Voyage To the Lower World (11-15)

Megapenthes.

Well, Clotho, I hope you will not refuse my last request.

Clotho

Which is?

Megapenthes.

I should like to know how things will be, now that I am gone.

Clotho

Certainly; you shall have that mortification. Your wife will pass into the hands of Midas, your slave; he has been her gallant for some time past.

Megapenthes.

Acurse on him! 'Twas at her request that I gave him his freedom.

Clotho

Your daughter will take her place in the harem of the present monarch. ‘Then all the old statues and portraits which the city set up in your honour will be overturned,—to the entertainment, no doubt, of the spectators.

Megapenthes.

And will no friend resent these doings?

Clotho

Who was your friend? Who had any reason to be? Need I explain that the cringing courtiers who lauded your every word and deed were actuated either by hope or by fear —time-servers every man of them, with a keen eye to the main chance?

Megapenthes.

And these are they whose feasts rang with my name! who, as they poured their libations, invoked every blessing on my head! Not one but would have died before me, could he have had his will; nay, they swore by no other name.

Clotho

Yes; and you dined with one of them yesterday, and it cost you your life. It was that last cup you drank that brought you here.

Megapenthes.

Ah, I noticed a bitter taste—But what was his object?

Clotho

Oh, you want to know too much. It is high time you came on board.

Megapenthes.

Clotho, I had a particular reason for desiring one more glimpse of daylight. I have a burning grievance!

Clotho

And what is that? Something of vast importance, I make no doubt.

Megapenthes.

It is about my slave Carion. The moment he knew of my death, he came up to the room where I lay; it was late in the evening; he had plenty of time in front of him, for not a soul was watching by me; he brought with him my concubine Glycerium (an old affair, this, E suspect), closed the door, and proceeded to take his pleasure with her, as if no third person had been in the room! Having satisfied the demands of passion, he turned his attention to me. ‘You little villain,’ he cried, ‘many’s the flogging I’ve had from you, for no fault of mine!’ And as he spoke he plucked out my hair and smote me on the face. ‘Away with you,’ he cried finally, spitting on me, ‘away to the place of the damned!’—and so withdrew. I burned with resentment: but there I lay stark and cold, and could do nothing. That baggage Glycerium, too, hearing footsteps approaching, moistened her eyes and pretended she had been weeping for me; and withdrew sobbing, and repeating my name.—If I could but get hold of them——

Clotho

Never mind what you would do to them, but come on board. The hour is at hand when you must appear before the tribunal.

Megapenthes.

And who will presume to give his vote against a tyrant?

Clotho

Against a tyrant, who indeed? Against a Shade, Rhadamanthus will take that liberty. He is strictly impartial, as you will presently observe, in adapting his sentences to the requirements of individual cases. And now, no more delay.

Megapenthes.

Dread Fate, let me be some common man,—some

pauper! I have been a king,—let me be a slave! Only let me live!

Clotho

Where is the one with the stick? Hermes, you and he must drag him up feet foremost. He will never come up by himself.

Hermes

Come along, my runagate. Here you are, skipper. And I say, keep an eye——

Charon

Never fear. We'll lash him to the mast.

Megapenthes.

Look you, I must have the seat of honour.

Clotho

And why exactly?

Megapenthes.

Can you ask? Was I not a tyrant, with a guard of ten thousand men?

Cynic

Oh, dullard! And you complain of Carion’s pulling your hair! Wait till you get a taste of this stick; you shall know what it is to be a tyrant.

Megapenthes.

What, shall a Cynic dare to raise his staff against me? Sirrah, have you forgotten the other day, when I had all but nailed you to the cross, for letting that sharp censorious tongue of yours wag too freely?

Cynic

Well, and now it is your turn te be nailed,—to the mast.

Micyllus

And what of me, mistress? Am I to be left out of the reckoning? Because I am poor, must I be the last to come aboard?

Clotho

Who are you?

Micyllus

Micyllus the cobbler.

Clotho

A cobbler, and cannot wait your turn? Look at the tyrant: see what bribes he offers us, only for a short reprieve. It is very strange that delay is not to your fancy too.

Micyllus

It is this way, my lady Fate. I find but cold comfort in that promise of the Cyclops: ‘Outis shall be eaten last,’ said he; but first or last, the same teeth are waiting. And then, it is not the same with me as with the rich. Our lives are what they call ‘diametrically opposed.’ This tyrant, now, was

thought happy while he lived; he was feared and respected by all: he had his gold and his silver; his fine clothes and his horses and his banquets; his smart pages and his handsome ladies,—and had to leave them all. No wonder if he was vexed, and felt the tug of parting. For I know not how it is, but these things are like birdlime: a man’s soul sticks to them, and will not easily come away; they have grown to be a part of him. Nay, ’tis as if men were bound in some chain that nothing can break; and when by sheer force they are dragged away, they cry out and beg for mercy. They are bold enough for aught else, but show them this .ame road to Hades, and they prove to be but cowards. They turn about, and must ever be looking back at what they have left behind them, far off though it be,—like men that are sick for love. So it was with the fool yonder: as we came along, he was for running away; and now he tires you with his entreaties.

Micyllus

As for me, I had no stake in life; lands and horses, money and goods, fame, statues,—I had none of them; I could not have been in better trim: it needed but one nod from Atropus,—I was busied about a boot at the time, but down I flung knife and leather with a will, jumped up, and never waited to get my shoes, or wash the blacking from my hands, but joined the procession there and then, ay, and headed it, looking ever forward; I had left nothing behind me that called for a backward glance. And, on my word, things begin to look well already. Equal rights for all, and no man better than his neighbour; that is hugely to my liking. And from what I can learn there is no collecting of debts in this country, and no taxes; better still, no shivering in winter, no sickness, no hard knocks from one’s betters. All is peace. The tables are turned: the laugh is with us poor men; it is the rich that make moan, and are ill at ease.