CARIO (_opening the door_). Who knocks at the door? Halloa! I see no one;
'twas then by chance it gave forth that plaintive tone.
HERMES (_to Carlo, who is about to close the door_). Cario! stop!
CARIO. Eh! friend, was it you who knocked so loudly? Tell me.
HERMES. No, I was going to knock and you forestalled me by opening. Come,
call your master quick, then his wife and his children, then his slave
and his dog, then thyself and his pig.
CARIO. And what's it all about?
HERMES. It's about this, rascal! Zeus wants to serve you all with the
same sauce and hurl the lot of you into the Barathrum.
CARIO. Have a care for your tongue, you bearer of ill tidings! But why
does he want to treat us in that scurvy fashion?
HERMES. Because you have committed the most dreadful crime. Since Plutus
has recovered his sight, there is nothing for us other gods, neither
incense, nor laurels, nor cakes, nor victims, nor anything in the world.
CARIO. And you will never be offered anything more; you governed us too
ill.
HERMES. I care nothing at all about the other gods, but 'tis myself. I
tell you I am dying of hunger.
CARIO. That's reasoning like a wise fellow.
HERMES. Formerly, from earliest dawn, I was offered all sorts of good
things in the wine-shops,--wine-cakes, honey, dried figs, in short,
dishes worthy of Hermes. Now, I lie the livelong day on my back, with my
legs in the air, famishing.
CARIO. And quite right too, for you often had them punished who treated
you so well.[801]
HERMES. Ah! the lovely cake they used to knead for me on the fourth of
the month![802]
CARIO. You recall it vainly; your regrets are useless! there'll be no
more cake.
HERMES. Ah! the ham I was wont to devour!
CARIO. Well then! make use of your legs and hop on one leg upon the
wine-skin,[803] to while away the time.
HERMES. Oh! the grilled entrails I used to swallow down!
CARIO. Your own have got the colic, methinks.
HERMES. Oh! the delicious tipple, half wine, half water!