thrift sons and their accomplices: or mild and easy, when they go through the process of having their purses squeezed with less resistance and less suffering. There is the respectable mother of the family, who is sometimes the terror of her husband and sometimes tyrannised over by him. One or two sons, and sometimes a daughter—to which number the household of comedy seems limited—make up the family group. The sons are young men about town, having apparently nothing to do but to amuse themselves, a pursuit which they do not always follow after the most reputable fashion. Then there are the slaves, on whom depends in very great measure the action of the piece. It is very remarkable how in Greek comedy, and in the Roman adaptations from it, this class supplies not only the broadly comic element, but the wit of the dialogue, and the fertility of expedient which makes the interest of the drama. They are not brought upon the stage merely to amuse us by their successful roguery, or by its detection and consequent punishment, by their propensity to gormandise and their drunken antics,—this kind of "low comedy business" is what we might naturally expect of them. But in witty repartee, and often in practical wisdom, they are represented as far superior to their masters. And this ability of character is quite recognised by the masters themselves. They are intrusted, like Parmeno in the 'Eunuchus' of Terence, with the care of the sons of the house, even at that difficult age when they are growing up to manhood, during the father's absence abroad: or like his namesake in the 'Plocium' of Menander, and Geta in the 'Two Brothers' of Terence,
