—'you're one of the family, you know.'[1] While they are drinking good old wine, you will be expected to swallow some muddy vapid stuff: and you will do well to drink it out of gold or silver goblets, that it may not be plain to all, from the colour of the liquor, how little respect is paid to you in the household. Even of this poor stuff you will not be allowed your fill; for often, when you call for it, the servant will pretend not to hear."
He warns him, also, that in such a household the preceptor or the poet will be held of less account than the flutist, or the dancing-master, or the Egyptian boy who can sing love-songs. And after all, do what he will, he will hardly please. If he preserves a grave and dignified behaviour, he will be called churlish and morose; if he tries to be gay, and puts on a smiling face, the company will only stare and laugh at him.
If the town life of the unfortunate dependant is full of such mortifications, matters do not mend much when he accompanies his patron into the country. "Amongst other things, if it rains ever so hard, you must come last (that is your recognised place), and wait for a conveyance; and, if there is no room, be
- ↑ Lucian is not very original here. He had probably read the fifth Satire of Juvenal, where, among other indignities offered to the poor dependant, even the bread set before him is of very inferior quality—
"Black mouldy fragments which defy the saw,
The mere despair of every aching jaw,
While manchets of the finest flour are set
Before your lord."—Gifford.
