring sea,
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Show that your mind doth recollect my sire,
7.19
Who was your friend, and save his daughter now.
7.19
The Pompilus an everlasting slave
7.19
Of ships that swiftly pass along the sea.
7.20
And if a mortal seeks the gods with prayer
7.20
For a successful hunt, or plenteous gold,
7.20
A man who lives by the sea, whose nets he makes
7.20
His ploughs to raise his crops; then let him come,
7.20
And just at nightfall sacrifice with prayer
7.20
To this same goddess the most sacred fish,
7.20
Which men call leucus, (loveliest he of fish,)
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Then let him bend his nets; and soon he shall
7.20
Draw them back from the waters full of prey.
7.20
Sitting upon a high projecting rock
7.20
He caught the sacred fish.
7.20
Or shall I rather say the gold-brow'd fish,
7.20
That sacred fish, or perch, or all the rest
7.20
Which swim beneath the vast unfathom'd sea.
7.20
The sacred sacred hyca.
7.20
The sacred might of Alcinous.
7.21
They left a share of all their booty there;
7.21
Still living centipedes, the bearded mullet,
7.21
The sea-thrush, with dark spots embroider'd o'er,
7.21
Or the swift sacred fish with golden brows.
7.21
Those which do come from the Bosphoric seas
7.21
Are whitest; only let there be no sample
7.21
Of the hard meat o' the fish which grow around
7.21
The Lake Mæotis; not in verse can I
7.21
That fish correctly name.
7.22
Use all anchovies for manure, except
7.22
The Attic fish; I mean that useful seed
7.22
Which the Ionians do call the foam;
7.22
And take it fresh; just caught within the bays,
7.22
The sacred bays of beautiful Phalerum.
7.22
Good is it too, when by the sea-girt isle
7.22
Of Rhodes you eat it, if it's not imported.
7.22
And if you wish to taste it in perfection,
7.22
Boil nettles with it—nettles whose green leaves
7.22
On both sides crown the stem; put these in the dish
7.22
Around the fish, then fry them in one pan,
7.22
And mix in fragrant herbs well steep'd in oil.
7.23
You seem not now to move even an anchovy.
7.23
In preference to the best anchovy.
7.23
So that there is not really one anchovy.
7.23
Nor these little Phaleric ἀφύδια.
7.24
Are you at Rhodes? e'en if about to die,
7.24
Still, if a man would sell you a fox shark,
7.24
The fish the Syracusans call the dog,
7.24
Seize on it eagerly; at least, if fat:
7.24
And then compose yourself to meet your fate
7.24
With brow serene and mind well satisfied.
7.25
A harp-fish roast, besides a ray,
7.25
The head too of a tunny,
7.25
And eel, some crabs, and this acharnus,
7.25
The great Aenean dainty.
7.26
At Callias's house there is much pleasure,
7.26
For he has crabs for dinner, rays besides,
7.26
And hares, and women with light twinkling feet.
7.26
And there were rays and sea-frogs, sawfish, sharks,
7.26
Camitæ, roach, and lobsters with hard shells.
7.26
Its sides were like a ray,
7.26
Its back was altogether like a roach,
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Its head was long, far more like a stag's,
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Its flanks were like a scorpion's, son of the sea.
7.26
O rays, O dainty grayling.
7.26
Whenever you behold a frog, why roast him
7.26
* * * *
7.26
And . . . . prepare his stomach.
7.26
A boiled ray is good about midwinter.
7.26
Eat it with cheese and assafœtida;
7.26
But all the sons o' the sea whose flesh is lean
7.26
Should, as a rule, be dress'd in such a fashion;
7.26
And thus I recommend you now again.
7.26
A. Shall I first cut a ray in slender slices
7.26
And boil it? aye? or like the cooks in Sicily
7.26
Shall I prefer to roast it?
7.26
B. Copy Sicily.
7.27
And in addition to all these the boax,
7.27
The smarides, anchovies, crabs and lobsters.
7.27
The white synodons, the boeces, and trinchi.
7.27
But having had a bellyful of boaces,
7.27
I turn'd my steps towards home.
7.28
O golden-headed membrades, sons of the sea.
7.28
Bambradones and sea-thrushes, and hares,
7.28
And furious dragons.
7.28
Or a small sprat, or it may be a bembras,
7.28
Kept in a well; you recollect these baits.
7.28
The carcinobates of Sicily
7.28
Resembles the bembraphya.
7.28
Bringing some bembrades purchased for an obol.
7.28
The large anchovy plainly is not now,
7.28
Nor e'en the bembras, quite unfortunate.
7.28
Fed on the hoary bembrades.
7.28
O Hercules, do just survey these bembrades.
7.28
They do proclaim within the fishmarket
7.28
The most absurd of proclamations,
7.28
For just now one did shout with all his voice'
7.28
That he had got some bembrades sweet as honey;
7.28
But if this be the case, then what should hinder
7.28
The honey-sellers crying out and saying,
7.28
That they have honey stinking like a bembras?
7.28
Who to the young folks making merry, then
7.28
Put forth but lately pulse and membrades,
7.28
And well-press'd grapes to eat.
7.28
No poorer meal, by Bacchus now I swear,
7.28
Have I e'er tasted since I first became
7.28
A parasite; I'd rather sup on membrades
7.28
With any one who could speak Attic Greek;
7.28
It would be better for me.
7.29
Come now and bring me high-backed mullets,
7.29
And the ungrateful baiones.
7.30
Then we may take a turbot plump, or e'en
7.30
A rough buglossus in the summer time,
7.30
If one is near the famous Chalcis.
7.30
There were buglossi and the harp-fish there.
7.30
There were the variegated plotides,
7.30
And cynoglossi, and sciathides.
7.32
How great a wish has now come over me
7.32
To tell to heaven and earth the way in which
7.32
I did prepare that supper. Aye, by Pallas,
7.32
How sweet it is when everything goes right!
7.32
How tender was my fish! and how I dress'd it!
7.32
Not done with cheese, or powder'd o'er with dyes,
7.32
But looking as he did in life, though roasted.
7.32
So mild and gentle was the fire which I
7.32
Did to the fish apply, you'd scarce believe it.
7.32
It was as when a hen does seize some food,
7.32
And carries it away to eat at leisure:
7.32
She runs all round with care; another sees her,
7.32
And straightway follows her to take it from her.
7.32
So here, the man who first found out the pleasure
7.32
Of dainty eating, sprang up high and ran
7.32
All round and round, with his dish in his hand.
7.32
The rest pursued him—it was fine to see them:
7.32
Some got a little, some got nothing, some
7.32
Got all they wanted. Well, as I was saying,
7.32
I took some river fish, eaters of mud.
7.32
What if I'd had a scare, or blue-back'd fish
7.32
From Attic waters, O thou saving Jupiter!
7.32
Or boar from Argive woods, or noble conger
7.32
From Sicyon's bay, the conger which the god
7.32
Of the deep sea doth bear aloft to heaven,
7.32
Fit banquet for his brethren. Then no doubt
7.32
The guests who ate would all have seem'd like gods;
7.32
I should have been immortal, since the dead
7.32
By the mere smell of my meat I bring to life again.
7.33
Did not Menecrates call himself a god,
7.33
And Nicostratus of Argos a second Hercules?)
7.35
I am immortal, for I bring the dead,
7.35
By the mere smell of my meat, to life again.
7.36
A. My friend, a great deal has been said already
7.36
By many men on the art of cookery,
7.36
So either tell me something new yourself,
7.36
Unknown to former cooks, or spare my ears.
7.36
B. I'll not fatigue you; know that I alone
7.36
Of present men have sounded all the depths
7.36
Of culinary science and invention;
7.36
For I have not been just a short two years
7.36
Learning my art with snow-white apron girt,
7.36
But all my life I have devoted anxiously
7.36
To the investigation of each point
7.36
Of moment; I have inquired into all
7.36
The different kinds of herbs and vegetables;
7.36
I know the habits of the bembrades,
7.36
I know the lentils in their various sorts;
7.36
In short, this I can say—Whene'er I am
7.36
At a funereal feast as minister,
7.36
As soon as men come back from the funeral,
7.36
Clad in dark garments, I take off the lids
7.36
Of all my saucepans, and the weeping guests
7.36
I clothe with smiling faces in a moment;
7.36
And such a joy runs through each heart and frame
7.36
As if they were a marriage feast attending.
