"A very experienced physician lives there," interrupted the conjurer.
"No one has helped my father."
"Yet!"
"Then come in and speak to him."
"I'm afraid of the cross old woman."
"She has gone out, and you will find father alone."
"Then I'll go to him."
"Did you say you were from Messina?"
"That is my home."
"Do you know my uncle Alciphron, the merchant?"
"Certainly. He owns the most ships in the place."
"And his son Leonax, too?"
"I often saw him, for my hut stands opposite to the landing-place of
your uncle's vessels, and the youth always superintends the loading and
unloading. He, if any one, belongs to those spoiled children of fortune
who disgust poor dwarfs like me with life, and make us laugh when people
say there are just gods above."
"You are blaspheming."
"I only say what others think."
"Yet you too were young once."
"But I was a dwarf, and he resembles Achilles in stature; I was poor and
he does not know what to do with his wealth; maidens fled from me as they
seek him; I was found in the streets; and a father still guides, a loving
mother kisses him. I don't envy him, for whoever enters life an orphan
is spared the pain of becoming one afterward."
"You speak bitter words."
"He who is beaten does not laugh."
"So you envy Leonax his prosperity?"
"No, for, though I might have such excellent cause to complain, I envy no
king, for there is but one person whose inmost heart I know thoroughly,
and that one stands before you.
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