This, Xenophon says, was the case with the youth and maiden who enlivened the banquet of Callias. Absorbed in the earnestness of their feelings, they seem to have forgotten the presence of spectators, and instead of a stage representation, gave them a scene from real life, where every impassioned look and gesture were genuine, and every fiery glance was kindled at the heart.[772] This, however, may be considered a serious amusement, and something like broad farce was necessary to awaken the guests from the reverie into which the love scene had plunged them. Jesters were, therefore, put in requisition; and, as even they sometimes failed to raise a laugh, their more humorous brethren the wits and jesters of the forests, or, in the language of mortals, monkeys were called upon to dissipate the clouds of seriousness. These were the favourite buffoons of the Scythian Anacharsis,—not the Abbé Barthélemy’s,—who said, he could laugh at a monkey’s tricks, because his tricks were natural, but that he found no amusement in a man who made a trade of it.[773] Nor could Euripides at all relish punsters and manufacturers of jokes, whom he considered, with some reason, as a species of animal distinct from mankind. Many there be who exercise their wits In giving birth, by cutting jests, to laughter. I hate the knaves whose rude unbridled tongues Sport with the wise; and cannot for my life Think they are men, though laughter doth become them, And they have houses filled with treasured stores From distant lands.[774] ----- Footnote 772: Xen. Conviv. ix. 1–7. Footnote 773: Athen. xiv. 2. Footnote 774: Eurip. Fragm. Melanipp. 20. ----- But if Euripides found nothing desirable in laughter, there were those who had a clean contrary creed, and lamented nothing so much as the loss of their risible faculties. On this subject Semos has a story quite _à propos_. Parmeniscos, the Metapontine, having descended, he says, into the cave of Trophonios, became so extremely grave, that with all the appliances, and means to boot, furnished by wealth, and they were not a few, he thereafter found himself quite unable to screw up his muscles into a smile; which taking much to heart, as was natural, he made a pilgrimage to Delphi, to inquire by what means he might rid himself of the blue devils. Somewhat puzzled at the strangeness of the inquiry, the Pythoness replied,— Poor mortal unmerry, who seekest to know What will bid thy brow soften, thy quips and cranks flow, To the house of the mother I bid thee repair— Thou wilt find, if she’s pleased, what thy heart covets, there.