7.36
A. What! serving up lentils and bembrades?
7.36
B. These are some accidental dishes only;
7.36
But when I've got my necessary tools,
7.36
And once have properly arranged my kitchen,
7.36
That which in old time happen'd with the Sirens
7.36
You shall again behold repeated now.
7.36
For such shall be the savoury smell, that none
7.36
Shall bring themselves to pass this narrow passage;
7.36
And every one who passes by the door
7.36
Shall stand agape, fix'd to the spot, and mute,
7.36
Till some one of his friends, who's got a cold
7.36
And lost his smell, drags him away by force.
7.36
A. You're a great artist.
7.36
B. Do not you then know
7.36
To whom you speak? I do declare to you
7.36
I have known many of the guests, who have,
7.36
For my sake, eaten up their whole estates.
7.37
A. You do display a gentlemanlike taste
7.37
And kind; but one thing still you have omitted.
7.37
B. How so?
7.37
A. You never have inquired it seems
7.37
How great a man I am. Or had you heard it
7.37
From some one else who was acquainted with me,
7.37
And so was that the reason you engaged me?
7.37
B. By Jove I never heard or thought about it.
7.37
A. Perhaps you do not know how great the difference
7.37
Is that exists between one cook and another?
7.37
B. Not I, but I shall know now, if you tell me.
7.37
A. To take some meat that some one else has bought,
7.37
And then to dress it tolerably, is
7.37
What any cook can do.
7.37
B. O Hercules!
7.37
A. A perfect cook is quite another thing.
7.37
For there are many admirable arts,
7.37
All of which he must master thoroughly
7.37
Who would excel in this. He first must have
7.37
A smattering of painting; and indeed
7.37
Many the sciences are which he must learn
7.37
Before he's fit to begin learning cookery,—
7.37
And you should know them ere you talk to me,—
7.37
Astrology, and Medicine, and Geometry.
7.37
For by these arts you'll know the qualities
7.37
And excellences of the various fish.
7.37
You'll learn to guide your dishes by the seasons;
7.37
And when this fish is in, and this is out,
7.37
For there is great variety in the pleasures
7.37
That from the table spring. Sometimes, for instance,
7.37
A boax will be better than a tunny.
7.37
B. Perhaps; but what on earth has that to do
7.37
With your geometry
7.37
A. Why this. We say
7.37
The kitchen is a sphere; this we divide,
7.37
And take one portion, as may suit our art,
7.37
Borrowing the principles of mensuration.
7.37
B. I understand; that's quite enough of that.
7.37
Where does your medical skill display itself?
7.37
A. Know there are meats hard, indigestible,
7.37
Pregnant with flatulence, causing only torture
7.37
To the unhappy eater, and no nourishment.
7.37
Yet those who sup at other folks' expense
7.37
Are always greedy and not temperate.
7.37
For these and similar viands, remedies
7.37
Must come from the resources of our art;
7.37
And how to marshal everything in order
7.37
With wisdom and propriety, we learn
7.37
By borrowing from the science of the General.
7.37
To count the guests requires arithmetic.
7.37
And no one else has all these parts of knowledge
7.37
Except myself.
7.37
B. Now in your turn, awhile
7.37
Listen to me.
7.37
A. Say on.
7.37
B. Give no more trouble
7.37
To me nor to yourself: but just keep quiet,
7.37
And rest yourself all day for all I care.
7.38
There, let things be as they are. Only take care
7.38
The fire may not too small be or too slow
7.38
To roast the joints. (As a fire like that
7.38
Makes meat not roast but sodden.) Nor too fierce.
7.38
(For that again does burn whate'er it catches,
7.38
And yet is far from cooking the meat through.)
7.38
It is not every one who has a spoon
7.38
And knife about him that we call a cook,
7.38
Nor every one who puts his fish in a pan;
7.38
There is more wit and reason in the business.
7.39
A. I will not use your meat, nor give my aid
7.39
Unless I'm sure that I shall have all means
7.39
Which needful are to make a proper show;
7.39
Nor do I e'er go anywhere till first
7.39
I know who 'tis who makes the sacrifice,
7.39
Or what the cause may be which prompts the banquet,
7.39
,Or who the guests are who have been invited.
7.39
For I have got a regular list at home
7.39
Of where I choose to go, and where I don't.
7.39
As first, to speak of the commercial class;
7.39
Some captain of a ship may take a sacrifice
7.39
Just to discharge some vow, made when he lost
7.39
His mast, pr broke the rudder of his vessel,
7.39
Or, having sprung a leak, threw overboard
7.39
His cargo. I'll have nought to do with him:
7.39
For he does nothing willingly, but only
7.39
Just so much as he thinks he cannot help.
7.39
And every time a cup is fill'd with wine,
7.39
He makes a calculation of the sum
7.39
Which he can charge his owners or his passengers,
7.39
And thinks that what his guests do eat and drink
7.39
Is his own flesh and blood. Another came,
7.39
But three days since, from the Byzantine port,
7.39
Safe and successful; joyful in a profit
7.39
Of ten or twelve per cent; talking of nothing
7.39
But freight and interest, spending all his love
7.39
On worn-out panders. Soon as he did quit
7.39
The ship and set his foot upon the land,
7.39
I blew my nose, gave him my hand, and utter'd
7.39
Audible thanks to saving Jupiter,
7.39
And hasten'd forth to wait on him. For this
7.39
Is always my way; and I find it answer.
7.39
Again, an amorous youth will feast and squander
7.39
His sire's estate; to him I go at call.
7.39
But those who feast in shares, and throw together
7.39
Into one dish their petty contributions,
7.39
Though they may tear their clothes, and cry aloud,
7.39
Come, who will cook us our new-purchased supper.
7.39
I let bawl on. For if you go to them,
7.39
First there is language hard and blows to bear;
7.39
Secondly, one must slave the livelong night;
7.39
And when at last you ask them for your pay,
7.39
First bring the pot, say they. "There was no vinegar
7.39
In all that salad." Ask again. "Aye, you
7.39
Shall be the first to be well beaten here."
7.39
I could recount ten thousand facts like this.
7.39
B. But where I take now is a rich brothel,
7.39
Where a rich courtesan with other friends
7.39
Desires to celebrate with great abundance
7.39
A joyous feast in honour of Adonis,
7.39
And where you may enjoy yourself in style.
7.40
In the first place the guests invited came
7.40
While still the fish lay on the dresser raw.
7.40
Give me some water. Bring the fish up quick.
7.40
Then placing all my pans upon the fire,
7.40
I soak'd the ashes well with oil, and raise
7.40
A rapid heat. Meantime the fragrant herbs
7.40
And pleasant sharpness of the seasonings
7.40
Delight my master. Quickly I serve up
7.40
Some fish exactly boiled; retaining all
7.40
His juice, and all his unextracted flavour;
7.40
A dish which any free-born man must know
7.40
How to appreciate rightly. In this manner
7.40
At the expense of one small pot of oil
7.40
I gain employment at full fifty banquets.
7.40
In my opinion you, O Dædalus,
7.40
Surpass all cooks in skill and genius,
7.40
Save the Athenian Thimbron, call'd the Top.
7.40
So here I've come to beg your services,
7.40
Bringing the wages which I know you ask.
7.41
First I did take some squills, and fried them all;
7.41
Then a large shark I cut in slices large,
7.41
Roasting the middle parts, and the remainder
7.41
I boil'd and stuff'd with half-ripe mulberries.
7.41
Then I take two large heads of dainty grayling,
7.41
And in a large dish place them, adding simply
7.41
Herbs, cummin, salt, some water, and some oil.
7.41
Then after this I bought a splendid pike,
7.41
To boil in pickle with all sorts of herbs.
7.41
Avoiding all such roasts as want a spit,
7.41
I bought too some fine mullet, and young thrushes,
7.41
And put them on the coals just as they were,
7.41
Adding a little brine and marjoram.
7.41
To these I added cuttle-fish and squills.
7.41
A fine dish is the squill when carefully cook'd.
