How fertile in new tricks is Chæriphon, To sup scot-free and everywhere find welcome! Spies he a broker’s door with pots to let? There from the earliest dawn he takes his stand, To see whose cook arrives; from him he learns Who ’tis that gives the feast,—flies to the house, Watches his time, and, when the yawning door Gapes for the guests, glides in among the first.[501] ----- Footnote 498: See a figure, probably, of that instrument in Mus. Chiaramont. tav. 21. Footnote 499: Athen. xiv. 60. Poll. x. 95, sqq.—We find mention, also, of the cheese-rasp.—Schol. Aristoph. Pac. 251. Footnote 500: Aristoph. Acharn. 439. Brunck is vastly scandalised at the idea of the Scholiast, that any man should have been so poor in Attica as to be driven to mend his pots in the way commemorated in the text; but a German commentator, who had looked more into kitchens, is satisfied that the practice prevailed, and was perfectly rational. In fact, similar contrivances are still resorted to, even in England. Footnote 501: Athen. iv. 58. ----- But we must not pass over the Pyreion or Trypanon,[502] the clumsy contrivance which supplied the place of our lucifers, phosphorus, and tinder-boxes. This was a hollow piece of wood, in which another piece was turned rapidly till sparks of fire flew out.[503] Soldiers carried these fire-kindlers along with them as a necessary part of their kit. Footnote 502: Theoph. Histor. Plant. v. 9. 7. Footnote 503: Plat. de Rep. iv. t. vi. p. 194. Pollux. x. 146. vii. 113. ----- The ordinary fuel of the Greeks consisted chiefly of wood and charcoal,[504] (kept in rush or wicker baskets,) though the use of mineral coal was not altogether unknown to them.[505] In Attica, where wood was always scarce, they economically made use of vine-cuttings,[506] and even the green branches of the fig tree with the leaves on.[507] The charcoal of Acharnæ, the best probably in the country, was sometimes prepared from the scarlet oak.[508] To prevent the wood, used in their saloons, halls, and drawing-rooms from smoking, it was often boiled[509] in water or steeped in dregs of oil. The use of the bellows[510] was known in Hellas from the remotest antiquity. They had likewise a kind of osier flap, with a handle, and shaped like a fan, which at times supplied the place of a pair of bellows. ----- Footnote 504: Cf. Schol. Aristoph. Acharn. 34, 302, 314. Plat. de Legg. t. viii. 116. Footnote 505: Theoph. de Lap. § 16. Footnote 506: Schol. Aristoph. Lysist. 308. Footnote 507: Schol. Aristoph. Acharn. 312. Cf. Schol. Vesp. 145, 326. Footnote 508: Sch. Aristoph. Acharn. 587. Footnote 509: Plin. Hist. Nat. xv. 8. Footnote 510: Schol. Aristoph. Acharn. 853. Athen. ii. 71. -----