Her. Should you like a speedy, rapid, downhill road?
Bac. Indeed I should, for I'm a sorry traveller.
Her. Go to the Keramicus, then.
Bac. What then?
Her. Get up to the very top of the tower—
Bac. What then?
Her. Stand there and watch when the Race of the Torch begins;
And mind, when you hear the people cry 'Start, start!'
Then start at once with 'em.
Bac. Me? Start? Where from?
Her. From the top of the tower to the bottom.
Bac. No, not I.
It's enough to dash my brains out! I'll not go
Such a road upon any account."—(F.)
Bacchus gets the needful information at last, and sets out on his journey—not without some remonstrance from his slave as to the weight of the luggage he has to carry. Surely, Xanthias says, there must be some dead people going that way on their own account, in a conveyance, who would carry it for a trifle? His master gives him leave to make such an arrangement if he can—and as a bier is borne across the stage, Xanthias stops it, and tries to make a bargain with the occupant. The dead man asks eighteenpence; Xanthias offers him a shilling; the other replies that he "would rather come to life again," and bids his bearers "move on."
There must have been some kind of change of scene, to enable the travellers to arrive at the passage of the Styx, where Charon's ferry-boat is in waiting. He plies his trade exactly after the fashion of a modern omnibus-conductor. "Any one for Lethe, Tænarus,
