[666] An Argive to whom Conon entrusted the command of his fleet when he went to the court of the King of Persia.—In this passage the poet is warning his fellow-citizens not to alienate the goodwill of the allies by their disdain, but to know how to honour those among them who had distinguished themselves by their talents.
[667] The Lacedaemonians, after having recalled their king, Agesilas, who gained the victory of Coronea, were themselves beaten at sea off Cnidus by Conon and Pharnabazus. 'Twas no doubt this victory which gave a spark of hope to the Athenians, who had suffered so cruelly during so many years; but Aristophanes declares that, in order to profit by this return of fortune, they must recall Thrasybulus, the deliverer of Athens in 401 B.C. He was then ostensibly employed in getting the islands of the Aegean sea and the towns of the Asiatic coast to return under the Athenian power, but this was really only an honourable excuse for thrusting him aside for reasons of jealousy.
[668] Unknown.
[669] During the earlier years of the Peloponnesian war, when the annual invasion of Attica by the Lacedaemonians drove the country population into the city.
[670] A demagogue, otherwise unknown.
[671] Cephalus' father was said to have been a tinker.
[672] The comic poets accused him of being an alien by birth and also an informer and a rogue. See the 'Plutus.'
[673] There was a Greek saying, "Look into the backside of a dog and of three foxes" which, says the Scholiast, used to be addressed to those who had bad eyes. But the precise point of the joke here is difficult to see.
[674] An obscene allusion; [Greek: hupokrouein] means both pulsare and subagitare,—to strike, and also to move to the man in sexual intercourse.
[675] In order to vote.