The Same Joke Three Times

Athenaeus’ Deipnosophists, book 6.48

“Pausimachus used to remark about the parasite who was supported by an old woman that their intercourse produced an opposite effect: he was always getting something in his stomach. Makhon writes something similar about this:

People say that when Moschion the water-drinker
Saw with friends a parasite in the Lyceium
Who was fed well by a wealthy old lady, he said
“You terror, you are accomplishing the impossible,
Since this hag is always filling up your stomach!”

When the same man heard that a young man was being fed by an old lady and having sex with her every day, he said: “These days, anything can happen. She never gets pregnant, and he fills his gut every day!”

τὸν ὑπὸ τῆς γραὸς τρεφόμενον παράσιτον Παυσίμαχος ἔλεγεν τοὐναντίον πάσχειν τῇ γραίᾳ συνόντα· αὐτὸν γὰρ ἐν γαστρὶ λαμβάνειν ἀεί. περὶ τούτου καὶ

Μάχων γράφει οὕτως·
τὸν ὑδροπότην … Μοσχίωνα λεγόμενον
ἰδόντα φασὶν ἐν Λυκείῳ μετά τινων
παράσιτον ὑπὸ γραὸς τρεφόμενον πλουσίας
‘ὁ δεῖνα, παράδοξόν γε ποιεῖς πρᾶγμ’, ὅτι
ἡ γραῦς ποιεῖ σ’ ἐν γαστρὶ λαμβάνειν ἀεί.’
ὁ δὲ αὐτὸς παράσιτον ἀκούσας ὑπὸ γραίας τρεφόμενονσυγγινόμενόν τε αὐτῇ ἑκάστης ἡμέρας· νῦν πάντα, φασί, γίνεθ’· ἡ μὲν οὐ κύει, ἐν γαστρὶ δ’ οὗτος λαμβάνει καθ’ ἡμέραν.