7.41
But the rich cuttle-fish is eaten plain,
7.41
Though I did stuff them all with a rich forced meat
7.41
Of almost every kind of herb and flower.
7.41
Then there were several dishes of boil'd meats,
7.41
And sauce-boats full of oil and vinegar.
7.41
Besides all this a conger fine and fat
7.41
I bought, and buried in a fragrant pickle;
7.41
Likewise some tench, and clinging to the rocks
7.41
Some limpets. All their heads I tore away,
7.41
And cover'd them with flour and bread crumbs over,
7.41
And then prepared them as I dress'd the squills.
7.41
There was a widow'd amia too, a noble
7.41
And dainty fish. That did I wrap in fig-leaves,
7.41
And soak'd it through with oil, and over all
7.41
With swaddling clothes of marjoram did I fold it,
7.41
And hid it like a torch beneath the ashes.
7.41
With it I took anchovies from Phalerum,
7.41
And pour'd on them one cruet full of water.
7.41
Then shredding herbs quite fine, I add more oil,
7.41
More than two cotylee in quantity.
7.41
What next? That's all. This sir is what I do,
7.41
Not learning from recipes or books of cookery.
7.42
In Sicyon my friend you best can get
7.42
A mighty head of conger, fat, and strong,
7.42
And large; and also take his entrails whole,
7.42
Then boil him a long time, well-soak'd in brine.
7.42
There too fine congers may be caught, and they
7.42
Are to all other fish as far superior
7.42
As a fat tunny is to coracini.
7.42
And all the parts of a fine conger eel
7.42
Well hash'd together, overlaid with fat.
7.42
Then for three drachmas I agrayling bought.
7.42
Five more I gave for a large conger's head
7.42
And shoulders. (Oh, how hard a thing is life!)
7.42
Another drachma for the neck. I swear
7.42
By Phoebus, if I knew where I could get
7.42
Or buy another neck myself, at once
7.42
I'd choke the one which now is on my shoulders,
7.42
Rather than bring these dishes to this place.
7.42
For no one ever had a harder job
7.42
To buy so many things at such a price;
7.42
And yet if I have bought a thing worth buying
7.42
May I be hang'd. They will devour me.
7.42
What I now say is what concerns myself.
7.42
And then, such wine they spit out on the ground!
7.42
Alas! Alas!
7.44
Are you at Rhodese'en if about to die,
7.44
Still, if a man would sell you a fox shark,
7.44
The fish the Syracusans call the dog,
7.44
Seize on it eagerly; at least, if fat:
7.44
And then compose yourself to meet your fate
7.44
With brow serene and mind well satisfied.
7.44
Galei and rays, and all the fish besides
7.44
Which cooks do dress with sauce and vinegar.
7.45
There is the variegated scorpion,
7.45
The lizard, and the fat sea-grayling too.
7.45
The hycca, the callicthys, and the chromis,
7.45
The orphus, the sea-grayling too, who haunts
7.45
The places where seaweed and moss abound.
7.45
If you're at Megara or at Olynthus,
7.45
Dress me a grayling's head. For in the shallows
7.45
Around those towns he's taken in perfection.
7.45
Bœotian eels, and mussels too from Pontus,
7.45
Graylings from Megara, from Carystus shrimps,
7.45
Eretrian phagri, and the Scyrian crabs.
7.45
A. What shall be done with the grayling?
7.45
B. Why
7.45
Now, as at other times, boil him in brine.
7.45
A. What with the pike?
7.45
B. Why roast him whole, and dish h m.
7.45
A. What with the galeus?
7.45
B. Do him up with stuffing,
7.45
And serve him hot.
7.45
A. How will you have the eels!?
7.45
B. Cook them with salt, and marjoram, and water.
7.45
A. The conger?
7.45
B. Do the same.
7.45
A. The ray?
7.45
B. Take herbs
7.45
And season him with them.
7.45
A. There is besides
7.45
Half a large tunny.
7.45
B. Roast it.
7.45
A. Some goat's venison.
7.45
B. Roast that.
7.45
A. How will you have the rest o' the meat?
7.45
B. All boil'd.
7.45
A. The spleen?
7.45
B. Stuff that.
7.45
A. The paunch and trail?
7.46
There was a beautiful dish of the sea-grayling,
7.46
And a boil'd pike served up i' savoury pickle.
7.46
The man who first discover'd all the good
7.46
Of the most precious head of a large grayling,
7.46
And then how dainty was the tunny's meat,
7.46
Caught where the waves are by no tempests tost,
7.46
How good in short is the whole race of fish,
7.46
Nereus his name, dwells in this place for ever.
7.46
Whole graylings, and large slices of the head.
7.46
Take a small eel, and a fine grayling's head,
7.46
And slices of a pike fresh from the sea.
7.46
Give me an Hymettian mullet,
7.46
And a ray just caught, a perch
7.46
Split open, and a cuttle-fish,
7.46
And a well-roasted synodon;
7.46
A slice of grayling, and a head
7.46
Of mighty conger, luscious food;
7.46
A frog's inside, a tunny's flank,
7.46
A ray's sharp back, a cestra's loin,
7.46
Sea-sparrows, and sea-thrushes too,
7.46
Sprats, and anchovies, let me not
7.46
Complain of any want.
7.47
A. They say there are two kinds of fish most tender
7.47
And beautiful to see, which oft appear
7.47
To sailors wandering o'er the spacious plains
7.47
Of ocean. And they say that one foretells
7.47
To mortals all the evils which hang o'er them.
7.47
B. You mean the grayling.
7.47
A. You are right, I do.
7.47
There is a place, Anthedon is its name,
7.47
On the seaside, against th' Eubœan isle,
7.47
Near to the stream of the still vext Euripus—
7.47
Thence is my race; and Copeus was my sire.
7.48
First tasted grass,
7.48
The herb which in the islands of the blest,
7.48
When first the spring doth beam upon the earth,
7.48
The untill'd land shows to the genial sun.
7.48
And the sun gives it to his weary steeds,
7.48
A most refreshing food, raised in the shade.
7.48
So that they come in vigour back renew'd
7.48
Unto their daily task, and no fatigue
7.48
Or pain can stop their course.
7.48
And you found too th' agrostis of the gods,
7.48
The sacred plant which ancient Saturn sow'd.
7.48
Bearing a gift of love, a mazy shell,
7.48
Fresh from the Erythrean rock, and with it too
7.48
The offspring, yet unfledged, of Alcyon,
7.48
To win th' obdurate maid. He gave in vain.
7.48
Even the lone Siren on the neighbouring isle
7.48
Pitied the lover's tears. For as it chanced,
7.48
He swam towards the shore which she did haunt,
7.48
Nigh to th' unquiet caves of Aetna.
7.52
The eels and fish within the briny deep,
7.52
Were startled at the blaze.
7.53
I will attack it were it hot as fire;
7.53
I praise all kinds of eels; but far the best
7.53
Is that which fishermen do take in the sea
7.53
Opposite to the strait of Rhegium.
7.53
Where you, Messenius, who daily put
7.53
This food within your mouth, surpass all mortals
7.53
In real pleasure. Though none can deny
7.53
That great the virtue and the glory is
7.53
Of the Strymonian and Copaic eels.
7.53
For they are large, and wonderfully fat;
7.53
And I do think in short that of all fish
7.53
The best in flavour is the noble eel,
7.53
Although he cannot propagate his species.
7.54
The eels and fish were startled,
7.54
And you received full many sightless eels.
7.54
Behold, O boys, the noble eel (ἔγχελυν);
7.54
῎ἔγχελυν βοιωτίαν:
7.54
And smooth too ὥσπερ ἔγχελυς.
7.54
The tunny, orphus, grayling, eel, and sea-dog.
7.54
Imitating my images of the eels (ἐγχελέων);
7.54
I don't delight in rays nor in ἐγχέλεσιν
7.54
A cousin of the eels (ἐγχελέων).
7.54
Like an eel (ἔγχελυς) complaining of being slippery.
7.54
A kite was eating a Mæandrian eel (ἔγχελυν),
7.54
But a heron saw him and deprived him of it.
