A prophet: Let not the goat be sacrificed.
Pisthetaerus: Who are you?
Prophet: Who am I? A prophet.
Pisthetaerus: Get you gone.
Prophet: Wretched man, insult not sacred things. For there is an oracle of Bacis, which exactly applies to Nephelococcygia.
Pisthetaerus: Why did you not reveal it to me before I founded my city?
Prophet: The divine spirit was against it.
Pisthetaerus: Well, ’tis best to know the terms of the oracle.
Prophet: “But when the wolves and the white crows shall dwell together between Corinth and Sicyon …”
Pisthetaerus: But how do the Corinthians concern me?
Prophet: ’Tis the regions of the air that Bacis indicated in this manner. “They must first sacrifice a white-fleeced goat to Pandora, and give the prophet, who first reveals my words, a good cloak and new sandals.”
Pisthetaerus: Are the sandals there?
Prophet: Read. “And besides this a goblet of wine and a good share of the entrails of the victim.”
Pisthetaerus: Of the entrails—is it so written?
Prophet: Read. “If you do as I command, divine youth, you shall be an eagle among the clouds; if not, you shall be neither turtledove, nor eagle, nor woodpecker.”
Pisthetaerus: Is all that there?
Prophet: Read.
Pisthetaerus: This oracle in no sort of way resembles the one Apollo dictated to me: “If an impostor comes without invitation to annoy you during the sacrifice and to demand a share of the victim, apply a stout stick to his ribs.”
Prophet: You are drivelling.
Pisthetaerus: “And don’t spare him, were he an eagle from out of the clouds, were it Lampon himself or the great Diopithes.”
Prophet: Is all that there?
Pisthetaerus: Here, read it yourself, and go and hang yourself.
Prophet: Oh! unfortunate wretch that I am.
Pisthetaerus: Away with you, and take your prophecies elsewhere.
Meton: I have come to you.