Isocrates, in his exhortation to Demonicos, marks the distinction between the true and false friend, by observing, that, while the latter thinks only of those around him, the former remembers the absent, and makes his affection triumph over time and distance. And the Greeks generally had this merit. Amid the enjoyments of the festive board, they recalled to mind the friends of other days; and, having first performed libations to the gods, those best and purest of friends, drank to the health and prosperity of former associates, now far removed by circumstances,[789] and this they did not in the mixed beverage which formed their habitual potations, but in pure wine.[790] There was something extremely delicate in this idea, for tacitly it intimated, that their love placed the objects of it almost on a level with their divinities, in whose honour, also, on these occasions, a small portion of the wine was spilt in libations[791] upon the earth. The young, in whose hearts a mistress held the first place,[792] drank deeply in honour of their beloved, sometimes equalling the number of cups to that of the letters forming her name,[793] which, if the custom prevailed so early, would account for Ægisthos’s being a sot. Sometimes, however, taking the hint from the number of the Graces, they were satisfied with three goblets; but, when an excuse for drinking “pottle deep” was sought, they chose the Muses for their patrons, and honoured their mistresses’ names with three times three.[794] This is the number of cheers with which favourite political toasts are received at our public dinners, though every one who fills his bumper, and cries “hip, hip, hip, hurrah!” on these occasions, is, probably, not conscious that he is keeping up an old pagan custom in honour of the Muses. ----- Footnote 789: Theoc. Eidyll. vii. 69. Footnote 790: Cicero in Verr. Act. ii. Orat. i. § 26, and Ascon. Pedan. in loc. Footnote 791: Antiphon. Acc. Nec. Ven. § 3.—The third libation was in honour of Zeus.—Scol. Pind. Isth. vi. 22. Footnote 792: Theocrit. Eidyll. xiv. 18, et Schol. Footnote 793: Mart. Epig. i. 78. Footnote 794: Horat. Od. iii. 19. 11, sqq. Lambinus in loc. p. 143. ----- The number four was in no favour at the drinking-table, not because it was an even number, for they sometimes drank ten, but because some old superstition had brought discredit on it. Our very fox-hunters, however, exhibit an inferior capacity to many of the ancients in affairs of the bottle, though when it is the poets who perform the feat, we may safely consider them to be simply regaling their fancies on “air-drawn” goblets, which cost nothing, and leave no head-aches behind them. On this subject there is a very pretty song in the Anthology, which Potter, following some old edition, completely misrepresents.[795] It deserves to be well translated, and I would translate it well if I could. The following at least preserves the meaning: