A common mode of advertising, about the same time, was by means of the public crier, κήρυξ. In comparatively modern times our town-criers have been proverbial for murdering the king’s English, or, at all events, of robbing it of all elecutionary beauties. Not so among the Greeks, who were so nice in point of oratorical power, and so offended by a vicious pronunciation, that they would not suffer even the public crier to proclaim their laws unless he was accompanied by a musician, who, in case of an inexact tone, might be ready to give him the proper pitch and expression. But this would hardly be the case when the public crier was employed by private individuals. In Apuleius (“Golden Ass”) we are brought face to face with one of these characters, a cunning rogue, full of low humour, who appears to have combined the duties of crier and auctioneer. Thus, when the slave and the ass are led out for sale, the crier proclaims the price of each with a loud voice, joking at the same time to the best of his abilities, in order to keep the audience in good humour. This latter idea has not been lost sight of in more modern days. “The crier, bawling till his throat was almost split, cracked all sorts of ridiculous jokes upon me [the ass]. ‘What is the use,’ said he, ‘of offering for sale this old screw of a jackass, with his foundered hoofs, his ugly colour, his sluggishness in everything but vice, and a hide that is nothing but a ready-made sieve? Let us even make a present of him, if we can find any one who will not be loth to throw away hay on the brute.’ In this way the crier kept the bystanders in roars of laughter.”2
The same story furnishes further particulars regarding the ancient mode of crying. When Psyche has absconded, Venus requests Mercury “to proclaim her in public, and announce a reward to him who shall find her.” She further enjoins the divine crier to “clearly describe the marks by which Psyche may be recognised, that no one may excuse himself on the plea of ignorance, if he incurs the crime of unlawfully concealing her.” So saying, she gives him a little book, in which is written Psyche’s name and sundry particulars. Mercury thereupon descends to the earth, and goes about among all nations, where he thus proclaims the loss of