NOTE B.
On a Passage in Xenophon.—[p. 46].
The passage from Xenophon translated in the text is this: Οἱ οὖν ἀμφὶ τὸν Σωκράτην πρῶτον μέν, ὥσπερ εἰκὸς ἦν, ἐπαινοῦντες τὴν κλῆσιν οὐχ ὑπισχνοῦντο συνδειπνήσειν. ὡς δὲ πάνυ ἀχθόμενος φανερὸς ἦν, εἰ μὴ ἕψοιντο, συνηκολούθησαν. Sympos. c. 1. 7. Ernesti is angry at the ὥσπερ εἰκὸς, which is soon after repeated, when speaking of the order in which the guests placed themselves at table. He wants, in the last passage, to change it into ὡς ἔτυχον. But though the emendation is plausible, there seems to be no necessity to alter the reading. Xenophon is, indeed, remarkably fond of that phrase. The εἰκὸς, in both places, probably means according to custom. It might be applied to the order of precedence in England, and it should seem to have been used by Xenophon to denote the Greek sense of propriety in taking a place at table. In Spain, where there is no established order, a great deal of bowing and scraping takes place before the guests can arrange that important point. But, without any settled rule, there is a tact which seldom misleads any one who wishes not to give offence. This is probably the second ὥσπερ εἰκὸς of Xenophon.