_Cario_ (_stroking himself_). Oh what a blessed thing, good friends, is riches! And with no toil or trouble of our own! Lo, there is store of all good things within, Yea, heaped upon us--yet we’ve cheated no one! Our meal-chest’s brimming with the finest boltings, The cellar’s stocked with wine--of such a bouquet! And every pot and pan in the house is heaped With gold and silver--it’s a sight to see! The well runs oil--the very mustard-pot Has nothing but myrrh in it, and you can’t get up Into the garret, it’s so full of figs. The crockery’s bronze, the wooden bowls are silver, And the oven’s made of ivory. In the kitchen, We play at pitch-and-toss with golden pieces; And scent ourselves (so delicate are we grown) with--garlic.[55] As to my master, he’s within there, sacrificing A hog and a goat and a ram, full drest, good soul! But the smoke drove me out--(_affectedly_)--I can_not_ stand it. I’m rather sensitive, and smoke hurts my eyelids. The happy results of the new administration are further shown in the cases of some other characters who now come upon the scene. An Honest Man, who has spent his fortune on his friends and met with nothing but ingratitude in return, now finds his wealth suddenly restored to him, and comes to dedicate to the god who has been his benefactor the threadbare cloak and worn-out shoes which he had been lately reduced to wear. A public Informer--that hateful character whom the comic dramatist was never tired of holding up to the execration of his audience--has now found his business fail him, and threatens that, if there be any law or justice left in Athens, this god who leaves the poor knaves to starve shall be made blind again. Cario--quite in the spirit of the clown in a modern pantomime--strips him of his fine clothes, puts the honest man’s ragged cloak on him instead, hangs the old shoes round his neck, and kicks him off the stage, howling out that he will surely “lay an information.” An old lady who has lost her young lover, as soon as under the new dispensation she lost the charms of her money, in vain appeals to Chremylus, as having influence with this reformed government, to obtain her some measure of justice. Not only the world of men, but the world of gods, is out of joint. In the last scene, Mercury knocks at the door of Chremylus. He has brought a terrible message from Jupiter. He orders Cario to bring out the whole family--“master, mistress, children, slaves--and the dog--and himself--and the pig,” and the rest of the brutes, that they may all be thrown together into the Barathrum--the punishment inflicted on malefactors of the deepest dye. Cario answers the Olympian messenger with a courtesy as scant as his own; under the new _régime_, he and his master are become very independent of Jupiter. “You’d be none the worse for a slice off your tongue, young fellow,”