Mnesilochus: Well, women, to be very quick-tempered
Mnesilochus: "Euripides, having heard such evils,"
Mnesilochus: It is not surprising, nor to be boiled, the gall.
Mnesilochus: For I too, so may I live, of the children,
Mnesilochus: I hate that man, unless I am out of my mind.
470
Mnesilochus: Still, one must give an account of it in mutual exchanges;
Mnesilochus: For we are those women, and no one has reported it.
Mnesilochus: Why do we accuse him when they have these things?
Mnesilochus: we take it hard, if two of us or three
Mnesilochus: Having done and heard many evil things, did you say this?
475
Mnesilochus: for I myself first, so that I may speak again,
Mnesilochus: I am well aware of many terrible things; but that, however...
Mnesilochus: It is most terrible, when she was a bride for three days,
Mnesilochus: But the man was sleeping with me; for he was a friend of mine,
Mnesilochus: just as he ravaged me when I was seven years old.
480
Mnesilochus: This fellow, coming with longing for me, bit my door;
Mnesilochus: And then I understood clearly. So I went down secretly.
Mnesilochus: But the man asks where you are going down? Where?
Mnesilochus: The rope has me in a stranglehold, my belly, like a nightmare and a pain.
Mnesilochus: So I am going into the manure. Come on, then.
485
Mnesilochus: and then he rubbed cedar shavings and fennel stalks.
Mnesilochus: I, however, poured out the water from the mill.
Mnesilochus: I went out in order to catch the adulterer; then I was pushed around.
Mnesilochus: I am holding onto the laurel near the Agias.
Mnesilochus: Euripides has never said this, look!
490
Mnesilochus: Not even as [being] under the slaves and the wine-pourers
Mnesilochus: let us ash, unless we have another, he will not speak;
Mnesilochus: Not even when we are most completely mastered by him.
Mnesilochus: Let us chew garlic all night long until dawn.
Mnesilochus: so that a man, coming from the wall while sniffing,
495
Mnesilochus: may he be thought to do nothing evil. "You see, these things,"
Mnesilochus: He has never said it. But if he abuses Phaedra,
Mnesilochus: What is this for us? He has not yet said that either,
Mnesilochus: as the woman shows the husband the round object
Mnesilochus: In the sunlight, as it is, covered up.
500
Mnesilochus: He sent the adulterer away, but he has not yet spoken.
Mnesilochus: But I saw another woman, who said she was in labor.
Mnesilochus: Accept [him] for the day, until he has bought a child;
Mnesilochus: But the man was running about, buying quick-bearing.
Mnesilochus: But an old woman brought the child in a cooking-pot,
505
Mnesilochus: in order that it may not be a bull, but a bee, dipped in wax;
Mnesilochus: 'Then, as soon as she who is carrying [the basket] nods, immediately she shouts,'
Mnesilochus: Go, go, for I now think I am a man.
Mnesilochus: to give birth. For the potter's heart was kicked.
Mnesilochus: And he was running with joy, but she tore it out.
510
Mnesilochus: from the mouth of the child, but she screamed out.
Mnesilochus: 'Well then, the filthy old woman, who brought the child,'
Mnesilochus: She smiles at the man and says,
Mnesilochus: A lion, a lion has become yours, even your very own imprint,
Mnesilochus: all the rest and the penis
515
Mnesilochus: Just like your nose, crooked like a quince.
Mnesilochus: Are we not doing these evils? By Artemis!
Mnesilochus: We certainly do. And then we are angry at Euripides,
Mnesilochus: Did we suffer nothing greater than what we have done?
