Note 321 — Chapter VII · THEOCRITUS—THE GREEK EPIGRAMMATISTS

See Hall, op. cit. p. 22 (1914), and ibid., p. 35 (1912). Lucian, although a Syrian (to which nation fish was from the earliest times a forbidden food), frequently shows himself very conversant with fishes and avails himself of their characteristics: e.g. Menelaus, after witnessing some of the “turns” of that celebrated “lightning-change artist,” Proteus, exclaims frankly, “there must be some fraud!” The artist pooh-poohs him and bids him consider the everyday miracle of invisibility wrought by the Polypus, who having “selected his rock and having attached himself by means of his suckers, assimilates himself to it, changing his colour to match that of the rock. Thus there is no contrast of colour to betray his presence: he looks just like a stone” (Dialogues of the Sea Gods, iv. 1-3, Fowler’s Translation).