Oh, you poor poor fool, you don’t know you’re being sold this moment; and here you are standing on the very block with the crier crying you! _Nic._ Responde: quis me vendit? (_mystified_) Answer! Who is selling me? _Chrys._ Quem di diligunt adulescens moritur, dum valet sentit sapit. hunc si ullus deus amaret, plus annis decem, plus iam viginti mortuom esse oportuit: terrai odium ambulat, iam nil sapit 820 nec sentit, tantist quantist fungus putidus. (_sneeringly_) He whom the gods love dies young, while he has his strength and senses and wits. If any god loved this fellow, (_indicating Nicobulus_) it’s more than ten years, more than twenty years ago, he ought to have died. He ambles along encumbering the earth, absolutely witless and senseless already, worth about as much as a mushroom-- a rotten one. _Nic._ Tun terrae me odium esse autumas? abducite hunc intro atque adstringite ad columnam fortiter. numquam auferes hinc aurum. (_furious_) So I encumber the earth, do I, according to you? (_to Artamo and slaves_) March him off inside! yes, and tie him to a pillar--tight! (_to Chrysalus_) You shall never take that gold away from me. _Chrys._ At qui iam dabis. (_mysteriously_) However, you’ll soon give it away. _Nic._ Dabo? I give it away? _Chrys._ Atque orabis me quidem ultro ut auferam, cum illum rescisces criminatorem meum quanto in periclo et quanta in pernicie siet. tum libertatem Chrysalo largibere; ego adeo numquam accipiam. Yes, and beg me, beg me of your own accord, to take it away, when you learn about that accuser of mine and what danger, what deadly danger, he’s in. Then you’ll be all for liberating Chrysalus; but not for me, I won’t be liberated. _Nic._ Dic, scelerum caput, dic, quo in periclo est meus Mnesilochus filius? 830 Speak, you fount of iniquity, speak--what danger is my son Mnesilochus in? _Chrys._ Sequere hac me, faxo iam scies. (_going toward Bacchis’s house_) This way; follow me: I’ll soon let you know. _Nic._ Quo gentium? (_following_) Where on earth are you taking me? _Chrys._ Tres unos passus. Three steps merely. _Nic._ Vel decem. Ten, for that matter. _Chrys._ Agedum tu, Artamo, forem hanc pauxillum aperi; placide, ne crepa; sat est. accede huc tu. viden convivium? Come on now, you, Artamo; open this door a tiny bit; easy, don’t make it creak. (_Artamo obeys_) That will do. (_to Nicobulus_) Step up here, you. See that jovial party? (_pointing inside_) _Nic._ Video exadvorsum Pistoclerum et Bacchidem. (_peeking in_) I see Pistoclerus and Bacchis right opposite. _Chrys._ Qui sunt in lecto illo altero? Who are on that other couch? _Nic._ Interii miser.