If I love any strangers more than you,
I'll willingly be turn'd into an eel,
That Carabus Callimedon may buy me.
And in his Crateua he says—
And Carabus Callimedon with Orpheus.
And Antiphanes says, in his Gorgythus,—
'Twould harder be to make me change my mind
Than to induce Callimedon to pass
The head of a sea-grayling.
And Eubulus, in his Persons saved, says—
Others prostrating them before the gods,
Are found with Carabus, who alone of men
Can eat whole salt-fish out of boiling dishes
So wholly as to leave no single mouthful.
And Theophilus, in his Physician, ridiculing his coldness of expression, says—"And the slave put before the young man himself with great eagerness a little eel: his father had a fine cuttle-fish before him. 'Father,' says he, 'what do you think of your crawfish?' 'It is cold,' says he; 'take it away,—I don't want to eat any orators.'"[10]
And when Philemon says, in his Canvasser,—
Agyrrius, when a crawfish was before him,
On seeing him exclaim'd, Hail, dear papa!
Still what did he do? He ate his dear papa!