Coming to the sh.o.r.es of Acheron, he is ferried over in Charon's boat--Xanthias has to walk round--the First Chorus of Marsh Frogs (from which the play takes its t.i.tle) greeting him with prolonged croakings.

Approaching Pluto's Palace in fear and trembling, he knocks timidly at the gate. Being presently admitted, he finds a contest on the point of being held before the King of Hades and the Initiates of the Eleusinian Mysteries, who form the Second Chorus, between Aeschylus, the present occupant of the throne of tragic excellence in h.e.l.l, and the pushing, self-satisfied, upstart Euripides, who is for ousting him from his pride of place.

Each poet quotes in turn from his Dramas, and the indignant Aeschylus makes fine fun of his rival's verses, and shows him up in the usual Aristophanic style as a corrupter of morals, a contemptible casuist, and a professor of the dangerous new learning of the Sophists, so justly held in suspicion by true-blue Athenian Conservatives. Eventually a pair of scales is brought in, and verses alternately spouted by the two candidates are weighed against each other, the mighty lines of the Father of Tragedy making his flippant, finickin little rival's scale kick the beam every time.

Dionysus becomes a convert to the superior merits of the old school of tragedy, and contemptuously dismisses Euripides, to take Aeschylus back with him to the upper world instead, leaving Sophocles meantime in occupation of the coveted throne of tragedy in the nether regions.

Needless to say, the various scenes of the journey to Hades, the crossing of Acheron, the Frogs' choric songs, and the trial before Pluto, afford opportunities for much excellent fooling in our Author's very finest vein of drollery, and "seem to have supplied the original idea for those modern burlesques upon the Olympian and Tartarian deities which were at one time so popular."

THE FROGS

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

DIONYSUS.

XANTHIAS, his Servant.

HERACLES.

A DEAD MAN.

CHARON.

AEACUS.

FEMALE ATTENDANT OF PERSEPHONe.

INKEEPERS' WIVES.

EURIPIDES.

AESCHYLUS.

PLUTO.

CHORUS OF FROGS.

CHORUS OF INITIATES.

SCENE: In front of the temple of Heracles, and on the banks of Acheron in the Infernal Regions.

THE FROGS

XANTHIAS. Now am I to make one of those jokes that have the knack of always making the spectators laugh?

DIONYSUS. Aye, certainly, any one you like, excepting "I am worn out."

Take care you don't say that, for it gets on my nerves.

XANTHIAS. Do you want some other drollery?

DIONYSUS. Yes, only not, "I am quite broken up."

XANTHIAS. Then what witty thing shall I say?

DIONYSUS. Come, take courage; only ...

XANTHIAS. Only what?

DIONYSUS. ... don't start saying as you shift your package from shoulder to shoulder, "Ah! that's a relief!"

XANTHIAS. May I not at least say, that unless I am relieved of this cursed load I shall let wind?

DIONYSUS. Oh! for pity's sake, no! you don't want to make me spew.

XANTHIAS. What need then had I to take this luggage, if I must not copy the porters that Phrynichus, Lycis and Amipsias[382] never fail to put on the stage?

DIONYSUS. Do nothing of the kind. Whenever I chance to see one of these stage tricks, I always leave the theatre feeling a good year older.

XANTHIAS. Oh! my poor back! you are broken and I am not allowed to make a single joke.

DIONYSUS. Just mark the insolence of this Sybarite! I, Dionysus, the son of a ... wine-jar,[383] I walk, I tire myself, and I set yonder rascal upon an a.s.s, that he may not have the burden of carrying his load.

XANTHIAS. But am I not carrying it?

DIONYSUS. No, since you are on your beast.

XANTHIAS. Nevertheless I am carrying this....

DIONYSUS. What?

XANTHIAS. ... and it is very heavy.

DIONYSUS. But this burden you carry is borne by the a.s.s.

XANTHIAS. What I have here, 'tis certainly I who bear it, and not the a.s.s, no, by all the G.o.ds, most certainly not!

DIONYSUS. How can you claim to be carrying it, when you are carried?

XANTHIAS. That I can't say; but this shoulder is broken, anyhow.

DIONYSUS. Well then, since you say that the a.s.s is no good to you, pick her up in your turn and carry her.

XANTHIAS. What a pity I did not fight at sea;[384] I would baste your ribs for that joke.

DIONYSUS. Dismount, you clown! Here is a door,[385] at which I want to make my first stop. Hi! slave! hi! hi! slave!

HERACLES (_from inside the Temple_). Do you want to beat in the door? He knocks like a Centaur.[386] Why, what's the matter?

DIONYSUS. Xanthias!

XANTHIAS. Well?

DIONYSUS. Did you notice?

XANTHIAS. What?