forth a hearty laugh in such juxtaposition--that the women are designing to 'set up a tyranny!' "But poor Lysistrata soon has her troubles. Her unworthy recruits are fast deserting her. They are going off to their husbands in the most sneaky manner--creeping out through the little hole under the citadel which led to the celebrated cave of Pan, and letting themselves down from the walls by ropes at the risk of breaking their necks. Those who are caught all have excellent excuses. One has some fleeces of fine Milesian wool at home which must be seen to,--she is sure the moths are eating them. Another has urgent occasion for the doctor; a third cannot sleep alone for fear of the owls--of which, as every one knows, there were really a great many at Athens. The husbands, too, are getting uncomfortable without their housekeepers; there is no one to cook their victuals; and one poor soul comes and humbly entreats his wife at least to come home and wash and dress the baby. "It is becoming plain that either the war or the wives' resolution will soon give way, when there arrives an embassy from Sparta. They cannot stand this general strike of the wives. They are agreed already with their enemies, the Athenians, on one point--as to the women--that the old Greek comedian's proverb, which we have borrowed and translated freely, is true,-- "There is no living with 'em--or without 'em." {253} "They are come to offer terms of peace. When two parties are already of one mind, as Lysistrata observes, they are not long in coming to an understanding. A treaty is made on the spot, with remarkably few preliminaries."