Wilt thou for the Muses' sake play me somewhat of sweet on thy twin flutes? and I lifting the harp will begin to make music on the strings; and Daphnis the neatherd will mingle enchantment with tuneable breath of the wax-bound pipe; and thus standing nigh within the fringed cavern mouth, let us rob sleep from Pan the lord of the goats. XXIII POPULAR SONGS LUCILIUS Eutychides, the writer of songs, is dead; flee, O you under earth! Eutychides is coming with his odes; he left instructions to burn along with him twelve lyres and twenty-five boxes of airs. Now Charon has come upon you; whither may one retreat in future, since Eutychides fills Hades too? XXIV GRAMMAR, MUSIC, RHETORIC LUCILIUS Pluto turns away the dead rhetorician Marcus, saying, "Let the dog Cerberus suffice us here; yet if thou needs must, declaim to Ixion and Melito the song-writer, and Tityus; for I have no worse evil than thee, till Rufus the critic comes to murder the language here." XXV CALAMUS AUTHOR UNKNOWN I the reed was a useless plant; for out of me grew not figs nor apple nor grape-cluster; but man consecrated me a daughter of Helicon, piercing my delicate lips and making me the channel of a narrow stream; and thenceforth, whenever I sip black drink, like one inspired I speak all words with this voiceless mouth. XXVI IN THE CLASSROOM CALLIMACHUS Simus son of Miccus, giving me to the Muses, asked for himself learning, and they, like Glaucus, gave a great gift for a little one; and I lean gaping up against this double letter of the Samian, a tragic Dionysus, listening to the little boys; and they repeat /Holy is the hair/, telling me my own dream. XXVII THE POOR SCHOLAR ARISTON O mice, if you are come after bread, go to another cupboard (for we live in a tiny cottage) where you will feed daintily on rich cheese and dried raisins, and make an abundant supper off the scraps; but if you sharpen your teeth again on my books and come in with your graceless rioting, you shall howl for it. XXVIII THE HIGHER METAPHYSIC AGATHIAS