7.54
Your fate resembles that of those who hunt
7.54
For mud-fed eels. For when the lake is still
7.54
Their labour is in vain. But if they stir
7.54
The mud all up and down, they catch much fish.
7.54
And so you gain by stirring up the city;
7.55
They say in other things the Egyptian race
7.55
Is clever also, since they think the eel
7.55
On a level with the gods; or I may say
7.55
By far more valuable. For, as to the gods,—
7.55
Those we gain over by our prayers alone;
7.55
But as for eels, without you spend at least
7.55
Twelve drachmas you can scarce get leave to smell them.
7.55
So it is altogether a holy beast.
7.55
I never could myself your comrade be,
7.55
For neither do'our manners nor our laws
7.55
Agree with yours, but they are wholly different.
7.55
You do adore an ox; I sacrifice him
7.55
To the great Gods of heaven. You do think
7.55
An eel the mightiest of deities;
7.55
But we do eat him as the best of fish.
7.55
You eat no pork; I like it above all things.
7.55
You do adore a dog; but I do beat him
7.55
If e'er I catch him stealing any meat.
7.55
Then our laws enjoin the priests to be
7.55
Most perfect men; but yours are mutilated.
7.55
If you do see a cat in any grief
7.55
You weep; but I first kill him and then skin him.
7.55
You have a great opinion of the shrew-mouse;
7.55
But I have none at all.
7.55
How can an ibis or a dog be able
7.55
To save a man? For where with impious hearts
7.55
Men sin against the all-acknowledged Gods,
7.55
And yet escape unpunish'd, who can think
7.55
The altar of a cat will be more holy,
7.55
Or prompter to avenge itself, than they?
7.56
The nymph who never knew the joys of marriage,
7.56
Clothed with rosy beet will now appear,
7.56
The white-flesh'd eel. Hail, brilliant luminary,
7.56
Great in my taste, and in your own good qualities.
7.56
And after this were served up the rich
7.56
Entrails of roasted tunnies; then there came
7.56
Those natives of the lake, the holy eels,
7.56
Bœotian goddesses; all clothed in beet.
7.56
The sweet Bœotian Copaic virgin;
7.56
For I do fear to name the Goddess.
7.56
And then your namesake river, far renown'd
7.56
In all the mouths of men, the mighty Strymon,
7.56
Who waters the rich warlike plains of Thrace,
7.56
Breeds mighty eels.
7.56
Arriving at the springs
7.56
Where Euleus with his rapid eddies rises).
7.57
The best of ellopes which you can eat
7.57
Come from the bay of famous Syracuse.
7.57
Those eat whene'er you can. For that's the place
7.57
Whence this great fish originally came.
7.57
But those which are around the islands caught,
7.57
Or any other land, or nigh to Crete,
7.57
Too long have battled with the eddying currents,
7.57
And so are thin and harder to the taste.
7.60
There is not one dish of hepseti.
7.60
An hepsetus fell in with an anchovy
7.60
And quick devour'd him.
7.60
Ye graces who do love the hepseti.
7.60
Contented if just once in each twelve days
7.60
He sees an hepsetus well boil'd in beet.
7.60
There were some hepseti besides served up
7.60
In a dædalean manner. For they call
7.60
All clever works by the name of Dædalus;
7.60
Will you not now then try the coracini?
7.60
Nor trichides, nor any hepseti?
7.60
I will say nothing of a dish of hepseti.
7.60
The boy came in bringing some hepseti.
7.60
A bembras, an anchovy, and a hepsetus.
7.60
She's gone to buy a hepsetus.
7.61
Remember that the lebias is best,
7.61
As also is the hepatus, in the waves
7.61
Which wash the Delian and the Tenian shores.
7.62
The turbot, tunny, tench, elacatene.
7.62
The tench, th' elacatene, and the tail-fin of
7.62
The sea-dog are the best for pickling.
7.63
Around the sacred and the spacious isle
7.63
Of Samos you may see large tunnies caught.
7.63
The Samians call them horcyes, and others
7.63
Do name them cetus. These 'tis well to buy,
7.63
Fit offering for the Gods; and do it quickly,
7.63
Nor stop to haggle or bargain for the price.
7.63
Good too are those which fair Byzantium,
7.63
Or the Carystian marble rocks do breed.
7.63
And in the famous isle of Sicily,
7.63
The Cephalcedian and Tyndarian shores
7.63
Send forth fish richer still. And if you come
7.63
To sacred Italy, where Hipponium's cape
7.63
Frowns on the waves which lave the Bruttian coast
7.63
Those are the best of all. The tunnies there
7.63
Have gain'd the height of fame and palm of victory.
7.63
Still those which there you find have wander'd far,
7.63
Cross'd many seas, and many a roaring strait,
7.63
So that we often catch them out of season.
7.64
The tunnies bend their furious course to Gades.
7.65
And after this the luscious intestines
7.65
Of roasted tunnies sail'd upon the table.
7.65
Despise not thou the fat Bœotian eel,
7.65
Nor grayling, nor the entrails of the tunny.
7.65
Next buy the entrails of a tunny, and
7.65
Some pettitoes of pigs, to cost a drachma.
7.65
And the sweet entrails of the tunny fish.
7.65
These things poor men cannot afford to buy,
7.65
The entrails of the tunny or the head
7.65
Of greedy pike, or conger, or cuttle-fish,
7.65
Which I don't think the gods above despise.
7.65
The ὑπογάστριον of fish, O Ceres,
7.65
Whoever has by chance bought dainty food
7.65
For these accursed and abandon'd women,
7.65
Such as ὑπογάστρια, which may Neptune
7.65
Confound for ever; and who seeks to place
7.65
Beside them now a dainty loin of meat . . .
7.65
A. And I will throw the fishers headlong down
7.65
Into the pit. They only catch for me
7.65
Food fit for freed men; trichides and squids,
7.65
And partly fried fish.
7.65
B. But not long ago,
7.65
This man, if he could get a tunny's head,
7.65
Thought he was eating tunnies whole, and eels.
7.65
A. But now the dinner is all spoilt entirely.
7.65
B. Here are two roasted keys quite fit to eat.
7.65
A. What, keys to open doors?
7.65
B. No, tunny keys;
7.65
A dainty dish.
7.65
A. There is the Spartan key too.
7.66
I bid you take up hammers now, and beat
7.66
The fiery mass of iron, which will utter
7.66
No groan, but bear in silence like the tunny.
7.66
Turning his eye aside, just like the tunny;
7.66
And the disturbed and muddy sea which breeds
7.66
The largest tunnies.
7.67
For I'm a thunnis, a melænas, or
7.67
A thunnus, orphos, grayling, eel, or sea-dog.
7.67
And then the thunna's tail, which I call thunnis,
7.67
That mighty fish, whose home's Byzantium.
7.67
Cut it in slices, and then roast it all
7.67
With accurate care, strewing on nought but salt,
7.67
Most thinly spread; then sprinkle a little oil;
7.67
Then eat it hot, first dipping it in brine.
7.67
Or if you like to eat them dry they're good;
7.67
Like the immortal gods in character,
7.67
And figure too; but if you once forget,
7.67
And vinegar add to them, then you spoil them.
7.67
And the middle slices take
7.67
Of the choice Byzantian tunny,
7.67
And let them be neatly hidden
7.67
Under leaves from beet-root torn.
7.67
A. The man who's country bred likes not to eat
7.67
Food from the sea extracted; unless indeed
7.67
It comes quite close in shore. Such as some conger,
7.67
Some ray, or tunny's . . .
7.67
B. Which part of the tunny?
7.67
A. The lower part.
7.67
B. Well, you may eat that safely.
7.67
A. All other fish I reckon cannibals.
7.67
B. Do not you eat those fish with the ugly backs?
7.67
A. Which?
7.67
B. The fat eels which haunt Copais' lake.
7.67
A. Aye, like a ploughman. For indeed I have
7.67
A farm not far from that most dainty lake.
7.67
But I impeach the eels now of desertion,
7.67
For none at all were there the other day.
7.67
For one of them with rapid extravagance
7.67
Feasting each day on tunnies and on cheese-cakes,,
7.67
Like any eunuch of rich Lampsacus,
7.67
Ate up his whole estate. So that he now
7.67
Is forced to work and dig among the rocks,'
7.67
Eating poor figs, and small stale loaves of barley,
7.67
Food fit for slaves.
7.68
The sharp-nosed needle-fish,
7.68
And the hippurus, and bright chrysophrys.
7.68
Or the great synodons, or tumbler hippurus.
7.68
Th' hippurus of Carystus is the best,
7.68
And indeed all Carystian fish are good.
7.69
The coracinus colour'd like a crow,
7.69
Fat, well-fed fish; the smooth hippidion,
7.69
The phycæ and the tender squill . . .
7.69
The char, the mighty tench of size enormous,
7.69
The channus, and the eel; and he who roves
7.69
By night, the wary pitynus; the mussel,
7.69
The horse-fish, or the sea-green corydulis.
7.69
The hyca, or the horse-fish, or the one
7.69
Which they do call the thrush.
7.70
And ne'er neglect the medicine which keeps off
7.70
To a great degree the greedy fish ioulis,
7.70
And scolopendrus that doth poison dart.
7.70
Moreover do not then the bait forget,
7.70
Which on the highest hills that fringe the shore
7.70
Shall soon be found. And they are called iouli,
7.70
Black, eating earth-the entrails of the earth;
7.70
Or the long-footed grasshopper, what time
7.70
The sandy rocks are sprinkled with the foam
7.70
Of the high-rising tide. Then dig them up,
7.70
And stow them carefully within your bag.
7.71
Suppose a man had eaten a red mullet (τρίγλην),
7.71
Would that alone prove him an epicure?
7.71
The sea-born race of grayling or of orphus,
7.71
The black-flesh'd blackbird, or the dainty sea-thrush
7.71
Sporting beneath the waves.
7.71
Bambradones, sea-thrushes, and sea-hares;
7.71
And the bold dragon fish.
7.71
Add now to these the sea-thrush red, which they
7.71
Who seek to snare the wary fish with bait
7.71
Do call the saurus, and th' æolias,
7.71
Add too th' orphiscus with his large fat head.
7.71
The scarus or the thrush with many names.
7.72
But when you go to Acta's favour'd land,
7.72
If you by chance should see a rich sea-boar,
7.72
Buy it at once, and let it not escape you,
7.72
Not if you buy it at its weight in gold;
7.72
Else will the indignation of the gods
7.72
O'erpower you; for 'tis the flower of nectar.
7.72
But 'tis not all men who can be allow'd
7.72
To eat this dainty, no, nor e'en to see it;
7.72
Unless they take a strongly-woven mesh
7.72
Of marsh-bred rush, and hold it in their hands,
7.72
Well used to ply the floats with rapid mind.
7.72
And with these dainties you must offer up,
7.72
Thrown on the ground, some gifts of lamb and mutton.
7.73
The harp-fish is a good fish; be you sure
7.73
To buy him when you can. He really is good;
7.73
But, I by Phœbus swear, this does perplex me
7.73
Exceedingly which men do say, my friend,
7.73
That there is secret harm within this harp-fish.
7.73
There were hyænides,
7.73
And fine buglossi, and the harp-fish too
7.73
A roasted harp-fish, and a ray,
7.73
And the head of a well-fed tunny.
7.73
I counsel you always to boil a harp-fish
7.73
If he is white and full of firmish meat;
7.73
But if he's red and also no great size,
7.73
Then it were best, when you have prick'd him o'er
7.73
With a new sharpen'd knife, to roast him gently.
7.73
Sprinkle him then with oil and plenteous cheese,
7.73
For he does like to see men liberal,
7.73
And is himself intemperate.
7.74
All things are ready. First I strip the thighs
7.74
Of courylus, or pirene, and treat too
7.74
In the same way the marine grasshopper.
7.74
Mussels, sea-horses, or the sea-green cordylis.
7.75
Then after this there are boaces and
7.75
Smarides, anchovies, also cammori.
7.76
At times you may too a carcharias catch,
7.76
At times a psamathis who loves the surf.
7.78
Aeolians, and plotes, and cynoglossi.
7.78
There also were sciathides.
7.78
Maton seized hold of a large cestreus' head,
7.78
And ate it all. But I am quite undone.
7.78
Buy if you can a cestreus which has come
7.78
From the sea-girt Aegina; then you shall
7.78
For well-bred men be fitting company.
7.78
The cestreus leaps for joy.
7.79
Nestes cestres, cephali.
7.79
But all the other soldiers which you have
7.79
Are hungry (νήστεις) cestres.
7.79
So I a nestis cestreus now run home.
7.79
A. And I will seek the forum, there to find
7.79
Some one to take my work.
7.79
B. I wish you would,
7.79
You would all have less time to follow me,
7.79
Like any hungry (νῆστις) cestreus.
7.79
Midas then is a cestreus-see, he walks
7.79
Along the city fasting (νῆστις).
7.79
I bought me now a nestis cestreus roasted
7.79
Of no great size.
7.79
Is there within a colony of man cestres?
7.79
For that they all are νήστιδες you know.
7.79
He usually goes supperless about,
7.79
Like a cestrinus nestis.
7.79
Who has been drown'd 'tis now four days ago,
7.79
Leading the life of a sad nestis cestreus.
7.80
These men have supp'd, but I, wretch that I am,
7.80
Shall be a cestreus through th' extreme of fasting.
7.80
But stand in order—
7.80
hungry band of cestres,
7.80
You who are fed, like geese, on vegetables.
7.80
As I was going out I met a fisherman,
7.80
And he was bringing me some cestres, and
7.80
He brought me all those worthless starving fish.
7.80
Am by myself enough well to reply
7.80
To what two men have lately said before me.
7.81
It easily would attract the spotted coracinus.
7.81
Aeoliæ, plotes, cynoglossi too.
7.81
There there were mussels, and the alphastic fish,
7.81
And coracini like to coriander seed,
7.81
Aeoliæ, plotes too, and the cynoglossi.
7.81
Being with your κορακινίδια and μαινίδια.
7.81
Whoever eats a sea-born coracinus
7.81
When he may have a grayling, is a fool.
7.83
A char or tench (κῶθος) of mighty size and bold.
7.83
The turtle with their sting behind, and then the tender tench.
7.83
I come, but I have been to great expense
7.83
In buying viands for this marriage feast.
7.83
I've bought a pennyworth of frankincense
7.83
To offer to the gods and all the goddesses,
7.83
And to the heroes I will offer cakes.
7.83
But when I bid that rascally house-breaking
7.83
Seller of fish to add a dainty dish,
7.83
I'll throw you in, says he, "the borough itself,
7.83
For they are all Phalericans." The rest
7.83
I do believe were selling our Otrynicans.The burgh of Otryna was one of the most obscure ones, while the Phaleric burgh was one of those of the highest reputation.
7.83
A. There was a fishmonger not long ago,
7.83
Who asked four whole drachmas for his tench.
7.83
B. A mighty price indeed.
7.84
And the beauteous cuckoos
7.84
Which we split in twain,
7.84
Then we roast and season them,
7.84
And then with pleasure eat them.
7.84
Eating sometimes the cuckoo red, sometimes
7.84
A few pempherides, or else a lizard.
7.85
But when the sun, driving his coursers fleet
7.85
With solid hoofs along the heavenly road,
7.85
Guides them at mid-day in the centre path,
7.85
Then let us eat whate'er our heart may prompt,
7.85
And gratify our appetite with dainties.
7.85
Then let a Spartan maid with rosy hands,
7.85
Bring water, and fresh garlands for our brows.
7.85
O Academus, would you now but sing
7.85
A tuneful hymn, while in the midst should stand
7.85
A beauteous boy, in flower of his youth,
7.85
A prize for you and me to combat for,
7.85
Then you should know how far the mule excels the ass.
7.85
In fair Torone's town 'tis best to cook
7.85
The hollow entrails of the sharp-tooth'd dog.
7.85
Then strew the fish with cummin, sparing be
7.85
Of salt, then roast him, and add nothing else
7.85
Saving some sea-green oil. Then when 'tis done,
7.85
Serve him up with some little seasoning.
7.85
And if you boil a part of it within
7.85
The hollow of some flat dish, then add
7.85
No water, add no wine-made vinegar,
7.85
But pour on oil alone, and cummin dry,
7.85
And add what fragrant herbs the garden gives.
