_) I
was never so glad to see a man in my life.
MIS. (_Suspiciously, holding back._) What's the matter?
TR. (_Confidentially._) Just step this way. (_Looks back apprehensively at
Theopropides, who is regarding them suspiciously._)
MIS. (_In a loud and offensive voice._) Won't my interest be paid?
TR. I know you have a good voice; don't shout so loud.
MIS. (_Louder._) Hang it, but I _will_ shout!
TR. (_Groans and glances over shoulder again._) Run along home, there's a
good fellow. (_Urges him toward exit._)", etc.
Tranio has a chance for very lively business: a sickly smile for the
usurer, lightning glances of apprehension towards Theopropides, with an
occasional intimate groan aside to the audience. Other farcical scenes of
the many that may be cited as calling for particularly vivacious business
and gesture are, e.g., _Cas._ 621 ff., where Pardalisca befools Lysidamus
by timely fainting, _Rud._ 414 ff., where Sceparnio flirts with Ampelisca,
and the quarrel scene, _Rud._ 485 ff.[121]
The last four passages quoted in translation are by no means lacking in
artistic humor and a measure of reality, but they imply a pronounced
heightening of the actions and emotions of everyday life and lose their
humor unless presented in the broad spirit that stamps them as belonging
to the plane of farce. We now pass on to motives where the dialogue aims
at effects manifestly unnatural and where verisimilitude is sacrificed to
the joke, as we have seen it is in the employment of "bombast," "true
burlesque," etc.
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