And Theophilus, in his Amateur of the Flute, says-
Lest he should with disastrous shipwreck fall
Into Meconis, Lais, or Sisymbrion,

Or Barathrum, or Thallusa, or any other

With whom the panders bait their nets for youths,
Nannium, or Malthace.

53. Now when Myrtilus had uttered all this with extreme volubility, he added:-May no such disaster befal you, O philosophers, who even before the rise of the sect called Voluptuaries, yourselves broke down the wall of pleasure, as Eratosthenes somewhere or other expresses it. And indeed I have now quoted enough of the smart sayings of the courtesans, and I will pass on to another topic. And first of all, I will speak of that most devoted lover of truth, Epicurus, who, never having been initiated into the encyclic series of learning, used to say that those were well off who applied themselves to philosophy in the same way in which he did himself; and these were his words-"I praise and congratulate you, my young man, because you have come over to the study of philosophy unimbued with any system." On which account Timon styles him

The most unletter'd schoolmaster alive.

Now, had not this very Epicurus Leontium for his mistress, her, I mean, who was so celebrated as a courtesan ? But she did not cease to live as a prostitute when she began to learn philosophy, but still prostituted herself to the whole sect of Epicureans in the gardens, and to Epicurus himself, in the most open manner; so that this great philosopher was exceedingly fond of her, though he mentions this fact in his epistles to Hermarchus.

54. But as for Lais of Hyccara-(and Hyccara is a city in Sicily, from which place she came to Corinth, having been made a prisoner of war, as Polemo relates in the sixth book of his History, addressed to Timæus: and Aristippus was one of her lovers, and so was Demosthenes the orator, and Diogenes the Cynic: and it was also said that the Venus, which is at Corinth, and is called Melænis, appeared to her in a dream, intimating to her by such an appearance that she would be courted by many lovers of great wealth ;)—Lais, I say, is mentioned by Hyperides, in the second of his speeches against Aristagoras. And Apelles the painter, having seen

Lais while she was still a maiden, drawing water at the fountain Pirene, and marvelling at her beauty, took her with him on one occasion to a banquet of his friends. And when his companions laughed at him because he had brought a maiden with him to the party, instead of a courtesan, he said

"Do not wonder, for I will show you that she is quite beautiful enough for future enjoyment within three years." And a prediction of this sort was made by Socrates also, respecting Theodote the Athenian, as Xenophon tells us in his Memorabilia, for he used to say-"That she was very beautiful, and had a bosom finely shaped beyond all description. And let us," said he, "go and see the woman; for people cannot judge of beauty by hearsay." But Lais was so beautiful, that painters used to come to her to copy her bosom and her breasts. And Lais was a rival of Phryne, and had an immense number of lovers, never caring whether they were rich or poor, and never treating them with any insolence.

55. And Aristippus every year used to spend whole days with her in Ægina, at the festival of Neptune. And once, being reproached by his servant, who said to him-" You give her such large sums of money, but she admits Diogenes the Cynic for nothing" he answered, "I give Lais a great deal, that I myself may enjoy her, and not that no one else may." And when Diogenes said, "Since you, O Aristippus, cohabit with a common prostitute, either, therefore, become a Cynic yourself, as I am, or else abandon her;" Aristippus answered him-"Does it appear to you, O Diogenes, an absurd thing to live in a house where other men have lived before you?" "Not at all," said he. "Well, then, does it appear to you absurd to sail in a ship in which other men have sailed before you?" "By no means," said he. "Well, then," replied Aristippus, "it is not a bit more absurd to be in love with a woman with whom many men have been in love already."

And Nymphodorus the Syracusan, in his treatise on the People who have been admired and eminent in Sicily, says that Lais was a native of Hyccara, which he describes as a strong fortress in Sicily. But Strattis, in his play entitled The Macedonians or Pausanias, says that she was a Corinthian, in the following lines

1. Where do these damsels come from, and who are they?
3. At present they are come from Megara,

But they by birth are all Corinthians:
This one is Lais, who is so well known.

