Euripides: 'Egypt, as the greatest amount has been scattered,'
Euripides: With fifty children, let him sail with a shallow draft.
Euripides: Having seized Argos—
Aeschylus: he lost a lekythos.
Dionysus: What was this little oil-flask? Will it not cry?
Dionysus: Say another prologue to him, so that he may know again.
1210
Euripides: Dionysus, who with thyrsuses and fawnskins
Euripides: 'To be hanged among the pines down on Parnassus.'
Euripides: He leaps, dancing—
Aeschylus: He lost a lekythos.
Dionysus: Alas! I have been struck again by the oil-flask.
Euripides: But there will be no trouble; for with regard to this man
1215
Euripides: He will not have the prologue to add a lekythos.
Euripides: 'No man is happy in all things.'
Euripides: For a man who is naturally good has no livelihood,
Euripides: Or, being of low birth—
Aeschylus: He lost a lekythos.
Dionysus: Euripides—
1220
Dionysus: I think I should be carried.
Dionysus: for this little flask will smell very much.
Euripides: No, by Demeter, I would not even care!
Euripides: For now this very thing will be hacked off him.
Dionysus: Come on, say something else and keep hold of the oil flask.
Euripides: When Cadmus once left the Sidonian city,
1225
Euripides: The son of Agenor—
Aeschylus: he lost a lekythos.
Dionysus: O cursed one, boil the oil-flask for the men,
Dionysus: in order that he may not disturb our prologues.
Euripides: Have I bought this?
Dionysus: if he only obeys me.
Euripides: Not at all, since I shall have many prologues to speak.
1230
Euripides: 'So that this man will not be able to attach a lekythos.'
Euripides: Pelops, the son of Tantalus, having come to Pisa,
Euripides: with swift horses—
Aeschylus: He lost a lekythos.
Dionysus: You see, he has again lit the oil lamp.
Dionysus: But, good sir, give it back now by every art;
1235
Dionysus: for he will receive a very good and noble obol.
Euripides: By Zeus, not yet; for I still have many [plays].
Euripides: "Once Oeneus from the land—"
Aeschylus: he lost a lekythos.
Euripides: Let me first say the whole line.
Euripides: 'Once Oineus, taking from the earth a grain with many-measured stalks,'
1240
Euripides: sacrificing the firstfruits—
Aeschylus: 'He lost a lekythos.'
Dionysus: between sacrificing? And who then took it away?
Euripides: Let him be, you wretch, for let him say this.
Euripides: Zeus, as has been said by the truth—
Dionysus: He will lose you, for he will say, 'I have lost a lekythos.'
1245
Dionysus: for this lekythos is upon your prologues.
Dionysus: Just as figs grow on the eyes.
Dionysus: But by the gods, turn to the verses himself.
Euripides: And indeed I have means by which I will prove him bad.
Euripides: a musician being and doing these things too.
1250