length he exclaimed, with a loud voice, ‘Do not kill my father Croesus.’
A retort.
48.Once upon a time a certain man came to Aristippus, the philosopher, and said to him: ‘Art thou willing to teach my son your sciences?’ Aristippus replied, ‘I will do so on receiving two talents.’ But the father, terrified at the price, said, ‘Why, I can buy a slave for less.’ Aristippus (said) in reply, ‘Do so; thus you will have two slaves.’
An affectionate fish.
49.Once upon a time a dolphin is said to have formed a friendship with a certain boy. Now it being called by the boy daily used to receive crumbs of bread. It used to come to the top of the water, and, having received the crumbs, used to take the boy on its back. When the boy died, the dolphin is said to have died of grief.
Practical philosophy.
50.A certain youth had lived for a long time at the house of the philosopher Zeno. At length he returned home. Then his father questions him in these words‘What hast thou learnt, my son?’ The son (said) in reply, ‘I shall show you this by my conduct, father.’ The father, taking this reply very ill, laidied him with whips. The son remarked, ‘I have learned (how) to bear a father’s anger.’
Philoctetes.
51.The poets tell many (stories) of Philoctetes. He is said to have been the armour-bearer of Hercules, and to have received from him the arrows (which had been) dipped in the poisonous blood of the Hydra. Now, his foot was woimded by a falling arrow or the tooth of a serpent. From this wound arose a very unpleasant smell, so the Greeks drove him from them, and left him in the island of Lemnos. Here for a long time he lived alone in a cave. But the Greeks were not able to take Troy without his arrows. Then, indeed, Ulysses and Diomedes (were)