7.85
Then put the saucepan on the ashes hot,
7.85
And boil it; let no flame too quickly burn,
7.85
And stir it often lest the meat should catch,
7.85
And spoil your dinner so, before you know it.
7.85
'Tis but few mortals know this wondrous food;
7.85
And those who have thick stupid heavy souls,,
7.85
Refuse to taste it, but are all alarm'd,
7.85
Because they say this dog's a cannibal,
7.85
And feeds on human flesh. But there is not
7.85
A fish that swims which does not like man's flesh
7.85
If he can only chance to come across it.
7.86
The pike, the wisest of all fish that swim.
7.86
Take the large cestris cephalus from Gæson,
7.86
When you do come to fair Miletus' city.
7.86
Take too the pike, the offspring of the gods.
7.86
For in those waters both these fish are best.
7.86
Such is the natural character of the place.
7.86
But there are many places where they grow
7.86
More fat and large; in famous Calydon,
7.86
And in the opulent Ambracia,
7.86
And at the Bolbe lake; but there they want
7.86
The fragrant fat which here surrounds their belly;
7.86
Nor have they such a pungent taste, my friend.
7.86
Those which I speak of are most admirable.
7.86
Take them and roast them without scaling them,
7.86
Soften with salt, and serve them up with brine.
7.86
And let no Syracusan, no Italian
7.86
Break in upon you while you dress this dish:
7.86
For they have no idea of dressing fish,
7.86
But spoil them all by seasoning them with cheese,
7.86
By sprinkling them with too much vinegar,
7.86
And strongly scented assafœtida.
7.86
They are good cooks enough to dress the vile
7.86
Fish which they take while clinging to the rocks;
7.86
And there are many kinds of season'd dishes
7.86
Which they can dress quite well enough; but they
7.86
Have no idea of dressing good fish plain.
7.87
But you shall not disturb me thus
7.87
Feasting on Milesian pike.
7.87
He would not buy a pike's head, nor a locust:
7.87
Do not be too expensive, still not mean,
7.87
Whate'er you do; not for decency's sake.
7.87
Get some small cuttle-fish, or squids, some nestis,
7.87
Some small fry of the polypus, some tripe,
7.87
And beestings and black-puddings; get besides
7.87
A noble head of the Milesian pike.
7.87
Hermes th' Egyptian is the greatest rogue
7.87
Of all the fishmongers; he skins by force
7.87
The sharks and rhinos, and takes out the entrails
7.87
Of the Milesian pikes, before he sells them.
7.88
Near the well-treed Italia's verdant shores,
7.88
Fierce Scylla's strait the famous latus breeds,
7.88
Most marvellous of dainties.
7.88
Mæotæ, and saperdæ, likewise glanides.
7.89
The galeus, the leiobatus, the eel.
7.90
No congers fat were wanting, and no lampreys (μύραιναι).
7.90
The ray, the lamprey (σμύραινα) too, is here.
7.90
That is a terrible deed the lamprey does,
7.90
When oft its teeth it gnashes and pursues
7.90
Th' unhappy fishermen, and drives them headlong
7.90
Out of their boats in haste, when issuing forth
7.90
From the deep hole in which it long has lain:
7.90
If that the tale is true that it admits
7.90
The poisonous viper's love, when it deserts
7.90
Its pastures 'neath the sea, for food on land.
7.91
Between th' Italian and Sicilian shore,
7.91
Where the strait parts them with its narrow waves,
7.91
Whenever that most dainty fish is caught
7.91
Which men the lamprey call, be sure to buy it;
7.91
For in those waters'tis the best of food.
7.92
When you see many boaces and smarides.
7.92
A. Why, I did think that all these monstrous fish
7.92
Were cannibals.
7.92
B. What can you mean, my friend?
7.92
A. Why, cannibals: so how would any man eat them?
7.92
B. That's true. But these are food of Hecate,
7.92
Which he is speaking of, just sprats and mullets.
7.92
Let no man, in God's name I beg, persuade you,
7.92
Come when he will or whence, so to mistake
7.92
As to call leucomænides boaces.
7.93
The scorpion or melanurus black,
7.93
The guide and leader of the perch,
7.93
There were sargini, there were melanuri.
7.93
The psorus, or the salpe, or the dragon-fish
7.93
Which haunts the shore.
7.94
The sea-swallow, the myrmes too,
7.94
And they are larger than the colias tunny.
7.94
The mormyrus that haunts the pebbly shore,
7.94
Is a bad, good-for-nothing, worthless fish.
7.94
Buy an amia in the autumn . . . .
7.94
How good the cestreus is when winter comes.
7.95
A boil'd torpedo is delicious food.
7.95
His hand was torpid (νάρκησε) at the wrist.
7.95
A certain torpor (νάρκα) creeps o'er all my skin;
7.95
A bold torpedo done in oil and wine,
7.95
And fragrant herbs, and some thin grated cheese.
7.95
I counsel you to season well and stuff
7.95
Torpedos whole, and then to roast them thoroughly.
7.95
Then I took a torpedo, calculating
7.95
If my wife touch'd it with her tender fingers
7.95
That they would get no hurt from its backbone.
7.96
But take a slice of sword-fish when you go
7.96
To fair Byzantium, and take the vertebrae
7.96
Which bend his tail. He's a delicious fish,
7.96
Both there and where the sharp Pelorian cape
7.96
Juts out towards the sea.
7.97
Now with such baits as these it is not hard
7.97
To draw the lengthy scorpion from his bed,
7.97
Or the rough orphus: for they're easily caught.
7.97
The grayling, or the sea-born race of orphi,
7.97
Or the dark flesh'd sea-blackbird.
7.97
The orphus came to them, the priest o' the god.
7.97
A hot slice of the newly taken orphus.
7.97
For he has brought you here, old dame, to dwell,
7.97
A rotten food for orphi and for phagri,
7.97
And other gristly boneless fish around.
7.97
And Aristophanes, in his Wasps, says—
7.97
If a man be inclined to purchase orphi,
7.97
And likes to leave alone the membrades.
7.97
τέμαχος ὀρφὼ χλιαρόν.
7.99
And there are channel with their large wide mouths,
7.99
And cod with their huge bellies.
7.99
Anthedon's famous for its cod, which some
7.99
Do call gallerias; there its size is great,
7.99
But the flesh spongy, and in many respects
7.99
I do not think it good, though others praise it.
7.99
But this man likes one thing, and that another.
7.100
As when a polypus (πουλύποδος in the genitive) is dragged from out his lair:
7.100
When then I had this polypus (πουλύπους) and cuttle-fish.
7.100
He put before me a polypus (πουλύπουν).
7.100
They are the blows of a polypus press'd tight.
7.100
The man's a fool and has the mind of a polypus (πουλύποδος).
7.100
I want, it seems, a heap of polypi (πουλύπων).
7.100
First of all you like the polypodes (τοὺς πουλύποδας).
7.100
I myself eat like any polypus (πουλύπους).
7.100
The man's a fellow-citizen of mine,
7.100
A very polypus in disposition.
7.102
They live on green anthrysca, and on bracana,
7.102
And snails and slugs. And when they're very hungry,
7.102
Then, like the polypus, they e'en at night
7.102
Nibble their fingers.
7.102
A polypus with all his feelers
7.102
And limbs unhurt; whose wicked tooth
7.102
Has not devour'd himself, my friend,
7.102
Is ready for our supper.
7.102
Remark the tricks of that most wary polypus,
7.102
Who always seems of the same colour and hue
7.102
As is the rock near which he lies.
7.102
My son, my excellent Amphilochus,
7.102
Copy the shrewd device o' the polypus,
7.102
And make yourself as like as possible
7.102
To those whose land you chance to visit.
7.106
I was a shell, O Venus Zephyritis,Venus Zephyritis was the name under which Arsinoe was worshipped; and the next line refers to the custom of the maidens on the occasion of their marriage making a sportive offering of their toys to Venus. Arsinoe was the wife and sister of Ptolemy Philadelphus.
7.106
Now I'm the pious offering of Selena,
7.106
The gentle nautilus. When balmy winds
7.106
Breathe soft along the sea, I hold my course,
7.106
Stretching my sails on their congenial yards.
