(_looking down street_) But there is Amphitryon’s servant Sosia--just coming from the harbour with a lantern. I’ll bustle him away from the house as soon as he gets here. Watch now! It will be worth your while to attend when Jove and Mercury take up the histrionic art. (_steps aside_) ACTVS I ACT I (_Time, night._) _Sos._ Qui me alter est audacior homo aut qui confidentior, iuventutis mores qui sciam, qui hoc noctis solus ambulem? quid faciam nunc, si tres viri me in carcerem compegerint? inde cras quasi e promptaria cella depromar ad flagrum, nec causam liceat dicere mihi, neque in ero quicquam auxili nec quisquam sit quin me malo omnes esse dignum deputent. ENTER _Sosia_, LANTERN IN HAND. (_stopping and peering around timorously_) Who’s a bolder man, a more audacious man than I am--know all about the young bloods and their capers, I do, yet here I am strolling around all alone at this time of night! (_seems to hear something and jumps_) What if the police should lock me up in jail? To-morrow I should be taken out of that preserve closet and get served--to a rope’s end; and not a word would they let me say for myself,[C] and not a bit of help could I get from master, and there wouldn’t be a soul but what would reckon I deserved a hiding. [Footnote C: Being a slave] ita quasi incudem me miserum homines octo validi caedant: 159-160 ita peregre adveniens hospitio publicitus accipiar. 161-162 haec eri immodestia coegit, me qui hoc noctis a portu ingratiis excitavit. nonne idem hoc luci me mittere potuit? Those eight strong wardens would pound my poor carcass just as if I was an anvil: that is how I should be entertained on coming home from abroad--a public reception. (_disgustedly_) It’s master’s impatience forced me into this, routing me out from the harbour at this time of night, against my will. Might have sent me on the same errand by daylight, mightn’t he? opulento homini hoc servitus dura est, hoc magis miser est divitis servos noctesque diesque assiduo satis superque est, quod facto aut dicto adeost opus, quietus ne sis. This is where it comes hard slaving it for a nabob, this is where a plutocrat’s servant is worse off--night and day there’s work enough and more for him, no end, always something to be done, yes, or said, so that you can’t rest. ipse dominus dives, operis et laboris expers, 170 quodcumque homini accidit libere, posse retur: aequom esse putat, non reputat laboris quid sit[10] (172) ergo in servitute expetunt multa iniqua: (174) habendum et ferundum hoc onust cum labore.