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Original / primary: Perseus Eng2
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she made the servant The servant: Lampadiscus. of her father partaker of her counsels, and gave to that servant the child to be exposed to death. He exposed it; this woman took up the child; that servant, who had exposed it, secretly took note whither or to what house she carried away the child.
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As you have heard her own self confess, she gave this child to the Courtesan Melaenis; and she brought her up as being her own daughter, honestly and virtuously. But then, this Lemnian married a neighbour there, his relation, for his wife.
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She departed this life; there she was compliant to her husband. After he had performed the due obsequies to his wife, at once he removed hither; here he married for his wife that same woman That same woman: An exactly similar circumstance forms the groundwork of the plot in the Hecyra of Terence. whom formerly, when a maid, he ravished. When he understood that it was she whom he had ravished,
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she told him that, in consequence of the violation, she had brought forth a daughter, and had at once given her to a servant to be exposed. He forthwith ordered this same servant to make enquiries, if anyhow he could discover who had taken it up. Now to that task
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is the servant always assiduously devoting his attention, if he can find out that Courtesan, whom formerly, when he himself exposed her, he from his hidingplace had seen take her up. Now, what remains unpaid, I wish to discharge, that my name may be struck out, so that I mayn’t remain a debtor.
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A young man A young man: Alcesimarchus. is here at Sicyon, his father is alive; with affection he distractedly dotes upon this exposed girl, who just now went hence in tears unto her mother; and she loves him in return, which is the most delightful love of all. As human matters go, nothing is granted for everlasting:
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the father is wishful to give the young man a wife. When the mother When the mother: Melaenis. came to know of this, she ordered her to be sent for home. Thus have these matters come to pass. Kindly fare you well, and conquer by inborn valour, as you have done before; defend your allies, both ancient ones and new;
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increase resources by your righteous laws; destroy your foes; laud and laurels gather; that, conquered by you, the Pœni The Pœni: This Play was probably written towards the end of the second Punic war may suffer the penalty.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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I do believe that Love was the first to invent torture among mankind. This conjecture do I form from myself at home, not to go seek it out of doors;
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I, who surpass all men, exceed them in the pangs of my feelings. I’m tossed, tormented, agitated, goaded, whirled on the wheel of love in my misery, I’m deprived of sensation, carried one way, carried another way, I’m torn and rent asunder; such clouded faculties of mind have I,
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where I am, there I am not; where I am not, there my thoughts are; to such a degree have I now all kinds of feelings in me; what I like, then all at once I like not the same; so much does love trifle with me changing my mind,
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drive me, pursue, desire, and seize for itself, retain, trepan, and promise; what it gives, it gives not; it deludes me; what this moment it has persuaded me, it now dissuades me from; what it has dissuaded me from, it now points out to me that same.
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After the manner of the sea is it experienced by me; so much does it distract my enamoured feelings; and only in that, in my misery, I do not sink utterly, is there any evil removed from me thus ruined;
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in such a way has my father detained me these six days running in the country, at his house there; nor has it been allowed me in the meantime to visit my mistress. Isn’t this dreadful to relate?
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MELAENIS
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Are you joking for this reason, because you’ve got another wife engaged, a rich lady of Lemnos? Have her then! We are neither of a family so great as you are, nor is our wealth so substantial as yours; but still
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I have no fears that any one will impeach our oath; you then, if you shall feel any pain, will know for what reason you do feel pain.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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May the Gods confound me—
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MELAENIS
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Whatever you wish for, I desire it may befall you.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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If ever I’ll marry that wife which my father has engaged for me.
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MELAENIS
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And me, if ever I give you my daughter for a wife.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Will you allow me to be forsworn?
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MELAENIS
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Yes, and a little more easily than myself and my affairs to go to ruin, and my daughter to be trifled with. Begone! go seek where there is confidence enough in your oaths; here now, with us, Alcesimarchus, you’ve renounced your title Renounced your title: Confregisti tesseram. Literally, you have broken your tally, or ticket. These were pieces of wood cut in half, and fitting each other. They were exchanged by friends, and denoted their readiness, on the presenting thereof, to entertain each other with hospitality. She means that Alcesimarchus has broken his word, and has lost his right to be considered as a friend. See the Pœnulus, l. 1047. to our friendship.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Make trial of me but once.
