Drink waters three or five; but never four.
What they mean is, You had better take two parts wine with five of water, or one of wine to three of water. But, concerning this mixture, Ion the poet, in his book on Chios, says that Palamedes the soothsayer discovered and prophesied to the Greeks, that they would have a favourable voyage if they drank one portion of wine to three of water. But they, applying themselves to their drink very vigorously, took two pints of wine to five of water;—accordingly Nicochares in his Amymone, playing on the name, says—
Here, you Œnomaus,—here, you two and five,—
Let you and I now have a drink together.
And he said nearly the same in his Lemnian Women: and Ameipsias, in his Men Playing the Cottabus, says—
THE PROPORTIONS OF MIXED WINE.
But I (it is Bacchus who is represented as speaking) am five
and two to all of you.
And Eupolis says, in his Goats,—
Hail, my friend Bacchus, are you two to five?
And Hermippus says, in his Gods,—
A. Then, when we drink, or when we thirsty are,
We pray our wine may be in due proportion.
B. I do not bring it from a roguish wine-vault,
Meaning to mock you: this which I do bring
Is, as before, the proper two and five.