“Good-day, Myrrhus the philosopher! Will you drink with me a cup of wine?”
“That will I!” said Myrrhus, “and with thanks for the boon!”
The slaves poured the wine, and the philosopher drank. Said Myrina: “Dion and Simonides and I were disputing—Make me a gift in return, O Myrrhus, and answer three questions.”
“If I may, I will, Myrina the fair. What is the first?”
“Why, Myrrhus, when the sculptors make great forms of goddesses who are women, and why, when the poets write with so great beauty of goddesses who are women, and why when all hearts grant to these, who are surely women, power and attributes, why do the Hellenes rate women so low?”
“Those others,” said Myrrhus, “are Olympian women.”
“Am I answered?—This is the second question. Does Æschylus speak truly for Apollo when he causes him to say—
“‘The mother bears, but never truly makes the child,
Only the father makes’?”
“I, O Myrina, am not a poet but a philosopher.—So Æschylus said Apollo said.—Women cry to Demeter for many things, but never, that I heard of, for vengeance upon Æschylus! So, none objecting, it must be true.”
The cicadas made music in the tree. Myrina regarded the dust at her feet. She laughed, a dry sound like the cicadas’ tune. “Low things, rated lowly, put up low claims.—Give me wine, Xanthus.”