Aristophanes, translated by Algernon Charles Swinburne

“ And my main intention, or at least my main desire, in the undertaking of this brief adventure, was to renew as far as possible for English ears the music of this resonant and triumphant metre, which goes ringing at full gallop as of horses who
⁠'dance as 'twere to the music
Their own hoofs make.'
I would not seem over curious in search of an apt or inapt quotation: but nothing can be fitter than a verse of Shakespeare's to praise at once and to describe the most typical verse of Aristophanes. ”

“ Winged fame is a bird, as you reckon: you sneeze, and
⁠the sign's as a bird for conviction:
All tokens are 'birds' with you—sounds too, and lackeys,
⁠and donkeys. Then must it not follow
That we are to you all as the manifest godhead that
⁠speaks in prophetic Apollo? ”