Charon, or the Inspectors (6-10)

CHARON I see a quantity of land with a great lagoon encircling it, mountains, rivers bigger than Cocytus and Pyriphlegethon, tiny little men, and things which look like their hiding-places.

HERMES Those things which you take to be hiding-places are cities.

CHARON Do you know, Hermes, we haven’t accomplished anything, but have moved Mount Parnassus, Castaly and all, Mount Oeta and the rest of them for nothing.

HERMES Why?

CHARON I can’t see anything plainly from on high. What I wanted was not just to look at cities and mountains as in a picture, but to observe men themselves, what they are doing and what they are saying. For instance, when we first met and you saw me laughing and asked what I was laughing at, I had heard something which amused me vastly.

HERMES What was it?

CHARON A man who had been invited to dinner, I take it, by one of his friends for the next day replied “Certainly I shall come,” and even as he spoke a tile from the roof which someone had dislodged fell on him and killed him. I had to laugh at him because he did not keep his promise—I_ think I shall go down a little, so as to see and_ hear better.

HERMES Hold still ; I will remedy that for you too and will. make you sharp-sighted in a minute by getting a charm out of Homer for this purpose as well as the other. When I say the verses remember not to ‘be short-sighted any longer, but to sce everything distinctly.

CHARON Only say them!

HERMES

Lo, from your eyes I have lifted a veil that before was upon them.

So that your sight may be sure to distinguish a god from a mortal.

Iliad5, 127 ff. "Lo, from your eyes I have lifted a veil that before was upon them. So that your sight may be sure to distinguish a god from a mortal.” ! How about it? Do you see now ?

CHARON Marvellously! Lynceus was a blind man beside me; so now give me the necessary instruction and answer. my questions. But would you like me to ask them in the language of Homer, so that you may know that I myself am not unfamiliar with his poetry?

HERMES How can you know any of it when you are always on shipboard and at the oar?

CHARON See here, that is a libel on my calling! When I set’ him over the ferry after his death, I leard him recite a quantity of verses and still remember some of them, although a good bit of a storm caught us then. You see, he began to sing a song that was not too auspicious for ‘the passengers, telling how Poseidon brought the clouds together, stirred up the deep by plunging in his trident as if it were a ladle, excited all the gales and a lot more of it. Thus he put the sea in a commotion with his verses, and a black squall suddenly struck us and just missed capsizing the boat. Then he became seasick and jettisoned most of his lays, including Scylla and

Charybdis and the Cyclops; so that it wasn’t hard for me to get a little salvage out of all that he let go.[*]

Tell me:

Who is the burly man yonder, the hero so tall and so handsome,

Towering over the throng by a head and a broadpair of shoulders ?

Parody on Iliad3, 226 (Ajax). HERMES That is Milo, the athlete from Croton. The Greeks are clapping their hands at him because he has lifted the bull and is carrying him through the centre of the stadium.

CHARON How much more fitting it would be, Hermes, if they should applaud me ; for in a little while I shall seize Milo himself and heave him aboard the boat, when he comes to us after getting thrown by Death, the most invincible of all antagonists, without even knowing how he was tripped! Then we shall hear him wail, depend upon it, when he remembers these crowns of victory and this applause; but now he thinks highly of himself because of the admiration he is winning for carrying the bull. What! Are we to think that he expects to die some day ?

HERMES : Why should he think of death now, when he is so young and strong?

CHARON Never mind him; he will give us food for laughter

before long when he makes his voyage and is no longer able to lift a mosquito, let alone a bull!

Tell me,

Who is the other man yonder, the haughty one?

Iliad3, 226 served as a model for this line also. Not a Greek, it seems, from his dress at least.

HERMES That is Cyrus, Charon, the son of Cambyses, who has already transferred to the Persians the empire that once belonged to the Medes. Moreover, he recently conquered the Assyrians and brought Babylon to terms, and now he appears to be meditating a campaign against Lydia, with the idea of overthrowing Croesus and ruling the world.

CHARON And Croesus, where is he ?

HERMES Look over there towards the great acropolis with the triple wall. That is Sardis, and now you see Croesus himself sitting on a golden throne, talking with Solon of Athens. Would you like to listen to what they are saying ?[*] CHARON By all means.

CROESUS My friend from Athens, as you have seen my riches, my treasuries, all the bullion that I have and the rest of my splendor, tell me whom do you consider the most fortunate man in the world ?

CHARON What will Solon say to that?

HERMES Never fear ; nothing ignoble, Charon.

SOLON Fortunate men are few, Croesus, but I consider that of all the men I know, the most fortunate are Cleobis and Biton, the sons of the priestess at Argos, who died together the other day when they had harnessed themselves and drawn their mother to the temple on the wagon.[*] CROESUS . Very well, let them have the first rank in good fortune. But who would be the second? :

SOLON Tellus of Athens, who lived happily and died for his country.

CROESUS But what about me, knave? Don’t you think I am fortunate ?

SOLON I do not know, Croesus, and shall not until you come to the close of your life. Death is a sure test in such matters, that and a fortunate life right up to the end.

CHARON Thank you kindly, Solon, for not forgetting us,[*] but demanding the decision of such matters to be made right at the ferry.