7.106
Should calm, the placid goddess, still the waves,
7.106
I row myself along with nimble feet,
7.106
So that my name suits rightly with my acts.
7.106
Now have I fallen on the Iulian shore,
7.106
To be a pleasant sport to Arsinoe.
7.106
No more shall Halcyons' dew-besprinkled eggs,
7.106
My dainty meal, lie thick within my bed
7.106
As formerly they did, since here I lie.
7.106
But give to Cleinias's daughter worthy thanks;
7.106
For she does shape her conduct honestly,
7.106
And from Aeolian Smyrna doth she come.
7.106
Oh, all ye men who traffic on the streams,
7.106
Or on the land who hold a safer way,
7.106
Worship this shrine of Philadelphus' wife,
7.106
Venus Arsinoe, whom Callicrates,
7.106
The naval leader, first did firmly place
7.106
On this most beautiful Zephyrian shore.
7.106
And she will on your pious voyage smile,
7.106
And amid storms will for her votaries
7.106
Smooth the vex'd surface of the wide-spread sea.
7.106
I hate the colour-changing polypus,
7.106
Clinging with bloodless feelers to the rocks.
7.107
A polypus, a cuttle-fish, and quickly-moving squid,
7.107
A foul-smelling bolbitine, and chattering old woman.
7.107
The Carian and the Thasian polypi
7.107
Are far the best; Corcyra too can breed
7.107
Fish of large size and very numerous.
7.107
The polypodes and the dog-shark.
7.108
But I, as being a skilful fisherman,
7.108
Have carefully devised all sorts of arts
7.108
To catch those vile paguri, enemies
7.108
To all the gods and all the little fishes.
7.108
And shall I not without delay beguile
7.108
An old buglossus? That would be well done.
7.109
There, too, the foreign pelamys does winter,
7.109
The stranger from the Hellespont. For she
7.109
Doth come with many of her kind in summer
7.109
To these cool waters of the Bosphorus.
7.110
The comaris, the sea-dog, and the cestra
7.110
And variegated perch.
7.110
At one time perch, and at another strophades,
7.110
Which keep around the rocks. The phycis too,
7.110
Th' alphestes, and the red-flesh'd scorpion.
7.111
The oxyrhynchi, and the needle-fish,
7.111
And the hippuri.
7.112
And the far-famed Miletus does produce
7.112
All cartilauginous fish in high perfection,
7.112
But first of all one ought to take account
7.112
Both of the rhina and leiobatus,
7.112
Known for his spacious back. Still before all
7.112
Give me a roasted crocodile to eat,
7.112
Fresh from the oven, a most dainty dish
7.112
For all the children of Ionia.
7.113
We fish for spari, and for scari too,
7.113
Whose very dung may not be thrown away.
7.113
Seek now a scarus, fresh from Ephesus,
7.113
And in the winter season eat a mullet
7.113
Caught in the waves of sandy Teichioussa,
7.113
A village of Miletus, near the Carians,
7.113
The crooked-footed Carians.
7.113
Wash and then roast the mighty scarus which
7.113
Comes from the sea that laves Chalcedon's walls:
7.113
That too is good which near Byzantium swims,
7.113
With back as broad as a large oval shield.
7.113
Take him and cook him whole as I shall tell you.
7.113
Sprinkle him o'er with oil and grated cheese,
7.113
Then place him in the oven hanging up,
7.113
So as to escape the bottom, and then roast him,
7.113
And sprinkle him with salt and cummin seed
7.113
Well mix'd together; and again with oil,
7.113
Pouring out of your hand the holy stream.
7.114
Neptune then arives himself
7.114
Laden with most beauteous nets
7.114
In the boats of fair Phœnicia,
7.114
Then we all do spari catch,
7.114
And scari too, that sacred fish,
7.114
Whose very dung may not be thrown away.
7.114
The sparus or the hycas fond of company.
7.115
The phycides, the alphestes, and besides
7.115
The red-flesh'd scorpion, and the black-tail quick,
7.115
Which guides the perch all through the stormy sea.
7.115
The variegated scorpion, the grayling,
7.115
The fat and well-fed lizards.
7.115
When you're at Thasos buy a scorpion,
7.115
But let him not be longer than one cubit;
7.115
Avoid the larger sizes.
7.116
Sea-swallows, and mormyri, both of which
7.116
Are larger than the coliæ and the scombri,
7.116
But less than those whose name is thynnides.
7.117
The rich sea-blackbird, or the thrush who sports
7.117
Beneath the waves; the sargus too who rushes
7.117
Now here with sudden movement, and now there,
7.117
The greatest enemy to the fisher's nets.
7.117
The sargus, and the chalcis, and the . . .
7.117
There the sarginus was, the melanurus,
7.117
And the dear tænia, thin but delicious.
7.117
Now when the bright Orion's star doth set,
7.117
And the fair mother of the vinous grape
7.117
Doth shed her hair, then take a roasted sargus,
7.117
Well sprinkled o'er with cheese, of mighty size,
7.117
Smoking, and soften'd with sharp vinegar.
7.117
For he is hard by nature. And remember
7.117
This is the way all hard fish should be cook'd.
7.117
But those whose meat is good and soft by nature,
7.117
It is enough to sprinkle well with salt,
7.117
And lightly to anoint with oil. For they
7.117
Have virtue and delights within themselves.
7.118
The aon, and the phagrus, and the pike,
7.118
And the dung-eating, bloated, dirty salpe,
7.118
Which still have a sweet flavour in the summer.
7.118
I always do account the fish call'd salpe
7.118
A worthless fish. But it is least tasteless
7.118
When the wheat ripens. And the choicest kinds
7.118
Are caught at Mitylene.
7.118
There is the salpe too, of the same size,
7.118
Which the seafaring fishermen do call
7.118
The ox, because he grinds within his teeth
7.118
The stout seaweed with which he fills his belly.
7.118
The ceryx shouted out,
7.118
The salpes trumpeted and fetch'd seven obols.
7.119
Synagrides, and mazi, and the synodons,
7.119
With red spots variegated.
7.119
Then the white synodon, and boax, and triccus.
7.119
Fish with these baits then, if you wish to eat
7.119
The mighty synodon, or diving horsetail.
7.119
But try to catch a well-fed sinodon,
7.119
And you will find the best in narrow straits.
7.119
All this advice to Cyrus I have given,
7.119
And now to you, Cleænus, I impart it.
7.119
But who would eat an eel, or sinodon's head.
7.120
A. Do you know how you ought to dress a lizard?
7.120
B. I shall, when you have taught me.
7.120
A. First of all
7.120
Take off the gills, then wash him, then cut off
7.120
The spines all round, and split him open neatly;
7.120
Then when you've laid him flat, anoint him well
7.120
And thoroughly with assafœetida;
7.120
Sprinkle him then with cheese, and salt, and marjoram.
7.120
Slices of tunny, and of glanis,
7.120
Of shark, and rhine, and of conger,
7.120
Cephalus, perch, and lizard too,
7.120
And phycis, brinchus, also mullet,
7.120
Sea-cuckoo, phagrus, myllus, sparus,
7.120
Lebias, æolias, and sea-swallow,
7.120
Thritta, and squid, and cuttle-fish,
7.120
Sea-sparrow, and dracænides.
7.120
The polypus, the squid, and orphus,
7.120
The tench, th' anchovy, and the cestres,
7.120
And last of all the needle-fish.
7.120
Of fish with teeth serrated, you may eat
7.120
The grim torpedo, the sea-frog, the perch,
7.120
The lizard, and the trichias, and the phycis,
7.120
The brinchus, and the mullet, and sea-cuckoo.
7.121
Aeoliæ were there, and plotes too,
7.121
And cynoglossi and sciathides.
7.121
Use then this bait, and you perhaps may catch,
7.121
If such your wish, a mighty synodon,
7.121
Or the quick leaping hippurus, or the phagrus
7.121
Proud with his high-raised crest, or in a shoal
7.121
Of trusty comrades, the fresh sciadeus.
7.122
The chalcides, the sea-dog, and the cestra,
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And perch with variegated back.
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But what is the sphuræna?
