Servant: O dearest, have you come, Heracles? Come here.
Servant: For the goddess, since she has heard that you have arrived, [will come] immediately.
Maid: She was baking breads, she was rubbing down the pots with lye.
505
Maid: Two or three fennels, and strip the whole skin off an ox,
Maid: I baked flat cakes, little cakes. But come in.
Xanthias: Very beautiful, I praise you.
Maid: By Apollo, I will not...
Maidservant: I will go around and look after him, since you have meat too.
Maid: The hen was roosting, and the tidbits
510
Servant: It boiled, and she stirred in the most sweet wine-mix.
Maid: But come in with me.
Xanthias: very well.
Servant: You are talking nonsense.
Maid: For I will not let you go. For you are also a flute-girl.
Therapaina: She is inside, the most beautiful and a dancer.
Servant: Two or three others.
515
Xanthias: How do you say it? Dancers?
Maid: To have been anointed and just now put on.
Maid: But come in, just as the cook has already [prepared] the pieces.
Maid: She was about to take even the table, when she entered.
Xanthias: Go now, tell the dancers first.
Xanthias: to the women inside, I am entering.
520
Xanthias: Let the boy follow here carrying the equipment.
Dionysus: Stop right there. There is no hurry,
Dionysus: Did I make Heracles into a joke?
Dionysus: 'You will certainly not chatter, having [those words], O Xanthias,'
Dionysus: But, having lifted them up, you will carry the bedding back again.
525
Xanthias: What is it? Surely he does not intend to cheat me.
Xanthias: Have you sung yourself?
Dionysus: Not soon, but now I do it.
Dionysus: Put down the skin.
Xanthias: I testify to this.
Xanthias: And I entrust it even to the gods.
Dionysus: Which gods?
Dionysus: but it is not foolish or empty to expect you.
530
Dionysus: 'Will you be like a slave and mortal Alcmene?'
Xanthias: By all means, well; keep it. For perhaps to you at some time
Xanthias: You would ask me, if the god wished.
Frogs. Aristophanes. . 2026-09-08.