STREPSIADES. If I placed myself with this stone in the sun and a long way off from the clerk, while he was writing out the conviction, I could make all the wax, upon which the words were written, melt.
SOCRATES. Well thought out, by the Graces!
STREPSIADES. Ah! I am delighted to have annulled the decree that was to cost me five talents.
SOCRATES. Come, take up this next question quickly.
SOCRATES. If, when summoned to court, you were in danger of losing your case for want of witnesses, how would you make the conviction fall upon your opponent?
STREPSIADES. 'Tis very simple and most easy.
STREPSIADES. This way. If another case had to be pleaded before mine was called, I should run and hang myself.
STREPSIADES. Not so, by the gods! if I was dead, no action could lie against me.
SOCRATES. You are merely beating the air. Begone! I will give you no more lessons.
STREPSIADES. Why not? Oh! Socrates! in the name of the gods!
SOCRATES. But you forget as fast as you learn. Come, what was the thing I taught you first? Tell me.
STREPSIADES. Ah! let me see. What was the first thing? What was it then? Ah! that thing in which we knead the bread, oh! my god! what do you call it?
SOCRATES. Plague take the most forgetful and silliest of old addlepates!
STREPSIADES. Alas! what a calamity! what will become of me? I am undone if I do not learn how to ply my tongue. Oh! Clouds! give me good advice.
CHORUS. Old man, we counsel you, if you have brought up a son, to send him to learn in your stead.
STREPSIADES. Undoubtedly I have a son, as well endowed as the best, but he is unwilling to learn. What will become of me?
STREPSIADES. You see, he is big and strong; moreover, through his mother he is a descendant of those fine birds, the race of Coesyra.[541] Nevertheless, I will go and find him, and if he refuses, I will turn him out of the house. Go in, Socrates, and wait for me awhile.
CHORUS (_to Socrates_). Do you understand, that, thanks to us, you will be loaded with benefits? Here is a man, ready to obey you in all things. You see how he is carried away with admiration and enthusiasm. Profit by it to clip him as short as possible; fine chances are all too quickly gone.
STREPSIADES. No, by the Clouds! you stay no longer here; go and devour the ruins of your uncle Megacles' fortune.