Thus I grew up, unstained by serious ill,
Though venial faults, I grant you, haunt me still:
Yet items I could name retrenched e'en there
By time, plain speaking, individual care;
For, when I chance to stroll or lounge alone,
I'm not without a Mentor of my own:
"This course were better: that might help to mend
My daily life, improve me as a friend:
There some one showed ill-breeding: can I say
I might not fall into the like one day?"
So with closed lips I ruminate, and then
In leisure moments play with ink and pen:
For that's an instance, I must needs avow,
Of those small faults I hinted at just now:
Grant it your prompt indulgence, or a throng
Of poets shall come up, some hundred strong,
And by mere numbers, in your own despite,
Force you, like Jews, to be our proselyte.
SATIRE V.
EGRESSUM MAGNA.
Leaving great Rome, my journey I begin,
And reach Aricia, where a moderate inn
(With me was Heliodorus, who knows more
Of rhetoric than e'er did Greek before):
Next Appii Forum, filled, e'en, nigh to choke,
With knavish publicans and boatmen folk.
This portion of our route, which most get through
At one good stretch, we chose to split in two,
Taking it leisurely: for those who go
The Appian road are jolted less when slow.
I find the water villanous, decline
My stomach's overtures, refuse to dine,
And sit and sit with temper less than sweet
Watching my fellow-travellers while they eat.
Now Night prepared o'er all the earth to spread
Her veil, and light the stars up overhead:
Boatmen and slaves a slanging-match begin:
"Ho! put in here! What! take three hundred in?
You'll swamp us all:" so, while our fares we pay,
And the mule's tied, a whole hour slips away.
No hope of sleep: the tenants of the marsh,
Hoarse frogs and shrill mosquitos, sing so harsh,
While passenger and boatman chant the praise
Of their true-loves in amoebean lays,
Each fairly drunk: the passenger at last
Tires of the game, and soon his eyes are fast:
Then to a stone his mule the boatman moors,
Leaves her to pasture, lays him down, and snores.
And now 'twas near the dawning of the day,
When 'tis discovered that we make no way:
Out leaps a hair-brained fellow and attacks
With a stout cudgel mule's and boatman's backs:
And so at length, thanks to this vigorous friend,
By ten o'clock we reach our boating's end.
Tired with the voyage, face and hands we lave
In pure Feronia's hospitable wave.
We take some food, then creep three miles or so
To Anxur, built on cliffs that gleam like snow;
There rest awhile, for there our mates were due,
Maecenas and Cocceius, good and true,
Sent on a weighty business, to compose
A feud, and make them friends who late were foes.
I seize on the occasion, and apply
A touch of ointment to an ailing eye.
Meanwhile Maecenas with Cocceius came,
And Capito, whose errand was the same,
A man of men, accomplished and refined,
Who knew, as few have known, Antonius' mind.
Along by Fundi next we take our way
For all its praetor sought to make us stay,
Not without laughter at the foolish soul,
His senatorial stripe and pan of coal.
Then at Mamurra's city we pull up,
Lodge with Murena, with Fonteius sup.
Next morn the sun arises, O how sweet!
At Sinnessa we with Plotius meet,
Varius and Virgil; men than whom on earth
I know none dearer, none of purer worth.
O what a hand-shaking! while sense abides,
A friend to me is worth the world besides.
Campania's border-bridge next day we crossed,
There housed and victualled at the public cost.
The next, we turn off early from the road
At Capua, and the mules lay down their load;
There, while Maecenas goes to fives, we creep,
Virgil and I, to bed, and so to sleep:
For, though the game's a pleasant one to play,
Weak stomachs and weak eyes are in the way.
Then to Cocceius' country-house we come,
Beyond the Caudian inns, a sumptuous home.
Now, Muse, recount the memorable fight
'Twixt valiant Messius and Sarmentus wight,
And tell me first from what proud lineage sprung
The champions joined in battle, tongue with tongue.
From Oscan blood great Messius' sires derive:
Sarmentus has a mistress yet alive.
Such was their parentage: they meet in force:
Sarmentus starts: "You're just like a wild horse."
We burst into a laugh. The other said,
"Well, here's a horse's trick:" and tossed his head.
"O, were your horn yet growing, how your foe
Would rue it, sure, when maimed you threaten so!"
Sarmentus cries: for Messius' brow was marred
By a deep wound, which left it foully scarred.
Then, joking still at his grim countenance,
He begged him just to dance the Cyclop dance:
No buskin, mask, nor other aid of art
Would be required to make him look his part.
Messius had much to answer: "Was his chain
Suspended duly in the Lares' fane?
Though now a notary, he might yet be seized
And given up to his mistress, if she pleased.
Nay, more," he asked, "why had he run away,
When e'en a single pound of corn a day
Had filled a maw so slender?" So we spent
Our time at table, to our high content.
