Translations
GREEK ANTHOLOGY
X. 48
Woe to the house whose mistress was a slave!
So say old saws, my own in aid I crave;
Woe to the court whose judge once spake for fees,
Though he were readier than Isocrates!
An advocate that pleaded once for pelf
Scarce on the bench forgets his former self.
Palladas.
XI. 75
This Olympicus of old
Had, Sebastus, I am told
Quite his share of upper gear,
Nose and chin and eye and ear.
All he lost, and by his fist—
He became a pugilist.
Loss of members with it drew
Loss of patrimony too.
When his birthright he would claim,
Into court his brother came
With a portrait, saying, "Thus
Looked the old Olympicus."
None could any likeness see,
Disinherited was he.
Lucillus.
XI. 141
A pig, a goat, an ox I lost:
I want them back at any cost,
And so retained, O woful fate!
Menecles for my advocate.
But tell me, will you, what have these
In common with Othryades?
The heroes of Thermopylæ
Have nought to do with theft from me.
Against Eutychides I bring
My action for a trivial thing.
Let Xerxes rest a little space,
And leave the Spartans in their place.
For if you don't put all this by
I'll go into the streets and cry,
"The voice of Menecles is big,
But what about my stolen pig?"
Lucillus.
[This Epigram is probably an imitation of that of Martial, on p. [90].]
XI. 143
Pluto rejected at his gate
The soul of Mark the advocate;
"No, Cerberus my dog," quoth he,
"Will make you pleasant company;
But if within you needs must go,
Practise on poet Melito,
And you shall have, if he won't do,
Tityus and Ixion too.
You'll be to hell the sorest ill
Of all that hell contains, until
There come to us worse barbarisms
When Rufus speaks his solecisms."
Lucillus.
XI. 147
So soon hath Asiaticus
The gift of eloquence achieved?
It was in Thebes it happened thus,
The story well may be believed.
Ammianus.
XI. 151
The statue of an advocate, as like as like can be.
And why? The statue cannot speak a word, no more could he.
Anon.
XI. 152
Paul, dost thou wish to make thy boy
An advocate like these his betters?
Then let him not his time employ
To useless ends in learning letters.
Ammianus.
XI. 251
The parties were as deaf as deaf could be,
The judge was far the deafest of the three.
Said plaintiff, "Sir, I ask for five months' rent."
Defendant, "Grinding corn all night I spent."
"Why," quoth the judge, "dispute? Your mother's claim
Is good, and you must both support the dame."
Nicarchus.
XI. 350
Remember justice and her yoke, and know
That 'gainst the wicked votes of "Guilty" go.
Thou trustest in thy cunning speech, thy power
Of speaking words that vary with the hour.
Hope what thou wilt, thy trifling tricks are vain,
Thou canst not make the path of law less plain.
Agathias.
XI. 376
Once to Diodorus came a client in a state of doubt,
And to that most learned counsel thus he set the matter out:
"Alpha Beta found a slave-girl who had run away from me:
To a slave of his he wed her, though she was my property,
Well he knew she was my chattel; she has had a child or two;
Now I cannot tell for certain whose the children are, can you?"
Diodorus thought, consulted all authorities on "Slave,"
To his client turned his furrowed brows and slowly answer gave:
"'Tis to you or to the other who, you say, has done you wrong,
That the children of the handmaid rightfully of course belong,
Your best plan will be the matter in the proper court to place,
So you'll get a good opinion whether you have any case."
Agathias.
Plan, 193
"Good Hermes, only just one cabbage plant."
"Stop, stop, my thieving traveller, you can't."
"What, grudge me one poor cabbage! is it so?"
"Nay, I don't grudge it, but the law says no.
The law says, Keep your itching palms, d'ye see,
From meddling with another's property."
"Well, this beats anything I ever saw!
Hermes against a thief invokes the law."
Philippus.
Appendix, 385
Pupils seven of Aristides,
Tell me, how are ye?
Four of you are walls, beside is
Nought but benches three.
Seven pupils of the rhetor
Aristides, how are ye?
Seven! Hoc et nihil præter,
Four are walls and benches three.
Anon.
MARTIAL
In Caium
"Lend me sestertia, Caius, only twenty,
'Tis no great thing for you who roll in plenty."
