[[5]] The house-dog wags his tail, and rubs his nose
Against your legs; and servants hasten quick,
Unbidden all, since their lord's secret wish
Is known full well, to place an easy chair
To rest your weary limbs.
5. It would be a good thing if other rich men were like him; since when a man acts in a different manner, people are apt to say to him, "Why are you so mean? Your tents are full of wine."
Call the elders to the feast,
Such a course befits you best.
Such as this was the magnanimity of the great Alexander. And Conon, after he had conquered the Lacedæmonians in the sea-fight off Cnidus, and fortified the Piræus, sacrificed a real hecatomb, which deserved the name, and feasted all the Athenians. And Alcibiades, who conquered in the chariot race at the Olympic games, getting the first, and second, and fourth prizes, (for which victories Euripides wrote a triumphal ode,) having sacrificed to Olympian Jupiter, feasted the whole assembly. And Leophron did the same at the Olympic games, Simonides of Ceos writing a triumphal ode for him. And Empedocles of Agrigentum, having gained the victory in the horse race at the Olympic games, as he was himself a Pythagorean, and as such one who abstained from meat, made an image of an ox of myrrh, and frankincense, and the most expensive spices, and distributed it among all who came to that festival. And Ion of Chios, having gained the tragic crown at Athens, gave a pot of Chian wine to every Athenian citizen. For Antiphanes says:—
For why should any man wealth desire,
And seek to pile his treasures higher,
If it were not to aid his friends in their need,
And to gain for himself love's and gratitude's meed?
For all can drink and all can eat,
And it is not only the richest meat,
Or the oldest wine in the well-chased bowl
Which can banish hunger and thirst from the soul.
And Xenophanes of Chalcedon, and Speusippus the Academic philosopher, and Aristotle, have all written drinking songs.
And in the same manner Gellias of Agrigentum, being a very hospitable man, and very attentive to all his guests, gave a tunic and cloak to every one of five hundred horsemen who once came to him from Gela in the winter season.
[[6]] 6. The sophist uses the word Dinnerchaser, on which Clearchus says that Charmus the Syracusan adopted some little versicles and proverbs very neatly to whatever was put on the table. As on seeing a fish, he says:—
I come from the salt depths of Ægeus' sea.
And when he saw some ceryces he said—