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MENIPPUS I ask you, Aeacus, in the name of Pluto, to conduct me round every thing in Hades. AEACUS It’s not easy to do it all, Menippus, but I’ll show you the chief things. This is Cerberus, as you know, and on your way in you’ve already seen the ferryman here who brought you over, and the lake and Pyriphlegethon. MENIPPUS I know all that and that you are the gate-keeper, and I’ve seen the king and the Furies. But show me the men of old, and particularly the famous ones. AEACUS This is Agamemnon, and this Achilles, here is Idomeneus close by, and here Odysseus, then come Ajax, Diomede and the finest of the Greeks.

MENIPPUS Dear me, Homer, how the central figures of your epics have been cast to the ground and lie unrecognisable and ugly, all so much dust and rubbish, “strengthless heads” Cf. Homer, Od. II, 29, etc. in very truth! But who is this, Aeacus? AEACUS Cyrus, and this is Croesus, and the one beyond him Sardanapalus, and beyond them Midas, and that one is Xerxes. MENIPPUS Then you, you scum, were the terror of Hellas? You bridged the Hellespont, and wanted to sail through the mountains? By a canal through Athos. And what a sight Croesus is! And, Aeacus, let me slap the face of Sardanapalus. AEACUS Don’t, you’re breaking his skull; it’s as weak as a woman’s. MENIPPUS Then at least I’ll have a good spit at him, since he’s as much woman as man.

AEACUS Would you like me to show you the Philosophers? MENIPPUS Oh yes, please. AEACUS Here first you have Pythagoras. MENIPPUS Good day to you, Euphorbus or Apollo, or whatever name you prefer. Cf. Diogenes Laertius, VIII, 4 and 11. PYTHAGORAS And a bad day to you, Menippus. MENIPPUS Don’t you still have your thigh of gold? Cf. Diogenes Laertius, VIII, 4 and 11. PYTHAGORAS No; but let me see if there’s anything to eat in your wallet. MENIPPUS Beans, my good fellow—something you mustn’t eat. PYTHAGORAS Just give me some. Doctrines are different among the dead; I’ve learnt that beans and parents’ heads Cf. note on The Cock, 4 (vol. 2, p. 181), for verse forbidding Pythagoreans to eat beans. are not the same thing here.

AEACUS This is Solon, the son of Execestides, and that is Thales, and past them is Pittacus, and the others; they are seven in all, as you see. MENIPPUS These are the only happy and cheerful ones, Aeacus. But who is this covered with cinders, like a loaf baked in the ashes, and with such a crop of blisters on his skin? AEACUS Empedocles; he came half-boiled from Etna. MENIPPUS O brazen-foot Empedocles was said to have died by leaping into the crater of Etna, which later threw out one of his bronze-shod sandals. Cf. Strabo, VI, 274; Diogenes Laertius, VIII, 69. most excellent, what came over you that you jumped into the crater? EMPEDOCLES A fit of mad depression, Menippus. MENIPPUS No, but a fit of vanity and pride and a dose of drivelling folly; that was what burnt you to ashes, boots and all—and well you deserved it! But the trick didn’t do you any good; they found out that you were dead. But wherever, Aeacus, is Socrates? AEACUS Usually he’s talking nonsense with Nestor and Palamedes. MENIPPUS However, I should like to see him, if he’s around. AEACUS Do you see the bald one? MENIPPUS They’re all bald; that distinguishing feature would apply to them all. AEACUS I mean the one with the snub nose. MENIPPUS This too they have in common; they’re all snub-nosed.

SOCRATES Looking for me, Menippus? MENIPPUS Yes, I am, Socrates. SOCRATES What’s the news in Athens? MENIPPUS Many of the young men call themselves Philosophers, and, to judge at least from their garb and gait, are tiptop Philosophers. SOCRATES I’ve seen lots of them. MENIPPUS But you’ve seen, I imagine, what Aristippus was like when he came to join you, or Plato himself—the one reeking of scent, the other accomplished in flattering Sicilian tyrants. SOCRATES And what do they think of me? MENIPPUS In these respects at least, you’re a lucky fellow, Socrates. At any rate they all think you were a wonderful man, and knew everything, though—I think I’m right in saying so—you knew nothing. SOCRATES That’s what I myself kept telling them, but they thought it was all pretence on my part.

MENIPPUS But who are these round you? SOCRATES Charmides, my good fellow, and Phaedrus and Clinias’ son. Alcibiades. MENIPPUS Bravo, Socrates! Still following your own special line here! Still with an eye for beauty! SOCRATES What could I find to do more agreeable? But won’t you lie down by us, please? MENIPPUS Oh, no; I’m going off to Croesus and Sardanapalus, to stay near them. I expect to have plenty of fun hearing their lamentations. AEACUS I’m off now, too, to see that none of the dead gives us the slip and escapes. You’ll see things in full another time, Menippus. MENIPPUS Off with you, Aeacus. What I’ve seen is enough.