22
After these friends, who were by no means despicable, I should say, let me tell you now of a third who was not a bit inferior to them.
22
Eudamidas of Corinth had formed friendships with Aretaeus of Corinth and Charixenus of Sicyon, who were both rich, while he was extremely poor. When he died, he left a will which very likely appeared ridiculous to everyone else, but I hardly think it will seem so to you, since you are a good man, a worshipper of friendship, and a competitor for the first prize in it. It was set down in the will: “I leave to Aretaeus my mother to support and cherish in her old age, and to Charixenus my daughter to bestow in marriage with the largest dowry that he can give her out of his own means” (besides an aged mother he had also a daughter, already marriageable); “and if anything should befall either of these men in the meantime, his interest is to go to the other.” When this will was read, all who knew of the poverty of Eudamidas but were unaware of the friendship which he had with the men considered the thing a joke, and every one of them went away laughing. ‘ What a fine fortune Aretaeus and Charixenus, the lucky fellows, are coming into,” said they, “if they must pay out money to Eudamidas and have the dead man inherit from them while they themselves are still alive!”
23
The heirs to whom these legacies had been left, on hearing of it, came at once to administer the will. Charixenus, to be sure, outlived his friend only five days; but Aretaeus proved himself the best of legatees. Assuming both his own interest and the other’s, he supported Eudamidas’ mother and also not long ago portioned his daughter off, giving, out of five talents that he had, dowries of two talents to his own daughter and two to his friend’s; moreover, he thought fit that they should both be married on the same day.
