5
A very good-looking lad, to be sure; still immature, though, and hardly old enough to be married.
5
But he could not find anyone who suited him better, I suppose. As this boy seemed to be mannerly and had taken an interest in philosophy, and also as he was the only son of Eucritus, who is rich, he preferred him to all the rest as a husband for his daughter.
5
You give a very good reason in saying that Eucritus is rich. But come, Lycinus, who were the people at dinner?
6
Why should I tell you all of them? The philosophers and literary men, whom, I suppose, you are most eager to hear about, were Zenothemis, the old man of the Porch, The Porch: where Zeno the Stoic used to teach. and along with him Diphilus, whom they call “Labyrinth,” tutor of Aristaenetus’ boy Zeno. From the Walk The Walk (xepfxaros) in the Lyceum, where the Peripatetics had their meeting-place. there was Cleodemus— you know him, the mouthy, argumentative fellow, whom his pupils call “Sword” and “Cleaver.” Hermon the Epicurean was there too, and as he came in the Stoics at once began to glower at him and turn their backs on him; it was clear that they loathed him as they would a parricide or a man under a curse. These men had been asked to dinner as Aristaenetus’ own friends and associates, and also the grammarian Histiaeus and the rhetorician Dionysodorus.
7
Then, too, on account of Chaereas, the bridegroom, Ion the Platonic philosopher, who is his teacher, shared the feast—a grave and reverend person to look at, with great dignity written on his features. Indeed, most people call him “Rule,” out of regard for the straightness of his thinking. When he came in, they all arose in his honour and received him like a supernatural being; in short it was a regular divine visitation, the advent of Ion the marvellous.