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You, O Athenians, do call it the cestra.
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A. The sphuræna is a common fish.
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B. You should say cestra, in strict Attic Greek.
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The cestra and the pike.
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The cestra and the variegated perch.
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And when I have the cuttle-fish and polypus.
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The polypus, likewise the cuttle-fish,
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And the swift-moving squid.
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The cuttle-fish of Abdera and the middle of Maronea.
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Has any fish or cuttle-fish been bought?
7.124
Osmulia, mœnidea, and cuttle-fish.
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. . . But eat, my friend,
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This cuttle-fish, and this small polypus.
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Now these three cuttle-fish I have just bought
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For one small drachma. And when I 've cut off
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Their feelers and their fins, I then shall boil them.
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And cutting up the main part of their meat
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Into small dice, and rubbing in some salt,
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After the guests already are sat down,
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I then shall put them in the frying-pan,
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And serve up hot towards the end of supper.
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He brought the hump-back'd mullet too,
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And the ungrateful bæones.
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The trigola which cuts the navel string.
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The trigola which loves calm weather.
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. . . trigola . . . .
7.125
The bearded mullet (τρίγλη).
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The fat mullets and the hinder parts of the trigola.
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The mullet is not wholesome for the nerves,
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For it is sacred to the chaste Diana,
7.126
And all excitement hates.
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O mistress Hecate, Trioditis,
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With three forms (τρίμορφε) and three faces (τριπρόσωπε),
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Propitiated with mullets (τρίγλαις).
7.127
If you at Thasos are, then buy a mullet;
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You ne'er will get a worse, unless indeed
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You go to Tius; but even those are fair:
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But at Erythræ they are caught in shore
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And are most excellent.
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And do not eat a red-flesh'd mullet hard,
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Brought from Aexona; nor of any turtle,
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Or mighty melanurus from those seas.
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Those yellow fleshed fish, which the high wave
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That beats Aexona brings towards the shore,
7.127
The best of fish; with which we venerate
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The light-bestowing daughter of great Jove;
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When sailors offer gifts of feasts to heaven.
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B. You mean the mullet.
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The most belovèd tænia, which are thin,
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But highly flavour'd, and need little fire.
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His mother was a Thracian woman,
7.128
A seller of tænie;
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The aconia and the wagtail too,
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And the . . . trachurus.
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When it is summer buy a good-sized head
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Of fresh taulopias, just when Phaethon
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Is driving his last course. Dress it with speed.
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Serve it up hot, and some good seasoning with it,
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Then take its entrails, spit and roast them too.
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The best of all the teuthides are those
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Caught near Pierian Dium, near the stream
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Of Baphyras. And in Ambracia's port
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You will see mighty shoals of this same fish.
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Teuthides, thornbacks, rays, and fat
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Anchovies, lumps of meat, and paunches too.
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I took the teuthides, cut off their fins,
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Adding a little fat; I then did sprinkle
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Some thin shred herbs o'er all for seasoning.
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There were hyænides, buglossi,
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There was the harp-fish too in numbers.
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There were too chalcides and sea-pigs (ὕες),
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And sea-hawks, and the fat sea-dog.
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The cantharis, hyæna, and the mullet.
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At Aenus or at Potus buy the sea-pig,
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Which some men call the digger of the sand,
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Then boil his head, adding no seasoning,
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But only water, stirring it full often,
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And add some pounded hyssop; if you want
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Anything more, pour on some pungent vinegar;
7.131
Steep it in that, then eat it with such haste
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As if your object were to choke yourself.
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But roast its neck, and all its other parts.
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Sometimes the fierce carcharias, and sometimes
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The psamathis, delighting in the surf.
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And he does deem the sacred hyces god.
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The spar, or the gregarious hyces;
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Or phagrus, ever wand'ring near the rocks.
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Nor was the hyces the last fish who fled.
7.133
Aones, and the phagri, and the pikes.
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A food for orphi and selachia,
7.133
And for the greedy phagri.
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'Tis when the dogstar rises in the sky
7.133
That you should eat the phagrus; specially
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If you in Delos or Eretria are,
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Or other favouring harbours of the sea;
7.133
But, if you can, purchase his head alone,
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And tail; and bring no more within your doors.
7.133
Eating a number of large phagri.
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Then, going to the market, they will buy
7.133
A great abundance of large phagri, and
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Slices of tender round Copaic eel.
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The channa, with large mouth, and then the cod,
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With deep and spacious belly.
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The channas and the eel, and pitinus,
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Who only roams by night.
7.135
There is the sword-fish and the chromias,
7.135
Who, in the spring, as Ananius says,
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Is of all fish the daintiest.
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The hyces, or the beautiful callicthys,
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Or else the chromis, and sometimes the orphus.
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You may catch noble chromises in Pella,
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And they are fat when it is midsummer;
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And in Ambracia likewise they abound.
7.136
The chrysophrys, sacred to Cytherean Venus.
7.136
I spent a hundred drachmas upon fish,
7.136
And only got eight pike, and twelve chrysophryes.
7.136
Pass not the chrysophrys from Ephesus
7.136
Unheeded by; which the Ephesians call
7.136
The ioniscus. Take him eagerly,
7.136
The produce of the venerable Selinus;
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Wash him, and roast him whole, and serve him up,
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Though he be ten full cubits long.
7.137
The chalcides, the sea-pig too,
7.137
The sea-hawk, and the fat sea-dog.
7.137
But you would thus harpoon, in the same way,
7.137
That chalcis and the little tiny sprat.
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He was a stingy man, who once in his life
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Before the war did buy some trichides;
7.137
But in the Samian war, a ha'p'orth of meat.
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If trichides were to be a penny a hundred.
7.137
The trichias, and the premas tunny too,
7.137
Placed in enormous quantities for supper.
7.137
He once, when fishing, saw one of such size
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A man could scarcely carry it, in a shoal
7.137
Of premnades, and then he let it go,
7.137
Because it was a boax.)
7.137
But as when round a shoal of newly born
7.137
lopes, phagri, or fierce scopes roam,
7.137
Or the large orphus.
7.137
O wretched fish, the first of trichides
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To be immersed in pickle.
7.137
For before that it twice drank in the brine.
7.138
And it is agreed on further
7.138
That both the high contracting parties
7.138
Shall restore all they now do hold
7.138
Of each other's property.
7.138
We shall give up thus the Thrattæ,
7.138
And the flute-playing Atherina,
7.138
And Thyrsus's daughter Sepia,
7.138
And the mullet, and Euclides,
7.138
Who was archon t'other day,
7.138
And the coraciontes too,
7.138
Who from Anagyrus come;
7.138
And the offspring of the tench,
7.138
Who swims round sacred Salamis;
7.138
And the frog who's seated near,
7.138
From the marshes of Oreum.
7.138
The mullet, and the lebias, and the sparus,
7.138
The bright æolias, and the thratta too,
7.138
The sea-swallow, the cars, and the cuttlefish.
7.138
And sporting with the little coracini,
7.138
With little perches, and the little thrattæ.
7.138
A. He is of the Halæa borough. This is all
7.138
That now is left me, to be abused unjustly.
7.138
B. Why so?
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A. He will (you'll see) bestow on me
7.138
Some thratta. or sea-sparrow, or some lamprey,
7.138
Or some enormous other marine evil.
7.139
Hyænides, buglossi, and a citharus.
7.139
Remember then to get a fine sea-sparrow,
7.139
And a rough-skinn'd buglossus, near the port
7.139
Of sacred Chalcis
7.139
A. Those yellow-fleshed fish, which the high wave
7.139
That beats Aexona brings towards the shore,
7.139
The best of fish; with which we venerate
7.139
The light-bestowing daughter of great Jove;
7.139
When sailors offer gifts of feasts to heaven.
7.139
B. You mean the muller, with its milky colour,
7.139
Which the Sicilian multitude calls rhombus.
7.140
Besides all this you now shall have
7.140
A slice of tunny, a slice of pork,
7.140
Some paunch of kid, some liver of goat,
7.140
Some ram, the entrails of an ox,
7.140
A lamb's head, and a kid's intestines;
7.140
The belly of a hare, a pudding,
7.140
Some tripe, black-puddings, and a sausage.