The Frogs | Page 6

the wraps, my lad.
XAN. Now is not this too bad? Like "Zeus's Corinth," he "the wraps" keeps saying o'er and o'er.
CHOR. Now wheel your sacred dances through the glade with flowers bedight, All ye who are partakers of the holy festal rite; And I will with the women and the holy maidens go Where they keep the nightly vigil, an auspicious light to show.
(The departure for the Thriasian Plain)
Now haste we to the roses, And the meadows full of posies, Now haste we to the meadows In our own old way, In choral dances blending, In dances never ending, Which only for the holy The Destinies array. O happy mystic chorus, The blessed sunshine o'er us On us alone is smiling, In its soft sweet light: On us who strove for ever With holy, pure endeavour, Alike by friend and stranger To guide our steps aright.
DIO. What's the right way to knock? I wonder how The natives here are wont to knock at doors.
XAN. No dawdling: taste the door. You've got, remember, The lion-hide and pride of Heracles.
DIO. Boy! boy!
AEACUS. Who's there?
DIO. I, Heracles the strong!
AEAC. O, you most shameless desperate ruffian, you! O, villain, villain, arrant vilest villain! Who seized our Cerberus by the throat, and fled, And ran, and rushed, and bolted, haling off The dog, my charge! But now I've got thee fast. So close the Styx's inky-hearted rock, The blood-bedabbled peak of Acheron Shall hem thee in: the hell-hounds of Cocytus Prowl round thee; whilst the hundred-headed Asp Shall rive thy heart-strings: the Tartesian Lamprey, Prey on thy lungs: and those Tithrasian Gorgons Mangle and tear thy kidneys, mauling them, Entrails and all, into one bloody mash. I'll speed a running foot to fetch them hither.
XAN. Hallo! what now?
DIO. I've done it: call the god.
XAN. Get up, you laughing-stock; get up directly, Before you're seen.
DIO. What, I get up? I'm fainting. Please dab a sponge of water on my heart.
XAN. Here!
DIO. Dab it, you.
XAN. Where? O, ye golden gods, Lies your heart THERE?
DIO. It got so terrified It fluttered down into my stomach's pit.
XAN. Cowardliest of gods and men!
DIO. The cowardliest? I? What I, who asked you for a sponge, a thing A coward never would have done!
XAN. What then?
DIO. A coward would have lain there wallowing; But I stood up, and wiped myself withal.
XAN. Poseidon! quite heroic.
DIO. 'Deed I think so. But weren't you frightened at those dreadful threats And shoutings?
XAN, Frightened? Not a bit. I cared not.
DIO. Come then, if you're so very brave a man, Will you be I, and take the hero's club And lion's skin, since you're so monstrous plucky? And I'll be now the slave, and bear the luggage.
XAN. Hand them across. I cannot choose but take them. And now observe the Xanthio-heracles If I'm a coward and a sneak like you.
DIO. Nay, you're the rogue from Melite's own self. And I'll pick up and carry on the traps.
MAID. O welcome, Heracles! come in, sweetheart. My Lady, when they told her, set to work, Baked mighty loaves, boiled two or three tureens Of lentil soup, roasted a prime ox whole, Made rolls and honey-cakes. So come along.
XAN. (Declining.) You are too kind.
MAID. I will not let you go. I will not LET you! Why, she's stewing slices Of juicy bird's-flesh, and she's making comfits, And tempering down her richest wine. Come, dear, Come along in.
XAN. (Still declining.) Pray thank her.
MAID. O you're jesting, I shall not let you off: there's such a lovely Flute-girl all ready, and we've two or three Dancing-girls also.
XAN. Eh! what! Dancing-girls?
MAID. Young budding virgins, freshly tired and trimmed. Come, dear, come in. The cook was dishing up The cutlets, and they are bringing in the tables.
XAN. Then go you in, and tell those dancing-girls Of whom you spake, I'm coming in Myself. Pick up the traps, my lad, and follow me.
DIO. Hi! stop! you're not in earnest, just because I dressed you up, in fun, as Heracles? Come, don't keep fooling, Xanthias, but lift And carry in the traps yourself.
XAN. Why! what! You are never going to strip me of these togs You gave me!
DIO. Going to? No, I'm doing it now. Off with that lion-skin.
XAN. Bear witness all The gods shall judge between us.
DIO. Gods indeed! Why how could you (the vain and foolish thought!) A slave, a mortal, act Alcmena's son?
XAN. All right then, take them; maybe, if God will, You'll soon require my services again.
CHOR. This is the part of a dexterous clever Man with his wits about him ever, One who has travelled the world to see; Always to shift, and to keep through all Close to the sunny side of the wall; Not like a pictured block to be, Standing always in one position; Nay but to veer, with expedition,