HIEROCLES What are you laughing at?
TRYGAEUS Ha, ha! your apes amuse me!
HIEROCLES You simple pigeons, you trust yourselves to foxes, who are all craft, both in mind and heart.
TRYGAEUS Oh, you trouble-maker! may your lungs get as hot as this meat!
HIEROCLES Nay, nay! if only the Nymphs had not fooled Bacis, and Bacis mortal men; and if the Nymphs had not tricked Bacis a second time...(1)
f(1) Emphatic pathos, incomprehensible even to the diviner
himself; this is a satire on the obscure style of the
oracles. Bacis was a famous Boeotian diviner.
TRYGAEUS May the plague seize you, if you don't stop wearying us with your Bacis!
HIEROCLES ...it would not have been written in the book of Fate that the bends of Peace must be broken; but first...
TRYGAEUS The meat must be dusted with salt.
HIEROCLES ...it does not please the blessed gods that we should stop the War until the wolf uniteth with the sheep.