TRYGAEUS. No, friend; I find it hurts me to sit on. Take it away, I won't buy.
A TRUMPET-MAKER. What is to be done with this trumpet, for which I gave sixty drachmae the other day?
TRYGAEUS. Pour lead into the hollow and fit a good, long stick to the top; and you will have a balanced cottabos.[384]
TRUMPET-MAKER. Ha! would you mock me?
TRYGAEUS. Well, here's another notion. Pour in lead as I said, add here a dish hung on strings, and you will have a balance for weighing the figs which you give your slaves in the fields.
A HELMET-MAKER. Cursed fate! I am ruined. Here are helmets, for which I gave a mina each. What am I to do with them? who will buy them?
TRYGAEUS. Go and sell them to the Egyptians; they will do for measuring loosening medicines.[385]
A SPEAR-MAKER. Ah! poor helmet-maker, things are indeed in a bad way.
TRYGAEUS. That man has no cause for complaint.
SPEAR-MAKER. But helmets will be no more used.