He was an old companion, and his coffers
Were full enough to stand such friendly offers.
"Go, plead in court," said he; "'tis pleadings pay us."
"I want your money, not your counsel, Caius."
Martial, ii. 30.
In Causidicum
'Tis said that some bold advocate
Has dared to criticise my poem,
His name I have not learned, his fate
Will be a warning when I know him.
Martial, v. 33.
In Postumum Causidicum
No claim for trespass do I bring,
Or homicide, or poisoning.
I claim that by my neighbour's theft
Of she-goats three I was bereft.
The judge of course wants evidence,
But you go wandering far from thence,
And with a mighty voice declaim
Of Mithridates and the shame
Of Cannæ, and the lies of old
That Punic politicians told.
And why should you pass Sylla by,
The Marii and Mucii?
When, Postumus, d'ye hope to reach
My stolen she-goats in your speech?
Martial, vi. 19.
In Cinnam
Is this advocacy, Cinna, this a type of lawyers' powers,
This immense oration, Cinna, some nine words in some ten hours?
Waterclocks I grant you asked for, Cinna, yes, you called for four;
There you stopped, such wealth of silence, Cinna, ne'er was seen before.
Martial, viii. 7.
THE COURT OF REASON
A thousand doubts and pleadings in a day
Are filed in Empress Reason's court supreme
By angry Love—his eyes with anger gleam.
"Which of us twain hath been more faithful, say.
'Tis all through me that Cino can display
The sail of fame on life's unhappy stream."
"Thee," quoth I, "root of all my woe I deem,
I found what gall beneath thy sweetness lay."
Then he: "Ah, traitorous and truant slave!
Are these the thanks thou renderest, ingrate,
For giving thee a maid without a peer?"
"Thy left," cried I, "slew what thy right hand gave."
"Not so," said he. The judge, "Your wrath abate.
I must have time to give true judgment here."
Cino da Pistoia.
[Imitated by Petrarch in the conclusion of the Canzone, Quell' antico mio dolce empio signore.]
TO ROME
Tell me, proud Rome, why dost these edicts read,
These many laws by prince or people made,
Or answers by the prudent duly weighed,
When now thou canst the world no longer lead?
Thou readest, sad one, of each ancient deed
Where thy unconquered sons their might displayed,
Afric and Egypt at thy feet were laid,
But slavery, not rule, is now thy meed.
What boots it that thou wast of old a queen,
And over foreign nations heldest rein,
If thou and all thy fame no more exist?
Forgive me, God, if all my days have been
Devoted to man's laws, unjust and vain
Unless Thy law within the heart be fixed.
Cino da Pistoia.
JUSTICE
Ah! justice is a virtue bepraised and full of worth,
It castigates the sinner, and peoples all the earth,
And kings with care should guard it—instead they now forget
The gem that is most precious in all the coronet.
Some think they may do justice by cruelty, I wist;
But 'tis an evil counsel, for justice must consist
In showing deeds of mercy, in knowledge of the truth,
And executing judgment it executes with ruth.
Pedro Lopez de Ayala.
THE POET AND THE ADVOCATE
Glory and gain thus mixed distract the thought,
We owe to honour all, to fortune nought;
The poet, like the soldier, scorns for pay
Peruvian gold, but seeks the wreath of bay.
How is the advocate the poet's peer?
The poet's glory is complete and clear;
He far outlives the advocate's renown,
Patru is e'en by Scarron's name weighed down.
The bar of Greece and Rome you point me out,
A bar that trained great men, I do not doubt,
For then chicane with language void of sense
Had not deformed the law and eloquence.
Purge the tribune of all this monstrous growth,
I mount it, and my soul will sink, though loth,
Will yield to fortune and will speak in prose.
But since reform in this so slowly grows,
Leave me my tastes, for I aspire to be
By verse ennobled to posterity,
To hold first place in arts above the law,
More grave and noble than it ever saw.
Fraud in this age of ours unpunished can
Tread down the equity so dear to man.
Can you for spirits just and generous find
A fairer cause to plead before mankind?
Mother or stepmother let Fortune be,
The theatre and not the bar for me;
For client virtue, truth for counsel's wage;
For judge the present and the coming age.
Piron, La Métromanie, Act iii. Sc. 7.
MORRISON AND GIBB, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.