Plutus
[220]
Ah! they'll prove sorry helpers.
Chremylus
No, not so, once they've grown rich. But you, Cario, run quick ...
Cario
Where?
Chremylus
... to call my comrades, the other husbandmen (you'll probably find the poor fellows toiling away in the fields),
[225]
that each of them may come here to take his share of the gifts of Plutus.
Cario
I'm off. But let someone come from the house to take this morsel of meat.
Chremylus
I'll see to that; you run your hardest.
[230]
As for you, Plutus, the most excellent of all the gods, come in here with me; this is the house you must fill with riches to-day, by fair means or foul.
Plutus
I don't at all like going
[235]
into other folks' houses in this manner; I have never got any good from it. If I got inside a miser's house, straightway he would bury me deep underground; if some honest fellow among his friends came
[240]
to ask him for the smallest coin, he would deny ever having seen me. Then if I went to a fool's house, he would sacrifice in dicing and wenching, and very soon I should be completely stripped and pitched out of doors.
Chremylus
[245]
That's because you have never met a man who knew how to avoid the two extremes; moderation is the strong point in my character. I love saving as much as anybody, and I know how to spend, when it's needed. But let us go in; I want to make you known
[250]
to my wife and to my only son, whom I love most of all after yourself.
Plutus
I'm quite sure of that.
Chremylus
Why should I hide the truth from you?
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Aristophanes. Wealth. The Complete Greek Drama, vol. 2. Eugene O'Neill, Jr. New York. Random House. 1938.
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