"I do not know," lisped Aristotle. "It is his habit always to expose himself in battle."
"Can he make himself master of Hellas?" Ariston asked again.
"Only the Gods can answer that," Aristotle replied. "It is safe to say that what human ambition can accomplish, he will do. He was my pupil, and there are those who maintain that he knows more than his master!"
Although the philosopher spoke with a smile, there was a trace of irony in his tone that did not escape the alert Athenian.
"You hear that?" he cried, turning to Clearchus. "Here is a boy who begins by conquering his instructor. Where will he end?"
"They say he has ended already, up there among the savages," Chares said lazily.
"I'll lay you a box of Assyrian ointment that Alexander is still alive," Aristotle said.
"It's a wager," the Theban cried. "And the box shall be of gold."
"There goes Callicles. Hi, there, old Twenty Per Cent!" cried a youth who was sitting in front of them.
"By the Styx, I wish I had what I owe him!" Chares remarked fervently.