Then on to Beneventum, where our host,
As some lean thrushes he essayed to roast,
Was all but burnt: for up the chimney came
The blaze, and well nigh set the house on flame:
The guests and servants snatch the meat, and fall
Upon the fire with buckets, one and all.
Next rise to view Apulia's well-known heights,
Which keen Atabulus so sorely bites:
And there perchance we might be wandering yet,
But shelter in Trivicum's town we get,
Where green damp branches in the fireplace spread
Make our poor eyes to water in our head.
Then four and twenty miles, a good long way,
Our coaches take us, in a town to stay
Whose name no art can squeeze into a line,
Though otherwise 'tis easy to define:
For water there, the cheapest thing on earth,
Is sold for money: but the bread is worth
A fancy price, and travellers who know
Their business take it with them when they go:
For at Canusium, town of Diomed,
The drink's as bad, and grits are in the bread.
Here to our sorrow Varius takes his leave,
And, grieved himself, compels his friends to grieve.
Fatigued, we come to Rubi: for the way
Was long, and rain had made it sodden clay.
Next day, with better weather, o'er worse ground
We get to Barium's town, where fish abound.
Then Gnatia, built in water-nymphs' despite,
Made us cut jokes and laugh, as well we might,
Listening to tales of incense, wondrous feat,
That melts in temples without fire to heat.
Tell the crazed Jews such miracles as these!
I hold the gods live lives of careless ease,
And, if a wonder happens, don't assume
'Tis sent in anger from the upstairs room.
Last comes Brundusium: there the lines I penned,
The leagues I travelled, find alike their end.
SATIRE VI.
NON QUIA, MAECENAS.
What if, Maecenas, none, though ne'er so blue
His Tusco-Lydian blood, surpasses you?
What if your grandfathers, on either hand,
Father's and mother's, were in high command?
Not therefore do you curl the lip of scorn
At nobodies, like me, of freedman born:
Far other rule is yours, of rank or birth
To raise no question, so there be but worth,
Convinced, and truly too, that wights unknown,
Ere Servius' rise set freedmen on the throne,
Despite their ancestors, not seldom came
To high employment, honours, and fair fame,
While great Laevinus, scion of the race
That pulled down Tarquin from his pride of place,
Has ne'er been valued at a poor half-crown
E'en in the eyes of that wise judge, the town,
That muddy source of dignity, which sees
No virtue but in busts and lineal trees.
Well, but for us; what thoughts should ours be, say,
Removed from vulgar judgments miles away?
Grant that Laevinus yet would be preferred
To low-born Decius by the common herd,
That censor Appius, just because I came
From freedman's loins, would obelize my name—
And serve me right; for 'twas my restless pride
Kept me from sleeping in my own poor hide.
But Glory, like a conqueror, drags behind
Her glittering car the souls of all mankind;
Nor less the lowly than the noble feels
The onward roll of those victorious wheels.
Come, tell me, Tillius, have you cause to thank
The stars that gave you power, restored you rank?
Ill-will, scarce audible in low estate,
Gives tongue, and opens loudly, now you're great.
Poor fools! they take the stripe, draw on the shoe,
And hear folks asking, "Who's that fellow? who?"
Just as a man with Barrus's disease,
His one sole care a lady's eye to please,
Whene'er he walks abroad, sets on the fair
To con him over, leg, face, teeth, and hair;
So he that undertakes to hold in charge
Town, country, temples, all the realm at large,
Gives all the world a title to enquire
The antecedents of his dam or sire.
"What? you to twist men's necks or scourge them, you,
The son of Syrus, Dama, none knows who?"
"Aye, but I sit before my colleague; he
Ranks with my worthy father, not with me."
And think you, on the strength of this, to rise
A Paullus or Messala in our eyes?
Talk of your colleague! he's a man of parts:
Suppose three funerals jostle with ten carts
All in the forum, still you'll hear his voice
Through horn and clarion: that commends our
choice.
Now on myself, the freedman's son, I touch,
The freedman's son, by all contemned as such,
Once, when a legion followed my command,
Now, when Maecenas takes me by the hand.
But this and that are different: some stern judge
My military rank with cause might grudge,
But not your friendship, studious as you've been
To choose good men, not pushing, base, or mean.
In truth, to luck I care not to pretend,
For 'twas not luck that mark'd me for your friend:
Virgil at first, that faithful heart and true,
And Varius after, named my name to you.
Brought to your presence, stammeringly I told
(For modesty forbade me to be bold)
No vaunting tale of ancestry of pride,
Of good broad acres and sleek nags to ride,
But simple truth: a few brief words you say,
As is your wont, and wish me a good day.
Then, nine months after, graciously you send,
Desire my company, and hail me friend.
O, 'tis no common fortune, when one earns
A friend's regard, who man from man discerns,
Not by mere accident of lofty birth
But by unsullied life, and inborn worth!