And Timæus, in the thirteenth book of his History, says she cute from Hyceara, (using the word in the plural number ;) as Polemo has stated, where he says that she was murdered by some women in Thessaly, because she was beloved by a Thessaltan of the name of Pausanias; and that she was beaten to death, out of envy and jealousy, by wooden footsicels in the temple of Venus; and that from this circumsance that temple is called the temple of the impious Venus; and that her tomb is shown on the banks of the Peneus, having on it an emblem of a stone water-ewer, and this inscaption

This is the tomb of Lais, to whose beauty,

Equal to that of heavenly goddesses,

The glorious and unconquer'd Greece did bow;
Love was her father, Corinth was her home,
Now in the rich Thessalian plain she lies;-

so that those men talk nonsense who say that she was buried mn Corinth, ucar the Craneum.

36. And did not Aristotle the Stagirite have a son named Vicomachus by a courtesan named Herpyllis? and did he not ive with her till his death? as Hermippus informs us in the pak book of his History of Aristotle, saying that great care wes taken of her in the philosopher's will. And did not our The 20 Pluto love Archaianassa, a courtesan of Colophon? sehat he even composed this song in her honour :

My upstress is the fair Archaianassa

Avor Colophon, a damsel in whom Love,

น on her very wrinkles irresistible.

ched are those, whom in the flower of youth,
she came across the sea, she met ;

have been entirely consumed.

Mcles the Olympian (as Clearchus tells us in a treatise on Amatory Matters) throw all on son on account of Aspasia, not the younger Like one who associated with the wise Socrates; and org he was a man who had acquired such a Ron for wisdom and political sagacity? But, inMeadow was always a man much addicted to amorous

indulgences; and he cohabited even with his own son's wife, as Stesimbrotus the Thasian informs us; and Stesimbrotus was a contemporary of his, and had seen him, as he tells us in his book entitled a Treatise on Themistocles, and Thucydides, and Pericles. And Antisthenes, the pupil of Socrates, tells us that Pericles, being in love with Aspasia, used to kiss her twice every day, once when he entered her house, and once when he left it. And when she was impeached for impiety, he himself spoke in her behalf, and shed more tears for her sake than he did when his own property and his own life were imperilled. Moreover, when Cimon had had an incestuous intrigue with Elpinice, his sister, who was afterwards given in marriage to Callias, and when he was banished, Pericles contrived his recal, exacting the favours of Elpinice as his recompense.

And Pythænetus, in the third book of his History of Ægina, says that Periander fell violently in love with Melissa, the daughter of Procles of Epidaurus, when he had seen her clothed in the Peloponnesian fashion (for she had on no cloak, but a single tunic only, and was acting as cupbearer to the young men,) and he married her. And Tigris of Leucadia was the mistress of Pyrrhus king of Epirus, who was the third in descent from the Pyrrhus who invaded Italy; but Olympias, the young man's mother, took her off by poison.

57. And Ulpian, as if he had got some unexpected gain, while Myrtilus was still speaking, said :-Do we say & Tίypis in the masculine gender? for I know that Philemon says this in his play called Neæra :—

A. Just as Seleucus sent the tiger (Tv Tlypv) here,
Which we have seen, so we in turn ought now

To send Seleucus back a beast from here.

B. Let's send him a trigeranum; for that's

An animal not known much in those parts.

And Myrtilus said to him:-Since you interrupted us when we were making out a catalogue of women, not like the lists of Sosicrates the Phanagorite, or like the catalogue of women of Nilænetus the Samian or Abderitan (whichever was really his native country), I, digressing a little, will turn to your question, my old Phoenix. Learn, then, that Alexis, in his

1 This probably means a large crane.

de mas

but I postpone salogue, as far as it

cung Epaminondas: more dignity than of dignity in the his sentiments in will admit who conBut Hyperides

Sppus out of his grant courtesan he also kept Ariswhom he bought and after that lates. But, in fesses that he he had got cured stoned Myrrhina

S and being proshe was acquitted: man that he never 6 Hermippus tells Ph's cause, as he that the judges were arth into the middle of mic and displaying her the end of his speech, with the on the pity of her judges by and ined the judges with a superhey were so moved by pity as not to be of condemning to death "a prophetess And when she was acquitted, a

deavour to excite pity on behalf of any in the following form: "That hereafter