What did you tell your father when you handed it over?

Mnes.

  Me id aurum accepisse extemplo ab hospite Archidemide.

      That I had received it on demand from his friend
      Archidemides.

Chrys.

  Em,
  istoc dicto dedisti hodie in cruciatum Chrysalum;
  nam ubi me aspiciet, ad carnuficem rapiet continuo senex.

      (grimly) Aha!  And gave Chrysalus over to torment by the
      statement; for when he sets eyes on me the old man will
      promptly hale me off to the public torturer.

Mnes.

  Ego patrem exoravi.

      (hurriedly I persuaded him.

Chrys.

  Nempe ergo hoc ut faceret quod loquor?

      (dryly) Indeed?  To do what I’m saying, I take it?

Mnes.

  Immo tibi ne noceat neu quid ob eam rem suscenseat; 690
  atque aegre impetravi. nunc hoc tibi curandumst, Chrysale.

No, no, not to harm you, or be at all angry with you for what you did; and a hard time I had getting it out of him, too. (pauses, then in flattering manner) Here’s what you must see to now, Chrysalus.

Chrys.

  Quid vis curem?

      (sourly) What do you want me to see to?

Mnes.

  Ut ad senem etiam alteram facias viam.
  compara, fabricare finge quod lubet, conglutina,
  ut senem hodie doctum docte fallas aurumque auferas.

To making another march still against the old man.  Use your ideas, your devices, your craft, any way you please, stick together some clever scheme to fool the clever old fellow to-day and get away with the gold.

Chrys.

  Vix videtur fieri posse.

      It hardly looks possible to me.

Mnes.

  Perge, ac facile ecfeceris.

      You go ahead, and you’ll carry it through easily.

Chrys.

  Quam, malum, facile, quem mendaci prendit manufesto modo?
  quem si orem ut mihi nil credat, id non ausit credere.

      Easily, eh, curse it?  A man that has caught me in a
      barefaced lie?  A man that, if I should beg him not to
      believe me in a thing, wouldn’t dare to believe even that!

Mnes.

  Immo si audias quae dicta dixit me adversum tibi.

      (smiling feebly) Worse still—­if you had only heard what
      he said to me about you.

Chrys.

  Quid dixit?

      What did he say?

Mnes.

  Si tu illum solem sibi solem esse diceres,
  se illum lunam credere esse et noctem qui nunc est dies. 700

      That if you told him the sun there was the sun, he’d believe
      it was the moon, and that it was night now, not day.