SYR. Well. CHREM. How go matters? SYR. I’ve been wishing for some time for you to be thrown in my way. CHREM. You seem, then, to have effected something, I know not what, with the old gentleman. SYR. As to what we were talking of a short time since? No sooner said than done. CHREM. In real earnest? SYR. In real. CHREM. Upon my faith, I can not forbear patting your head {for it}. Come here, Syrus; I’ll do you some good turn for this matter, and with pleasure. (_Patting his head._) SYR. But if you knew how cleverly it came into my head---- CHREM. Pshaw! Do you boast because it has turned out according to your wishes? SYR. On my word, not I, indeed; I am telling the truth. CHREM. Tell {me} how it is. SYR. Clinia has told Menedemus, that this Bacchis is your Clitipho’s mistress, and that {he} has taken her thither with him in order that you might not come to know of it. CHREM. Very good. SYR. Tell me, please, {what you think of it}. CHREM. Extremely {good}, I declare. SYR. Why yes, pretty fair. But listen, what a piece of policy still remains. He is then to say that he has seen your daughter-- that her beauty charmed him as soon as he beheld her; {and} that he desires her for a wife. CHREM. What, her that has just been discovered? SYR. The same; and, in fact, he’ll request that she may be asked for. CHREM. For what purpose, Syrus? For I don’t altogether comprehend it. SYR. O dear, you are {so} dull. CHREM. Perhaps so. SYR. Money will be given him for the wedding-- with which golden trinkets and clothes---- do you understand me? CHREM. To buy {them}----? SYR. Just so. CHREM. But I neither give nor betroth my daughter {to him}. SYR. But why? CHREM. Why, do you ask me? To a fellow---- SYR. Just as you please. I don’t mean that in reality you should give her to him, but that you should pretend it. CHREM. Pretending is not in my way; do you mix up these {plots} of yours, so as not to mix me up {in them}. Do you think that I’ll betroth my daughter to a person to whom I will not marry her? SYR. I imagined {so}. CHREM. By no means. SYR. It might have been cleverly managed; and I undertook this affair for the very reason, that a short time since you so urgently requested it. CHREM. I believe you. SYR. But for my part, Chremes, I take it well and good, {either way}. CHREM. But still, I especially wish you to do your best for it to be brought about; but in some other way. SYR. It shall be done: some other {method} must be thought of; but as to what I was telling you of,-- about the money which she owes to Bacchis,-- that must now be repaid her. And you will not, of course, now be having recourse to this method; “What have I to do with it? Was it lent to me? Did I give any orders? Had she the power to pawn my daughter without my consent?” They quote that saying, Chremes, with good reason, “Rigorous law[88] is often rigorous injustice.” CHREM. I will not do {so}.