And we should have had the buyers replying, in all the lengthy insolence of Homeric compounds:
I have gold to discharge all that I call!
If it be forty pence, I will pay all.
Again, when Agamemnon endeavours to appease the anger of Achilles by the offer of sumptuous presents, he presents him with a magnificent list of the cities in his gift; and, in order to describe the value of them, is obliged to have recourse to the vague epithets of “εὖ ναιομένα”—“ποιήεσσαν”—“βαθύλειμον”—“ἀμπελόεσσαν.” Now, if Ηomer’s heroes had understood anything of coinage, the poet would have avoided all this circumlocution, and presented us at once with a clear statement of the yearly revenues, in the style of the above-quoted songster:
For Plumpton Park I will give thee,
With tenements fair beside;
’Tis worth three hundred markes by the yeare,
To maintain thy good cow-hide.
This, however, is mere jesting. The next consideration we shall offer will be a more serious one. How happy were the men of that age! They had no such crime as forgery, no discussions about stocks, no apprehensions of a paper currency. There was no liability to imposition; no necessity for pamphlets. At the present crisis, when the increase of forgery and the dread of national bankruptcy occupy so large a portion of public attention, we, in common with other more practised quacks, come humbly forward with our nostrum. Is it not “a consummation devoutly to be wished” that Britain would consent to forego the use of these horrible mischief-workers, these bits of silver, or of silver paper, and return contentedly to the original method of traffic, making her payments in oxen or in sheep? The veriest bungler may forge a shilling, but the veriest adept would find it plaguy difficult to forge an ox.
If it be true that the ancient Greeks were thus ignorant of stamped money (for we are only repeating what has been observed upon the subject before us), it cannot but surprise us that they had made so great a proficiency in other arts, without the use of what appears in modern times absolutely[Pg 185] indispensable to social intercourse. From the descriptions of Homer they should seem to have been, in a great measure, in possession of our arts, our ideas of policy, our customs, our superstitions. Although living at so remote a period they enjoyed many of our luxuries; although corrupted and debased by the grossest of religious codes, they entertained many of our notions of morality: the most skilful artisan, and the most enlightened sage, may, even in our days, find in the poems of Homer always an incitement to curiosity, and frequently a source of instruction.
Many a lady of ton (if ladies of ton were in the habit of studying Homer) would be astonished at learning that her last new lustres would sink into insignificance by the side of the candelabras of Alcinous:
Χρύσειοι δ’ ἄρα κοῦροι ἐϋδμήτων ἐπὶ βωμῶν,
Ἔστασαν, αἰθομένας δαΐδας μετὰ χερσὶν ἔχοντες,
Φαίνοντες νύκτας κατὰ δώματα δαιτυμόνεσσιν.
Refulgent pedestals the walls surround,
Which boys of gold with flaming torches crowned;
The polished ore, reflecting every ray,
Blazed on the banquets with a double day.
Nor would she be less amazed, upon turning from these inanimate attendants, and learning the number and duties of the housemaids: