To which the host: And that reminds me, a supply of unguents might not
be amiss;[3] what say you? Shall we feast on perfumes also?[4]

[3] Lit. "suppose I tell the servant to bring in some perfumes, so
that we may further feast on fragrance . . ." Cf. Theophr. "Char."
vii. 6 (Jebb ad loc.)

[4] See Athen. xv. 686.

No, I protest (the other answered). Scents resemble clothes. One dress
is beautiful on man and one on woman; and so with fragrance: what
becomes the woman, ill becomes the man. Did ever man anoint himself
with oil of myrrh to please his fellow? Women, and especially young
women (like our two friends' brides, Niceratus' and Critobulus'), need
no perfume, being but compounds themselves of fragrance.[5] No,
sweeter than any perfume else to women is good olive-oil, suggestive
of the training-school:[6] sweet if present, and when absent longed
for. And why? Distinctions vanish with the use of perfumes. The
freeman and the slave have forthwith both alike one odour. But the
scents derived from toils--those toils which every free man loves[7]--
need customary habit first, and time's distillery, if they are to be
sweet with freedom's breath, at last.[8]

[5] Cf. Solomon's Song, iv. 10: "How fair is thy love, my sister, my
spouse! how much better is thy love than wine! and the smell of
thine ointments than all spices!"

[6] Lit. "the gymnasium."

[7] Cf. Aristoph. "Clouds," 1002 foll. See J. A. Symonds, "The Greek