Reader

CHARON Pay the fare, curse you. MENIPPUS Shout away, Charon, if that’s what you prefer. CHARON Pay me, I say, for taking you across. MENIPPUS You can’t get blood out of a stone. CHARON Is there anyone who hasn’t a single penny? MENIPPUS I don’t know about anyone else, but I am without one. CHARON But by Pluto, I’ll throttle you, you blackguard, if you don’t pay. MENIPPUS And I’ll smash your head with a blow from my stick. CHARON Then you’ll have sailed all this long way for nothing. MENIPPUS Hermes delivered me to you; let him pay.

HERMES Heaven help me, if I’m going to pay for the dead too. CHARON I won’t leave you alone. MENIPPUS Then you’d better beach your ferry, and stay put; but how will you get what I don’t have? CHARON Didn’t you know you had to bring it with you? MENIPPUS Yes, but I didn’t have it. What of it? Did that make it wrong for me to die? CHARON So you’ll be the only one to boast of a free passage? MENIPPUS Not free, my good fellow; I baled, I helped at the oar, I was the only passenger who wasn’t weeping. CHARON That’s nothing to do with a ferryman; your penny must be paid. No alternative’s allowed.

MENIPPUS Then take me back to life. CHARON That’s a bright remark! Do you want me also to get a thrashing from Aeacus for my pains? MENIPPUS Then don’t bother me. CHARON Show me what you have in your bag. MENIPPUS Lupines, if you want some, and a meal meant for Hecate. CHARON Where did you find us this Dog, Hermes? How he chattered on the crossing too, mocking and jeering at all the passengers and singing on his own while they were lamenting! HERMES Don’t you know, my dear Charon, what sort of man you’ve taken across? He is absolutely independent and cares for nobody. This is Menippus. CHARON But if ever I get my hands on you— MENIPPUS If you get your hands on me, my good fellow! But you won’t get them on me a second time.