Besides Pluto, god of the Infernal Regions, the Greeks also worshiped Plutus, a son of Ceres and Jason, who was known exclusively as a god of wealth. Abandoned in infancy, he was reared by Pax, goddess of peace, who is often represented as holding him in her lap. Because Plutus would bestow his favors only upon good and worthy mortals, Jupiter deprived him of his sight; and he then distributed his wealth indiscriminately. Virgil thus describes the crowd of spirits that wait to be ferried by Charon across the river:-- "The shivering army stands, And press for passage with extended hands, Now these, now those, the surly boatman bore; The rest he drove to distance from the shore." XXXVI The Furies visited the earth to punish filial disobedience, irreverence to old age, perjury, murder, treachery to guests, and even unkindness toward beggars. They avenged the ghosts of those who died by a violent death and had no one to avenge them. Therefore they persecuted Orestes, who killed his mother, and brought to punishment the murderers of Ibycus. This poet, beloved by Apollo, was journeying to the musical contest at Corinth, and was attacked by two robbers. As he lay dying he called upon a flock of cranes, that were passing overhead, to take up his cause and avenge his death. When his body was found, there was great lamentation among the Greeks, and every effort was made to discover the murderers, but without success. Later on, when a vast assemblage was witnessing a play in which the Chorus personated the Furies, the people sat terrified and still as death when the Choristers, clad in black, appeared bearing in their fleshless hands torches blazing with a pitchy flame. As they advanced with measured step, the company could see their bloodless cheeks and the writhing serpents that curled--in place of hair--around their brows. Then they began to sing: "Woe, woe to him who has done the deed of secret murder. We, the fearful brood of night, fasten ourselves upon him, flesh and soul. Unwearied we pursue him; no pity checks our course; still on to the end of life, we give no peace, no rest." As the Furies finished their weird chant a number of dark objects came sailing across the sky, and in the solemn stillness that had fallen over the assembly a terrified cry arose from one of the benches, "Look, comrade, the cranes of Ibycus!" Having informed thus far against themselves, it was not long before the murderers were seized, and, having confessed their crime, were put to death. The effect upon the audience of this appearance of the Furies (as related in the story of Ibycus) is not exaggerated, for it is recorded that Æschylus, the tragic poet, having on one occasion represented the Furies in a chorus of fifty performers, the terror of the spectators was such that many fainted and were thrown into convulsions, and the magistrates forbade a like representation for the future. Poem:-- Cranes of Ibycus SCHILLER