But Demosthenes the orator reproaches Pherecrates, because, with the gold which he received for his treason, he bought himself courtesans and fish, and charges him with debauchery and gluttony. But Diodes the epicure, as Hegesander says, when a man once asked him which of the two fish was the best, the conger or the pike, said—“The one when it is boiled, and the other when it is roasted.” And Leonteus the Argive also was an epicure: he was a tragedian, and a pupil of Athenion, and a slave of Juba, king of Mauritania; as Amarantus relates, in his treatise on the Stage, saying that Juba wrote this epigram on him, because he had acted the character of Hypsipyle very badly:—
If you should wish to see the genius
Of that devoted artichoke-devourer
Leonteus the tragedian, don't regard
The sorrow-stricken heart of Hypsipyle.
I once was dear to Bacchus, and his taste
Is ne'er perverted by base bribes t' approve
Untuneful sounds. But now the pots and pans,
And well-fill'd dishes have destroyed my voice,
While I've been anxious to indulge my stomach.
