On kings thus, though it serve thee well; nor think thou canst restrain, With that thy railing faculty, their wills in least degree; For not a worse, of all this host, came with our king than thee, To Troy’s great siege; then do not take into that mouth of thine The names of kings, much less revile the dignities that shine In their supreme states, wresting thus this motion for our home, To soothe thy cowardice; since ourselves yet know not what will come Of these designments, if it be our good to stay, or go. Nor is it that thou stand’st on; thou revil’st our general so, Only because he hath so much, not given by such as thou, But our heroes. Therefore this thy rude vein makes me vow, Which shall be curiously observed, if ever I shall hear This madness from thy mouth again, let not Ulysses bear This head, nor be the father called of young Telemachus, If to thy nakedness I take and strip thee not, and thus Whip thee to fleet from council; send, with sharp stripes, weeping hence This glory thou affect’st to rail.” This said, his insolence He settled with his scepter; struck his back and shoulders so That bloody wales rose. He shrunk round, and from his eyes did flow Moist tears, and, looking filthily, he sate, feared, smarted, dried His blubbered cheeks; and all the press, though grieved to be denied Their wished retreat for home, yet laughed delightsomely, and spake Either to other: “Oh, ye gods, how infinitely take Ulysses’ virtues in our good! Author of counsels, great In ordering armies, how most well this act became his heat, To beat from council this rude fool. I think his saucy spirit Hereafter will not let his tongue abuse the sovereign merit, Exempt from such base tongues as his.” --_The Iliad._ Attributed to Homer by many, and stoutly denied by others, is a comedy called _The Battle of the Frogs and Mice_. Again we note the device of animals masquerading as human beings. Samuel Wesley, himself a humorist, calls this the oldest burlesque in the world, and he also dubs it, _The Iliad in a Nutshell_. He holds that Homer wrote it as a parody of his own masterpiece, while, conversely, Statius contends that it is a work of youth, written by Homer before he wrote _The Iliad_. Chapman deems it the work of the poet’s old age, and as none may decide when doctors disagree, many scholars deny a Homeric authorship to it at all. Plutarch asserts the real author was Pigres of Halicarnassus, who flourished during the Persian war. This first burlesque known to literature has the following plot.