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MELAENIS
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I have made that trial full oft; which I lament has been so made.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Give her back to me.
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MELAENIS
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Under new circumstances I’ll use an old proverb: What I have given, I wish I had not given; what’s left, that I shall not give.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Won’t you restore her again to me?
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MELAENIS
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Answer yourself for me.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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You won’t restore her then?
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MELAENIS
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You know the whole of my resolution already.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Is that quite resolved upon by you in your heart?
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MELAENIS
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Why, in fact, I’m thinking about something else;
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i’ faith, I don’t at present catch these words of yours with my ears.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Not hear? Why, what are you doing?
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MELAENIS
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Part of line 511 in Latin attributed to the prior speaker.Then do you give heed at once, that you may know what you are doing.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Then, so may the Gods and Goddesses of above and below, and of middle rank Of middle rank: Medioxumi. By these are meant the Demigods., and so may Juno the queen and the daughter And the daughter: In his confusion he calls Juno, the sister and wife of Jupiter, his daughter. of supreme Jove, and so may Saturn his uncle—
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MELAENIS
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I’ troth, his father—
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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And so may Ops the opulent, his grandam—
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MELAENIS
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Indeed, his mother, rather.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Juno his daughter, and Saturn his uncle, supreme Jove—You are maddening me; it’s through you I make these mistakes.
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MELAENIS
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Go on saying so.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Is it that I’m to know That I’m to know: According to the suggestion of Rost, the reading sciam, I may know, has been preferred to scias, you may know, in the present passage. what conclusion you are going to come to?
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MELAENIS
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Go on talking; I shall not send her back, that’s resolved upon.
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ALCESIMARCHUS
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Why then, so may Jupiter,
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and so may Juno and Saturn, to me, so may—I don’t know what to say—Now I know—Yes, madam, listen, that you may know my mind; may all the Deities, great and small, and those honored with the platter Honored with the platter: Patellarii. These were the Lares and Penates, the household Gods, to whom offerings were made of victuals in small plates or platters. Ovid, in the Fasti, B. 2, l. 634, says: Offer, too a share of the viands, that the presented platter, testimony of the pleasing honor, may feed the well-girt Lares. cause me not surviving to give a kiss this day to Silenium, if I don’t this very day murder you and your daughter and myself,
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and after that, with the break of day, if I don’t to-morrow kill you both, and indeed, by all the powers, if at the third onset I don’t demolish you all, if you don’t send her back to me. I’ve said what I intended. Farewell.
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MELAENIS
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He’s gone in-doors in a rage. What shall I do now? If she comes back to him, matters will be just in the same position. When satiety begins to take possession;
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he’ll be turning her out of doors, when he shall be bringing home this Lemnian wife. But still I’ll go and follow him; there’s necessity for caution, lest he, in love, should be doing some mischief. In fine, since with strict justice a poor person’s not allowed to contend with a rich one, I’ll lose my labour rather than lose my daughter. But who’s this that straight along the street is directing his course this way?
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Both the other matter do I fear, and this do I dread; so utterly in trepidation am wretched I.
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LAMPADISCUS
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I’ve followed the old woman with my clamour through the streets; I’ve kept her most dreadfully plagued. In what a multitude of ways has she, this day, kept guard upon herself, and been able to remember nothing. How many alluring things, what advantages I’ve promised her.
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How many inventions I’ve applied to her, how many stratagems in questioning her. With difficulty have I extorted it from her that she should tell me, because I promised to give her a cask of wine.
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PHANOSTRATA
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I seemed just now to be hearing the voice of my servant Lampadiscus before the house.
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LAMPADISCUS
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You are not deaf, mistress, you heard aright.
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PHANOSTRATA
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What are you doing here?
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LAMPADISCUS
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A thing for you to rejoice at.
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PHANOSTRATA
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What’s that?
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LAMPADISCUS
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A little while ago, I saw a woman coming out of that house there.
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PHANOSTRATA
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Her that took up my daughter?
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LAMPADISCUS
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You have the matter rgiht.
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PHANOSTRATA
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What after that?
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LAMPADISCUS
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I told her in what way I had seen her take up the daughter of my mistress from the Hippodrome.
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Then she was in a fright.
