“Copy
OF
Callippides’ Last Will.“May all be well! I hereby make the following disposition of my estate. The little rented dwelling in the Piræeus shall be sold to the highest bidder and the money used for my funeral obsequies, which must be worthy of my birth. The tomb shall be built on the road to Budoron, opposite to the garden attached to General Myronides’ country-seat, and the memorial stone is to be a plain column inscribed with the name and date of birth and death. Nothing more.
“I free my slave Manes and, as I have no relatives, I give him for his property my house in the Street of the Potters, with the garden belonging to it, on condition that he always takes care of the tomb.
“The papyrus furnished with a seal, of which this is a copy, is deposited with Philon, son of Sophilus. The witnesses are: Lycon, son of Hegesias, and Charicles, son of Theron.”
By the side of the papyrus lay a note in which was written:
“To Manes:
“Conceal the manner of my death, that I may go to the grave unmutilated.[G] Say that you found me dead in the chair.
“In a box on the table is a ring with an exquisitely-carved stone, representing Charis bathing her mistress Aphrodite in the sacred grove at Paphos. Take the ornament to Melitta, General Myronides’ daughter, and say to her: ‘My dead master Callippides, your neighbor, begs you to accept this ring, which belonged to his mother. You can wear it without fear; from the day he first saw you he has not been a sycophant.’
“To you, my faithful Manes, I say: Farewell, and do not grieve. It is better to have poison in the body than in the soul.”
[G] It was the custom to punish suicides by cutting off the right hand.
The old man gave free course to his tears.
As if in a dream he heard the birds twittering in the garden; the refreshing fragrance of the dewy verdure entered, filling the room, and through the still morning air echoed nearer and nearer the rumbling of chariots. Outside was heard the Acharnians’ usual cry in the streets:
“Buy charcoal! Buy vinegar!”
The unexpected and the usual, stillness and awakening traffic, death and life, blended so strangely in this hour that the old man experienced a feeling he had never before known.
Without knowing what he was doing he knelt and kissed his dead master’s hand, then clasping his own he cried in his simple, honest fashion:
“May the twelve Olympians grant him every blessing! He was a kind master.”