In Lucian the most remarkable specimen, and that which has been most frequently quoted and borrowed, is the retort of the lady to her lover about the small size of the cask of wine which he had sent to her, considering its reputed age; and this is also in the Deipnosophistæ, where it is related, however, of Phryne.
Perhaps the most interesting feature in the latter work, in connection with the immediate topic, is the notice which we get of the Athenian Club of the Sixty, in the time of Demosthenes. Even the names or sobriquets of some of the members have survived; and Philip of Macedon honoured the institution by the expression of his regret that his other avocations precluded him from joining it, and by a simultaneous request that a collection of all the good sayings uttered at its gatherings should be sent to him. Whether or not this flattering requisition was supplied, there is no record; but in any case it shadows the possibility of a jest-book far more ancient, and presumably also more copious, than that of Hierocles.
It thus appears, moreover, that the earliest companionship of anecdotes of all descriptions is with the feast and the cup; the lost conversational gems of the Attic Sexagint were distilled over the convivial glass; and the pages of Athenæus are put forward in like manner as the gradual progeny of table-talk—table-talk which may have received in not a few instances the polishing touches of an editor.
The student who may be at the pains to consult the Deipnosophistæ and its analogues will probably concur with me in the opinion that such repositories were little calculated to prove advantageous resorts for later compilers of bons-mots. Not merely is it that the bulk of the matter is not with ease transfusible into a modern language, but the spirit and atmosphere of these effusions are foreign to our sympathies; and the wittiest sayings of the wittiest of Corinthian humourists, male or female, are apt to strike us, not having the context, as vapid and pointless.
Athenæus has preserved several of the repartees of Gnathæna, the celebrated courtesan. One of the best of them appears to be her play upon words, when Pausanius, who was nicknamed Laccus, fell into a cask, and she remarked that the cellar (laccus) had fallen into the cask. Another is by no means contemptible. “Once, when a chattering fellow was relating that he had just come from the Hellespont, ‘Why, then,’ said she, ‘did you not go to the first city in that country?’ and when he asked what city, ‘To Sigeum,’ said she.” But in a third, which occurs immediately below, the salt is very thinly sprinkled:—
“On one occasion, when Chærephon came to sup with her without an invitation, Gnathæna pledged him in a cup of wine. ‘Take it,’ said she, ‘you proud fellow!’ ‘I proud?’ ‘Who can be more so,’ said she, ‘when you come without even being invited?’”
Here is one of another hetaira, Nico by name:—
“Once, when she met a parasite, who was very thin in consequence of a long sickness, she said to him, ‘How lean you are!’ ‘No wonder,’ says he, ‘for what do you think is all I have had to eat these three days?’ ‘Why, a leather bottle,’ says she, ‘or perhaps your shoes.’”
Our author adduces these and several other ineptitudes of similar calibre in honest good faith, and assures us that the lady was always very neat and witty in all she said. He adds that she compiled a code of laws for banquets, in compliance with which her friends were required to pay their respects to her and her daughters; but these regulations have not been preserved. It is to be hoped that they were wiser than her jocular achievements.
The same criticism is, in the main, applicable to the gossip which Athenæus has bequeathed to us about three other distinguished members of the sisterhood—Lais, Glycera and Thais. One of these items concerns, however, the dramatist Menander, and awakens an independent interest:—