The Memorabilia Part 23

By Hera! a pretty invention this, Pistias, by which you contrive that the corselet should cover the parts of the person which need protection, and at the same time leave free play to the arms and hands.... but tell me, Pistias (he added), why do you ask a higher price for these corselets of yours if they are not stouter or made of costlier material than the others?

Because, Socrates (he answered), mine are of much finer proportion.

Soc. Proportion! Then how do you make this quality apparent to the customer so as to justify the higher price--by measure or weight? For I presume you cannot make them all exactly equal and of one pattern--if you make them fit, as of course you do?

Fit indeed! that I most distinctly do (he answered), take my word for it: no use in a corselet without that.

But then are not the wearer's bodies themselves (asked Socrates) some well proportioned and others ill?

Decidedly so (he answered).

Soc. Then how do you manage to make the corselet well proportioned if it is to fit an ill-proportioned body? (12)

(12) Or, "how do you make a well-proportioned corselet fit an ill- proportioned body? how well proportioned?"

Pist. To the same degree exactly as I make it fit. What fits is well proportioned.

Soc. It seems you use the term "well-proportioned" not in an absolute sense, but in reference to the wearer, just as you might describe a s.h.i.+eld as well proportioned to the individual it suits; and so of a military cloak, and so of the rest of things, in your terminology? But maybe there is another considerable advantage in this "fitting"?

Pist. Pray instruct me, Socrates, if you have got an idea.

Soc. A corselet which fits is less galling by its weight than one which does not fit, for the latter must either drag from the shoulders with a dead weight or press upon some other part of the body, and so it becomes troublesome and uncomfortable; but that which fits, having its weight distributed partly along the collar-bone and shoulder-blade, partly over the shoulders and chest, and partly the back and belly, feels like another natural integument rather than an extra load to carry. (13)

(13) Schneider ad loc. cf Eur. "Electr." 192, {prosthemata aglaias}, and for the weight cf. Aristoph. "Peace," 1224.

Pist. You have named the very quality which gives my work its exceptional value, as I consider; still there are customers, I am bound to say, who look for something else in a corselet--they must have them ornamental or inlaid with gold.

For all that (replied Socrates), if they end by purchasing an ill-fitting article, they only become the proprietors of a curiously-wrought and gilded nuisance, as it seems to me. But (he added), as the body is never in one fixed position, but is at one time curved, at another raised erect how can an exactly-modelled corselet fit?

Pist. It cannot fit at all.

You mean (Socrates continued) that it is not the exactly-modelled corselet which fits, but that which does not gall the wearer in the using?

Pist. There, Socrates, you have hit the very point. I see you understand the matter most precisely. (14)

(14) Or, "There, Socrates, you have hit the very phrase. I could not state the matter more explicitly myself."

XI

There was once in the city a fair woman named Theodote. (1) She was not only fair, but ready to consort with any suitor who might win her favour. Now it chanced that some one of the company mentioned her, saying that her beauty beggared description. "So fair is she," he added, "that painters flock to draw her portrait, to whom, within the limits of decorum, she displays the marvels of her beauty." "Then there is nothing for it but to go and see her," answered Socrates, "since to comprehend by hearsay what is beyond description is clearly impossible." Then he who had introduced the matter replied: "Be quick then to follow me"; and on this wise they set off to seek Theodote. They found her "posing" to a certain painter; and they took their stand as spectators. Presently the painter had ceased his work; whereupon Socrates:

(1) For Theodote see Athen. v. 200 F, xiii. 574 F; Liban. i. 582. Some say that it was Theodote who stood by Alcibiades to the last, though there are apparently other better claimants to the honour.

Plut. "Alc." (Clough, ii. p. 50).

"Do you think, sirs, that we ought to thank Theodote for displaying her beauty to us, or she us for coming to gaze at her?... It would seem, would it not, that if the exhibition of her charms is the more profitable to her, the debt is on her side; but if the spectacle of her beauty confers the greater benefit on us, then we are her debtors."

Some one answered that "was an equitable statement of the case."

Well then (he continued), as far as she is concerned, the praise we bestow on her is an immediate gain; and presently, when we have spread her fame abroad, she will be further benefited; but for ourselves the immediate effect on us is a strong desire to touch what we have seen; by and by, too, we shall go away with a sting inside us, and when we are fairly gone we shall be consumed with longing. Consequently it seems that we should do her service and she accept our court.

Whereupon Theodote: Oh dear! if that is how the matter stands, it is I who am your debtor for the spectacle. (2)

(2) In reference to the remark of Socrates above; or, "have to thank you for coming to look at me."

At this point, seeing that the lady herself was expensively attired, and that she had with her her mother also, whose dress and style of attendance (3) were out of the common, not to speak of the waiting-women--many and fair to look upon, who presented anything but a forlorn appearance; while in every respect the whole house itself was sumptuously furnished--Socrates put a question:

(3) Or, "her mother there with her in a dress and general get-up ({therapeia}) which was out of the common." See Becker, "Charicles," p. 247 (Eng. tr.)

Pray tell me, Theodote, have you an estate in the country?

Theod. Not I indeed.

Soc. Then perhaps you possess a house and large revenues along with it?

Theod. No, nor yet a house.

Soc. You are not an employer of labour on a large scale? (4)

(4) Lit. "You have not (in your employ) a body of handicraftsmen of any sort?"

Theod. No, nor yet an employer of labour.

Soc. From what source, then, do you get your means of subsistence? (5)

(5) Or, Anglice, "derive your income."

Theod. My friends are my life and fortune, when they care to be kind to me.

Soc. By heaven, Theodote, a very fine property indeed, and far better worth possessing than a mult.i.tude of sheep or goats or cattle. A flock of friends!... But (he added) do you leave it to fortune whether a friend lights like a fly on your hand at random, or do you use any artifice (6) yourself to attract him?

(6) Or, "means and appliances," "machinery."

Theod. And how might I hit upon any artifice to attract him?

Soc. Bless me! far more naturally than any spider. You know how they capture the creatures on which they live; (7) by weaving webs of gossamer, is it not? and woe betide the fly that tumbles into their toils! They eat him up.

(7) Lit. "the creatures on which they live."

Theod. So then you would counsel me to weave myself some sort of net?

Soc. Why, surely you do not suppose you are going to ensnare that n.o.blest of all game--a lover, to wit--in so artless a fas.h.i.+on? Do you not see (to speak of a much less n.o.ble sort of game) what a number of devices are needed to bag a hare? (8) The creatures range for their food at night; therefore the hunter must provide himself with night dogs.

At peep of dawn they are off as fast as they can run. He must therefore have another pack of dogs to scent out and discover which way they betake them from their grazing ground to their forms; (9) and as they are so fleet of foot that they run and are out of sight in no time, he must once again be provided with other fleet-footed dogs to follow their tracks and overtake them; (10) and as some of them will give even these the slip, he must, last of all, set up nets on the paths at the points of escape, so that they may fall into the meshes and be caught.

(8) See the author's own treatise on "Hunting," vi. 6 foll.

(9) Lit. "from pasture to bed."

(10) Or, "close at their heels and run them down." See "Hunting"; cf.