to help me; do I not well to be angry? It is no petty everyday peril,
this threatened separation from my long-tried familiars. My _kissa_,
my talking bird that nestled in my breast, he has torn away and named
anew; my _phassa_, my _nhssai_, my _khossuphoi_--all gone; and I had
Aristarchus's own word that they were mine; half my _melissai_ he has
lured to strange hives; Attica itself he has invaded, and wrongfully
annexed its Hymettus (as he calls it); and you and the rest looked on
at the seizure.

But why dwell on such trifles? I am driven from all Thessaly
(Thettaly, forsooth!), _thalassa_ is now _mare clausum_ to me; he will
not leave me a poor garden-herb like _seutlion_, I have never a
_passalos_ to hang myself upon. What a long-suffering letter I am
myself, your own knowledge is witness enough. When Zeta stole my
_smaragdos_, and robbed me of all Smyrna, I never took proceedings
against him; Xi might break all _sunthhkai_, and appeal to Thucydides
(who ought to know) as xympathizing with his xystem; I let them alone.
My neighbour Rho I made no difficulty about pardoning as an invalid,
when he transplanted my _mursinai_ into his garden, or, in a fit of
the spleen, took liberties with my _khopsh_. So much for my temper.

Tau's, on the other hand, is naturally violent; its manifestations are
not confined to me. In proof that he has not spared other letters, but
assaulted Delta, Theta, Zeta, and almost the whole alphabet, I wish
his various victims to be put in the box. Now, Vowels of the jury,
mark the evidence of Delta:--'He robbed me of _endelecheia_, which he
claimed, quite illegally, as _entelecheia_.' Mark Theta beating his
breast and plucking out his hair in grief for the loss of
_kolokunthh_. And Zeta mourns for _surizein_ and _salpizein_--nay,
_cannot_ mourn, for lack of his gryzein. What tolerance is possible,