Any communication about the country,
The roads, the streets, the bridges, public houses
And lodgings, free from bugs and fleas, if possible.

Hercules mentions various ways of arriving at the infernal regions: "The hanging road,—rope and noose?"—"That's too stifling."—"The pestle and mortar, then,—the beaten road?"—"No; that gives one cold feet."—"Go, then, to the tower of the Keramicus, and throw yourself headlong." No; Bacchus does not wish to have his brains dashed out. He would go by the road which Hercules took. Of this, Hercules gives an alarming account, beginning with the bottomless lake and the boat of Charon. Bacchus determines to set forth, but is detained by the recalcitrance of his servant, Xanthias, who refuses to carry his bundle any further.

A funeral now comes across the stage. Bacchus asks the dead man if he is willing to carry some bundles to Hell for him. The dead man demands two drachmas for the service. Bacchus offers him ninepence, which he angrily refuses, and is carried out of sight. Charon presently appears, and makes known, like a good ferryman, the points at which he will deliver passengers.

Who wants the ferryman?
Anybody waiting to remove from the sorrows of life?
A passage to Lethe's wharf? to Cerberus' Beach?
To Tartarus? to Tenaros? to Perdition?

Just so, in my youth, sailing on the Hudson, one heard all night the sound of Peekskill landing! Fishkill landing! Rhinebeck landing!—with darkness and swish of steam quite infernal enough.

Charon takes Bacchus on board, but compels him to do his part of the rowing, promising him: "As soon as you begin you shall have music that will teach you to keep time."

This music is the famous "Chorus of the Frogs," beginning, "Brokekekesh, koash, koash," and running through many lines, with this occasional refrain, of which Bacchus soon tires, as he does of the oar. His servant Xanthias is obliged to make the journey by land and on foot, Charon bidding him wait for his master at the Stone of Repentance, by the Slough of Despond, beyond the Tribulations. After encountering the Empousa, a nursery hobgoblin, they meet the spirits of the initiated, singing hymns to Bacchus—whom they invoke as Jacchus—and to Ceres. This part of the play, intended, Frere says, to ridicule the Eleusinian mysteries, is curiously human in its incongruity,—a jumble of the beautiful and the trivial. I must quote from it the closing strophe:—

Let us hasten, let us fly
Where the lovely meadows lie,
Where the living waters flow,
Where the roses bloom and blow.
Heirs of immortality,
Segregated safe and pure,
Easy, sorrowless, secure,
Since our earthly course is run,
We behold a brighter sun.

Such sweet words we to-day could expect to hear from the lips of our own dear ones, gone before.

Very incongruous is certainly this picture of Bacchus, in a cowardly and ribald state of mind, listening to the hymn which celebrates his divine aspect. Jacchus, whom the spirits invoke, is the glorified Bacchus, the highest ideal of what was vital religion in those days. But the god himself is not professionally, only personally, present, and, wearing the disguise of Hercules, in no way notices or responds to the strophes which invoke him. He asks the band indeed to direct him to Pluto's house, which turns out to be near at hand.