But Euripides, supposed (with a good deal of theatrical licence) to have been summoned by the message so oddly despatched, does not appear to his rescue. “It must be because he is so ashamed of his Palamedes,” says Mnesilochus--“I’ll try some device from another of his tragedies--I’ll be Helen, that’s his last--I’ve got the woman’s dress on, all ready.” And he proceeds to quote, from the tragedy of that name, her invocation to her husband Menelaus to come to her aid. This second appeal is successful; the poet enters, dressed in that character; and a long dialogue takes place between the two, partly in quotation and partly in parody of the words of the play,--to the considerable mystification of the assembled women. But it is in vain that the representative of Menelaus tries to take his Helen “back with him to Sparta.” The police arrive, and Mnesilochus is put in the stocks. And there he remains, though various devices from other tragedies, which give occasion for abundant parody, are tried to rescue him: forming a scene which, supposing again that the peculiar style of well-known actors was cleverly imitated, must lose nearly all its humour when read instead of being heard and seen. But the Athenian police show themselves as insensible to theatrical appeals and poetic quotations as their London representatives would probably be. At last Euripides offers terms of peace to the offended ladies: he will never abuse them in future, if they will only let his friend off now. They agree, so far as they are concerned; but the prisoner is now in the hands of the law, and Euripides must deal with the law’s representatives for his release. It is effected by the commonplace expedient of bribing the constable on duty; and so the burlesque ends,--somewhat feebly, according to our modern requirements. THE ECCLESIAZUSÆ. “The Female Parliament,” as the name of this comedy may be freely rendered, was not produced until nineteen years after the play last noticed, but may be classed with it as being also in great measure levelled against the sex. It is a broad but very amusing satire upon those ideal republics, founded upon communistic principles, of which Plato’s well-known treatise is the best example. His ‘Republic’ had been written, and probably delivered in the form of oral lectures at Athens, only two or three years before, and had no doubt excited a considerable sensation. But many of its most startling principles had long ago been ventilated in the Schools; and their authorship has been commonly attributed, as was also the art of “making the worse cause appear the better,” with very much besides of the sophistical teaching of the day, to Protagoras of Abdera.