are for
the decency and good order of the banquet. This proposal pleased every
one, and they were all an end begging me to do it. Well then, said I,
since you will have it so, I make myself steward and director of you
all, command the rest to drink every one what he will but Crato and
Theon, the first proposers and authors of this decree, I enjoin to
declare in short what qualifications fit a man for this office, what he
should principally aim at and how behave himself towards those under
his command. This is the subject, and let them agree amongst themselves
which head each shall manage.

They made some slight excuse at first; but the whole company urging them
to obey, Crato began thus. A captain of a watch (as Plato says) ought
to be most watchful and diligent himself, and the director of merry
companions ought to be the best. And such a one he is, that will not be
easily overtaken or apt to refuse a glass; but as Cyrus in his epistle
to the Spartans says, that in many other things he was more fit than
his brother to be a king, and chiefly because he could bear abundance
of wine. For one that is drunk must have an ill carriage and be apt to
affront; and he that is perfectly sober must be unpleasant, and fitter
to be a governor of a school than of a feast. Pericles as often as he
was chosen general, when he put on his cloak, used to say to himself,
as it were to refresh his memory, Take heed, Pericles, thou dost govern
freemen, thou dost govern Greeks, thou dost govern Athenians. So let
our director say privately to himself, Thou art a governor over friends,
that he may remember to neither suffer them to be debauched nor stint
their mirth. Besides he ought to have some skill in the serious studies
of the guests and not be altogether ignorant of mirth and humor yet I
would have him (as pleasant wine ought to be) a little severe and rough,
for the liquor will soften and smooth him, and make his temper pleasant
and agreeable. For as Xenophon says, that Clearchus's rustic and morose
humor in a battle, by reason of his bravery and heat, seemed pleasant
and surprising; thus one that is not of a very sour nature, but grave
and severe, being softened by a chirping cup becomes more pleasant and
complaisant. But chiefly he should be acquainted with every one of the
guests' humors, what alteration the liquor makes in him, what passion he
is most subject to, and what quantity he can bear; for it is not to be
supposed different sor