CHAPTER II.
MENANDER.
Menander was born at Athens, B.C. 342, of a family in which dramatic talent was in some degree hereditary, for his uncle Alexis had written comedies of some repute. It would appear that the faculties which make the successful comic writer commonly develop themselves at an early age; for Menander, like his predecessor Aristophanes, won his first prize for comedy when he had barely reached manhood: and the same may be remarked as to the early and rapid success of some of our modern humorists.[1] But this youthful triumph was not followed, as might have been ex-
- ↑ Of course he did not escape the charge of presumption and precocity from older candidates. He had to defend himself on this occasion, like Pitt, from "the atrocious crime of being a young man." His defence, if we may trust the anecdotist, was by a parable. He brought upon the stage some new-born puppies, and had them thrown into a vessel of water. Blind and weak as they were, they instinctively tried to swim, "Athenians," said the young author, "you ask how, at my years, I can have the knowledge of life which is required in the dramatist: I ask you, under what master and in what school did these creatures learn to swim?"
