The Praise Singer by Mary Renault Read Free Book Online

up; he only needed to hear anyone praised. Before supper was over, he had accused the city’s best sculptor of stealing bronze; the least greedy of the nobles, of being too cowardly to risk a quarrel; and a gentle old priest, gifted with prophecy, of vices I’d never heard of till that night. Such was my first meeting with Hipponax; and Kleobis was right, it had done me good. It showed me that the face of envy is uglier than a birthmark on the cheek.
    So, when his name was shouted in the crowd, I wondered what Kleobis was thinking. On the one hand, the man was detestable; on the other, he was one of us. That he had sung against the lords showed courage, which one should honor, even though his spleen was like one of those burning mountains which cannot contain their fires. They were doused now, however. He grinned with terror like a Gorgon mask on a shield. The wretched swindler chosen by the priests (he had cheated even the temple) stood up in his bonds, refreshed with hope.
    It caught Hipponax’s eye and showed him his salvation.
    As all poets know, one can stand or fall by one’s impromptus. Hipponax stood. He lived some five years more on the strength of it. As soon as he saw it was a choice between the two of them, he offered no defense; he denounced his rival. After it was all over, no one remembered very clearly what the first man had been accused of, or on what evidence. Hipponax was more memorable.
    The man was in Persian pay. He had poisoned a well, near which some people had lately died of fever. His wife was a backdoor bawd who undid good men’s homes. He had bargained with Harpagos, for a talent of silver, to open a postern that very night. So that all this could be heard, our Poet of the Agora scrambled up a statue plinth. The statue was of an Isthmian victor; but Hipponax was the victor now. One thing he taught me: that whomever you blacken, there will always be someon?e glad of it. All men seek esteem; the best by lifting themselves, which is hard to do, the rest by shoving others down, which is much easier.
    When he’d done, the crowd turned on the swindler, hating him because they feared the Medes; and it was agreed he had been chosen justly.
    They stripped him, and put the ritual offering-cakes in his hands, having to tie them there because he shook so, and led him out to the gate. There they beat him as the rite prescribes, on his tenderest parts till he screamed aloud. Then everyone fell on him as they chose, to purge their offenses which he carried for them, and drove him along with sticks and cudgels till he fell. I don’t know if he was dead when they came to throw him on the bonfire. I know I saw Hipponax dancing round it.
    I climbed down and went home. Kleobis was sitting with a face of stone. He said, “And now they will surrender.” Only the day before, I would have proposed making them a battle song. As it was, I just poured some wine.
    Whether or not the goddess liked her offering, when Harpagos’ siege-mound was ten cubits up the wall, the lords of Ephesos took counsel. They gave out that the city would ask for terms, and all the people acclaimed them.
    The envoys rode out, and in due course Harpagos rode in at the head of his cavalry: a tall Mede with a curled grey beard and a gold-thread scarf around his helmet. He shone like a carp in a corselet of gilded fish-scales. The Ephesian lords, unarmed, escorted him to the council chamber. He sat there till they had dismounted first, and one of them held his horse for him. Peace was agreed; in a few days the Medes rode off again. They had done as Kyros had ordered in his wisdom, and spared a city which had given no more trouble than a couple of slaves shot down as they dug the mound. Three of the lords were to rule it as his deputies. It was said they had been treating with Harpagos long before.
    Their first act was to get rid of Hipponax. They did not kill him, lest it should be said they feared something he knew; he was banished, which