[398] “Aristophanes, in his Comedy of the Knights, satirizes Cleon, the Athenian demagogue. He introduces a declaration of the oracle, that the Eagle of hides (by whom Cleon was meant, his father having been a tanner), should be conquered by a serpent, which Demosthenes, one of the characters in the play, expounds as meaning a maker of sausages. How Lord Bacon could for a moment doubt that this was a mere jest, it is difficult to conjecture. The following is a literal translation of a portion of the passage from The Knights (l. 197): “But when a leather eagle with crooked talons shall have seized with its jaws a serpent, a stupid creature, a drinker of blood, then the tan-pickle of the Paphlagonians is destroyed; but upon the sellers of sausages the deity bestows great glory, unless they choose rather to sell sausages.” [399] This is a very just remark. So-called strange coincidences, and wonderful dreams that are verified, when the point is considered, are really not at all marvellous. We never hear of the 999 dreams that are not verified, but the thousandth that happens to precede its fulfilment is blazoned by unthinking people as a marvel. It would be a much more wonderful thing if dreams were not occasionally verified. [400] Under this name he alludes to the Critias of Plato, in which an imaginary “terra incognita” is discoursed of under the name of the “New Atlantis.” It has been conjectured from this by some, that Plato really did believe in the existence of a continent on the other side of the globe. [401] Hot and fiery. [402] With the eyes closed or blindfolded. [403] He was a favorite of Tiberius, to whose murder by Nero he was said to have been an accessary. He afterwards prostituted his own wife to Caligula, by whom he was eventually put to death. [404] Liable to. [405] Chirpings like the noise of young birds. [406] Jewels or necklaces. [407] Spangles, or O’s of gold or silver. Beckmann says that these were invented in the beginning of the seventeenth century. See Beckmann’s Hist. of Inventions (Bohn’s Stand. Lib.), vol. i. p. 424. [408] Or antic-masques. These were ridiculous interludes dividing the acts of the more serious masque. These were performed by hired actors, while the masque was played by ladies and gentlemen. The rule was, the characters were to be neither serious nor hideous. The “Comus” of Milton is an admirable specimen of a masque. [409] Turks. [410] “He is the best asserter _of the liberty_ of his mind, who bursts the chains that gall his breast, and at the same moment ceases to grieve.”—This quotation is from _Ovid’s Remedy of Love_, 293. [411] “My soul has long been a sojourner.” [412] “The wish is father to the thought,” is a proverbial saying of similar meaning. [413] _Vide_ Disc. Sop. Liv. iii. 6.