ERG. The young men have given me the name of "the mistress," for this reason, because invocated [1] I am wont to attend at the banquet. I know that buffoons [2] say that this is absurdly said, but I affirm that it is rightly _said_. For at the banquet the lover, when he throws the dice, invokes his mistress.[3] Is she _then_ invocated, or _is she_ not? She is, most clearly. But, i' faith, we Parasites with better reason _are so called_, whom no person ever either invites or invokes, _and who_, like mice, are always eating the victuals of another person. When business is laid aside [4], when people repair to the country, at that same moment is business laid aside for our teeth. Just as, when it is hot weather, snails lie hidden in secret, _and_ live upon their own juices, if the dew doesn't fall; so, when business is laid aside, do Parasites lie hidden in retirement, _and_ miserably live upon their own juices, while in the country the persons are rusticating whom they sponge upon. When business is laid aside, we Parasites are greyhounds; when business recommences, _like_ mastiffs [5], we are annoying-like and very troublesome-like [6]. And here, indeed, unless, i'faith, any Parasite is able to endure cuffs with the fist, and pots to be broken [7] about his head, why he may e'en go with his wallet outside the Trigeminian Gate [8]. That this may prove my lot, there is some danger. For since my patron [9] has fallen into the hands of the enemy--(such warfare are the Aetolians now waging with the Eleans; for this is Aetolia; this Philopolemus has been made captive in Elis, the son of this old man Hegio who lives here (_pointing to the house_)--a house which to me is _a house_ of woe, _and_ which so oft as I look upon, I weep). Now, for the sake of his son, has he commenced this dishonorable traffic, very much against his own inclination. He buys up men that have been made captives, if _perchance_ he may be able to find some one for whom to gain his son in exchange. An object which I really do much desire that he may gain, for unless he finds him, there's nowhere for me to find myself. I have no hopes in the young men; they are all _too_ fond of themselves. He, in fine, is a youth with the old-fashioned manners, whose countenance I never rendered cheerful without a return. His father is worthily matched, as endowed with like manners. Now I'll go to him;--but his door is opening, _the door_ from which full oft I've sallied forth drunk with excess of cheer (_He stands aside._)