ON A PASSAGE IN THE FROGS. 



BY H. W. MAGOUN. 



In the Frogs of Aristophenes in a speech of Dionysus, 

 line 268, occur the words: 



t!J.sXXo'^ apa rzauffsr^ -o^Y uij.d.<; zol) xad:^ 



' I thought I should make you stop your croaking sometime.' 

 The passage seems to have troubled some of the commentators, 

 notably Fritzsche who thinks that the commentators as a whole 

 have quite failed to understand the passage. He takes it in per- 

 fect seriousness and supposes that Dionysus must mean all that 

 he says. 



He infers from line 257, 



oiixm^ez' ob yap /j.oc iiiket^ 



' Go howl; for I don't care a fig,' which he renders 'be cudgeled,' 

 (vopulate) etc., that Dionysus takes his oar and beats the frogs; 

 but he fails to explain what Charon was doing all this time that 

 he allowed such proceedings, or how the boat could come to land 

 with one oar only in use for rowing. The simple fact is that 

 Dionysus is merely an overgrown boy in his actions and words, 

 in fact a kind of clown almost, and he must be judged on this 

 basis. The Greeks as a whole were "but children of a large 

 growth" at this time, and in their comedies especially were like 

 a crowd of boys. The frogs began their croaking only when 

 Dionysus embarked and began to row, lines 206-7, 



dxouffsc yap /liXyj 



xdkXiffr\ kTZ£i(iav ^/i/3aAjjc aiza^. 



It is natural then to expect them to stop when he ceases rowing 

 as the boat comes to land. This is exactly what happens and 

 Dionysus, who has been bawling at them to stop their noise, in 



