GARLANDS.
But Philoxenus the Dithyrambic poet, in his poem entitled
The Banquet, represents the garland as entering into the
commencement of the banquet, using the following language:
Then water was brought in to wash the hands,
Which a delicate youth bore in a silver ewer,
Ministering to the guests; and after that
He brought us garlands of the tender myrtle,
Close woven with young richly-colour'd shoots.
And Eubulus, in his Nurses, says—
For when the old men came into the house,
At once they sate them down. Immediately
Garlands were handed round; a well-fill'd board
Was placed before them, and (how good for th' eyes!)
A closely-kneaded loaf of barley bread.
And this was the fashion also among the Egyptians, as Nicostratus says in his Usurer; for, representing the usurer as an Egyptian, he says—
A. We caught the pimp and two of his companions,
When they had just had water for their hands,
And garlands.
B. Sure the time, O Chærophon,
Was most propitious.
But you may go on gorging yourself, O Cynulcus; and when you have done, tell us why Cratinus has called the melilotus "the ever-watching melilotus." However, as I see you are already a little tipsy ([Greek: exoinon])—for that is the word Alexis has used for a man thoroughly drunk ([Greek: methysên]), in his Settler—I won't go on teasing you; but I will bid the slaves, as Sophocles says in his Fellow Feasters,
Come, quick! let some one make the barley-cakes,
And fill the goblets deep; for this man now,
Just like a farmer's ox, can't work a bit
Till he has fill'd his belly with good food.
And there is a man of the same kind mentioned by Aristias of Phlius; for he, too, in his play entitled The Fates, says—
The guest is either a boatman or a parasite,
A hanger-on of hell, with hungry belly,
Which nought can satisfy.
However, as he gives no answer whatever to all these things which have been said, I order him (as it is said in the Twins of Alexis) to be carried out of the party, crowned with [Greek: chydaioi] garlands. But the comic poet, alluding to [Greek: chydaioi] garlands, says—
These garlands all promiscuously ([Greek: chydên]) woven.