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MELAENIS
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(apart.) Now my body’s in a shudder, my heart is throbbing; for I recollect that from the Hippodrome the little female infant was brought to me, and that I brought it up as my own.
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PHANOSTRATA
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Come, prithee, do go on; my soul’s longing to hear
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how the matter proceeded.
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MELAENIS
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(apart.) I only wish you couldn’t hear.
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LAMPADISCUS
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I proceed sayingSaying: We are to suppose that on following the Procuress to her own house, he says this to Gymnasium, taking her for the young woman whom he is in search of. Probably a large portion of the Play is lost here., This old woman calls you her daughter wrongfully. For this woman here is your foster-mother, so don’t think she is your mother. I’m to take you back and invite you to opulence, where you may be settled in a noble family,
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where your father may present you with twenty great talents for a portion. For this is not a place where after the Etrurian mode The Etrurian mode: The Tuscans or Etrurians, who were said to have been originally a colony from Lydia, are by some writers stated to have forced their young women to gain their marriage-portions by prostitution. Herodotus alludes to this custom of the Lydians. you are disgracefully to earn a dowry for yourself by prostitution of your person.
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PHANOSTRATA
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Is she, pray, a Courtesan, who took it up?
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LAMPADISCUS
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Yes, she was a Courtesan. But how it happened, I’ll tell you about that matter. I was now winning her over to me by my persuasion. The old woman embraced her knees, weeping and entreating that she would not forsake her; saying that she was her own daughter; and she took a solemn oath to me that she herself had borne her.
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Her, said she, whom you are in search of, I gave to a friend of mine to bring her up as her own daughter; and she is alive, said she. Where is she? immediately said I.
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PHANOSTRATA
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Preserve me, ye Gods, I do entreat you.
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MELAENIS
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But me you are undoing!
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PHANOSTRATA
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You ought to have enquired to whom she gave it.
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LAMPADISCUS
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I did enquire, and she said to the Courtesan Melaenis.
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MELAENIS
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He has mentioned my name? I’m utterly undone!
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LAMPADISCUS
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When she mentioned her, I straightway asked, Where does she live? said I; take and show me. She has been carried off hence, says she, to live abroad.
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MELAENIS
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He’s sprinkling He’s sprinkling: This metaphor, which is also used in the Trinummus, is taken from the custom of throwing cold water on persons when in a fainting state a little cold water now.
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LAMPADISCUS
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Wherever she has been carried off, thither we will follow. Do you trifle in this fashion? You are undone, if, i’ faith, you don’t disclose this.I insisted to such a degree, that the old woman swore that she would soon inform me.
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PHANOSTRATA
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But you oughtn’t to have let her go.
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LAMPADISCUS
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She’s all safe; but she said that she wished first to meet a certain woman, a friend of hers, with whom this was a matter of interest in common, and I’m sure she’ll come.
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MELAENIS
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She’ll be discovering me, and adding her own distress to mine.
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PHANOSTRATA
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Make me acquainted what you now wish me to do.
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LAMPADISCUS
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Go in-doors, and be of good heart. If your husband shall come, bid him wait at home, lest he should be required by me, if I want him for anything. I’m going to run back to the old woman.
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PHANOSTRATA
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Lampadio, prithee, do take care.
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LAMPADISCUS
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I’ll have this matter well managed.
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PHANOSTRATA
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I trust in the Gods and in yourself.
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LAMPADISCUS
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And I in the same.—that you’ll now go home.
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MELAENIS
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Young man, stay and listen.
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LAMPADISCUS
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What, are you calling to me, woman?
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MELAENIS
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To you.
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LAMPADISCUS
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What’s the matter? For I’m fully engaged.
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MELAENIS
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Who lives there?
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LAMPADISCUS
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Demipho, my master.
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MELAENIS
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It is he, I suppose, that has betrothed his daughter with such great wealth to Alcesimarchus?
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LAMPADISCUS
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It is he himself.
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MELAENIS
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How now, you? What other daughter, then, are you people now in search of?
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LAMPADISCUS
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I’ll tell you; not his daughter by his wife, but his wife’s daughter.
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MELAENIS
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What’s the meaning of that speech?
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LAMPADISCUS
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By a former woman, I say, my master had a daughter born.