Sumetur Hecyra sexta ex his fabula.
The Step-mother is reckoned the last of the six.
The Eunuch was acted twice in one day[17]; and the author received for it a higher price than was ever paid for any comedy before that time, viz., eight thousand sesterces[18]: on account of the magnitude of the sum, it is mentioned in the title of that play. Varro[19] even prefers the opening scenes of the Brothers of Terence to the same part in Menander. The report that Terence was indebted to Scipio and Lælius, with whom he was so intimate, for parts of his comedies, is well known; and he himself scarcely seems to have discouraged the assertion, as he never seriously denies it: witness the Prologue to the Brothers:
Nam quod isti dicunt malevoli, homines nobiles
Eum adjutare, assidueque una scribere:
Quod illi maledictum vehemens existimant,
Eam laudem hic ducit maximam, cum illis placet
Qui vobis universis, et populo placent:
Quorum opera in bello, in otio, in negotio
Suo quisque tempore usus est sine superbia.