51. Now let us speak of provocatives to appetite, called Πρόπομα.--When they were brought round by the butler, Ulpian said, "Does the word πρόπομα occur in any ancient author in the sense in which we use it now?" and when every one joined in the question, "I will tell you," said Athenæus; "Phylarchus the Athenian, (though some called him a native of Naucratis,) in the book where he speaks of Zelas the king of the Bithynians, who invited to supper all the leaders of the Galatians, and then plotted against them, and was killed himself also, says, if I recollect his words rightly, 'A certain πρόπομα was brought round before supper, as was the custom of antiquity.'" And when Ulpian had said this, he asked for something to drink from the wine-cooler, saying, that he was in good humour with himself for having been able to remember this so very _à propos_. But there were things of all sorts, says Athenæus, used in these πρόποματα. 52. With respect to Mallows, Hesiod says-- Nor do men know how great may be the good Derived from asphodel and mallow food. Μαλάχη is the Attic name for mallow. But I, says Athenæus, have found in many of the copies of the Minos of Antiphanes the word spelt with an ο; for instance, he speaks of men-- Eating the root of mallow (μολόχης). And Epicharmus has-- I am milder than the mallow (μολόχης). And Phanias says, in his book on Plants--"The seminal portions of the cultivated mallow are called 'the cheese-cake,' as being like a cheese-cake. For those pistils which are like the teeth of a comb have some resemblance to the edge of a cheese-cake; and there is a bosslike centre, like that in the middle of a cheese-cake. And the whole circumference of the rim is like the sea-fish denominated the sea-urchin." But Diphilus the Siphnian makes a statement, that the mallow is full of pleasant and wholesome juice; having a tendency to smooth the arteries, separating from them the harshnesses of the blood by bringing them to the surface. And he adds that the mallow is of great service in irritations of the kidneys and the bladder, and that it is very tolerably digestible and nutritious. And moreover, that the wild mallow is superior to that which grows in a garden. But Hermippus, the follower of Callimachus, in his treatise on the Seven Wise Men, says that mallows are put in what he calls the ἄλιμον, that is to say, the preventive against hunger, and into the ἄδιψον, that is, the preventive against thirst; and that it is a very useful ingredient in both.