People who
saw him wearing his hair close cut, bathing in cold water, eating
coarse meal, and dining on black broth, doubted, or rather could
not believe, that he ever had a cook in his house, or had ever
seen a perfumer, or had worn a mantle of Milesian purple. For he
had, as it was observed, this peculiar talent for gaining men's
affections, that he could at once comply with and really enter
into their habits and ways of life, and change faster than the
chameleon. One color, indeed, they say the chameleon cannot
assume; it cannot make itself appear white; but Alcibiades,
whether with good men or with bad, could adapt himself to his
company, and equally wear the appearance of virtue or vice. At
Sparta, he was devoted to athletic exercises, was frugal and
reserved; in Ionia, luxurious, gay, and indolent; in Thrace,
always drinking; in Thessaly, ever on horseback; and when he lived
with Tissaphernes, the Persian satrap, he exceeded the Persians,
themselves in magnificence and pomp. Not that his natural
disposition changed so easily, nor that his real character was so
very variable, but whenever he was sensible that by pursuing his
own inclinations he might give offence to those with whom he had
occasion to converse, he transformed himself into any shape and
adopted any fashion, that he observed to be most agreeable to
them.
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