PISTHETAERUS So it seems, despite all your youthful vigour, you make it
your trade to denounce strangers?

INFORMER Well, and why not? I don't know how to dig.

PISTHETAERUS But, by Zeus! there are honest ways of gaining a living at
your age without all this infamous trickery.

INFORMER My friend, I am asking you for wings, not for words.

PISTHETAERUS 'Tis just my words that give you wings.

INFORMER And how can you give a man wings with your words?

PISTHETAERUS 'Tis thus that all first start.

INFORMER All?

PISTHETAERUS Have you not often heard the father say to young men in the
barbers' shops, "It's astonishing how Diitrephes' advice has made my son
fly to horse-riding."--"Mine," says another, "has flown towards tragic
poetry on the wings of his imagination."

INFORMER So that words give wings?

PISTHETAERUS Undoubtedly; words give wings to the mind and make a man
soar to heaven. Thus I hope that my wise words will give you wings to
fly to some less degrading trade.

INFORMER But I do not want to.

PISTHETAERUS What do you reckon on doing then?

INFORMER I won't belie my breeding; from generation to generation we
have lived by informing. Quick, therefore, give me quickly some light,
swift hawk or kestrel wings, so that I may summon the islanders, sustain
the accusation here, and haste back there again on flying pinions.

PISTHETAERUS I see. In this way the stranger will be condemned even
before he appears.

INFORMER That's just it.

PISTHETAERUS And while he is on his way here by sea, you will be flying
to the islands to despoil him of his property.

INFORMER You've hit it, precisely; I must whirl hither and thither like
a perfect humming-top.

PISTHETAERUS I catch the idea. Wait, i' faith, I've got some fine
Corcyraean wings.(1) How do you like them?

f(1) That is, whips--Corcyra being famous for these articles.

INFORMER Oh! woe is me! Why, 'tis a whip!

PISTHETAERUS No, no; these are the wings, I tell you, that set the top
a-spinning.

INFORMER Oh! oh! oh!

PISTHETAERUS Take your flight, clear off, you miserable cur, or you will
soon see what comes of quibbling and lying. Come, let us gather up our
wings and withdraw.

CHORUS In my ethereal flights I have seen many things new and strange
and wondrous beyond belief. There is a tree called Cleonymus belonging
to an unknown species; it has no heart, is good for nothing and is as
tall as it is cowardly. In springtime it shoots forth