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20. Sometimes an unpopular citizen attracted notice; and then the wit at his expense flowed fast and furious, as it occasionally does now from a Dublin gallery. Were there a hole in his coat, it was likely to be mentioned with "additional particulars:" if he had ever gone through the bankruptcy court, it was not forgotten: swindling or perjury were joyfully commemorated: still more so any current rumours about poisoning a wife, a rich uncle, troublesome step-sons, wards, mothers-in-law, and other family inconveniences.

Such were the audiences who sat in judgment on the great drama of the ancient world. It may be probably conjectured that Euripides found more favour with the resident aliens and the visitors from foreign parts than with the born citizens. To these, his somewhat arbitrary treatment of old legends—his familiar dealing with, or perhaps humanising of, the Hellenic deities, his softening of the terrors of destiny, his modification of the songs and functions of the Chorus, and other deviations from the ancient severity of dramatic art—would give little, if any, offence. For such spectators the dooms hanging over Argive or Theban royal houses would have but little interest. Their forefathers had taken no part in the quarrel between Eteocles and Polynices, cared little for the authority of the Areopagus, had local deities and myths of their own, among whom were not reckoned Pallas Athene, Apollo, or the Virgin Huntress. To the foreigner, that triumphal song, the "Persians" of Æschylus, and his "Prometheus," were perhaps