[Footnote 34: The cordax was a lascivious dance of the old comedy; to dance it off the stage was considered a sign of drunkenness and indecency.] [Footnote 35: As being thrown to the dogs; from κυὼν, a dog.] BOOK X. 1. But a wise poet should behave Like one who gives a splendid feast; And so if he is wise should he Seek the spectators to delight, So that each one, when he departs, May think that he has drunk and eaten Exactly what he'd most have wish'd; Not that there should have been but one Dish for all sorts of appetites, Or but one kind of writing for all tastes. These, my good friend Timocrates, are the words of Astydamas the tragedian, in his satyric drama of Hercules. Come, let us now proceed to mention what is consistent with what we have said before, to show how great an eater Hercules was. And this is a point in his character mentioned by nearly all poets and historians. Epicharmus, in his Busiris, says— For if you were to see him eat, you would Be frighten'd e'en to death; his jaws do creak, His throat with long deep-sounding thunder rolls, His large teeth rattle, and his dog-teeth crash, His nostrils hiss, his ears with hunger tremble. And Ion, in his Omphale, having mentioned his voracity, adds— And then, excited by th' applause, he rose And swallow'd all the logs and burning coals. [Sidenote: ULYSSES.] But Ion borrowed all this from Pindar, who said[36]— * * * * * And they say that he was a man of such excessive voracity, that they gave him the cormorant, amongst birds which should be sacred to him, which is called the ox-eater, on account of its voracity. 2. And Hercules is represented as having entered into a contest with Lepreus in respect of their mutual powers of eating, Lepreus having been the challenger: however, Hercules gained the victory. But Zenodotus, in the second book of his Epitomes, says that Lepreus was the son of Caucon, who was the son of Neptune and Astydamia; and that he ordered Hercules to be thrown into prison, when he demanded of Augeas the reward which was due to him for his labours. But Hercules, when he had completed his labours, came to the house of Caucon, and at the entreaty of Astydamia, he became reconciled to Lepreus. And after this Lepreus contended with Hercules in throwing the quoit, and in drawing water, and also as to which would eat a bull with the greatest rapidity; and in all these things he was defeated. And after that he armed himself, and challenged Hercules to single combat, and was slain in the battle. But Matris, in his panegyric on Hercules, says, that Hercules was also challenged by Lepreus to a contest as to who could drink most, and that Lepreus was again defeated. And the Chian orator, Caucalus, the brother of Theopompus the historian, relates the same story in his panegyric on Hercules.