To tell the world whose ashes it contains.
Cumberland.
Another poet of this age who composed mimes was C. Matius, surnamed, from his baldness, Calvena. His mimes were termed Mimiambi, because he wrote in the iambic measure,[[450]] and he was also a translator of the Iliad as well as the author of a work on cookery. His principal merit is said to have been his skill in enriching his native language by the introduction of new words.[[451]] He was somewhat younger than Laberius, and enjoyed the friendship of the greatest amongst his contemporaries. His intimacy with Julius Cæsar,[[452]] to whom he was warmly attached,[[453]] and afterwards with Augustus,[[454]] gave him great influence;[[455]] but he never took much part in the political strife which imbittered his times, nor did he use his influence in order to procure his own advancement.
His retired habits and love of literary leisure saved him from seeking his happiness in the excitements of ambition. Cicero, who loved him dearly, often mentions him in his letters, and pays a compliment[[456]] to his learning and amiability. An interesting letter of his, which is preserved in the collection of Cicero’s epistles to his friends,[[457]] shows that he possessed an accomplished mind and an affectionate heart. It cannot be supposed, therefore, that his Mimiambi were debased by the too common faults of coarseness and immodesty.
Publius Syrus.
Publius Syrus was, as his name implies, originally a Syrian slave, and took his prænomen from the master who gave him his freedom. All that is known respecting his life has already been stated in the account of Laberius. The commendations which his mimes received from the ancients, especially from Cicero,[[458]] Seneca,[[459]] and Pliny,[[460]] prove them to have been much read and admired. The fragments which still remain are marked by wit and neatness, and the shrewd wisdom of proverbial philosophy. Tradition has also recorded a bon-mot of his, which is as witty as it is severe. Seeing once an ill-tempered man, named Mucius, in low spirits, he remarked, “Either some bad fortune has happened to Mucius, or some good fortune to one of his friends.” An accurate knowledge of human nature, exhibited in pointed and terse language, most probably constituted the charm of this species of scenic literature. The large collection of his proverbial sayings, entitled P. Syri Sententiæ, are by no means all genuine; but the nucleus around which the collection has grown by successive additions is undoubtedly his, and those which are the work of after ages are formed after the model of his apothegms.
The Roman pantomime differed somewhat from the mime—it was a ballet of action performed by a single dancer. It was first introduced in its complete form in the reign of Augustus: and Suidas,[[461]] misquoting a passage from Zosimus,[[462]] groundlessly attributes the invention to the emperor himself. As the mime bore some resemblance to the Atellan farces, so the pantomime resembled the histrionic performances introduced by Livius Andronicus. In both, the person who recited the words (canticum[[463]]) was different from him who represented the characters. In the pantomime, the canticum was sung by a chorus arrayed at the back of the stage. Until the times of the later emperors, when vice was paraded with unblushing effrontery, women never acted in pantomime; but the exhibition itself was sensual and licentious in its character,[[464]] and the actors of it were deservedly deemed infamous, and forbidden by Tiberius to hold any intercourse with Romans of equestrian or senatorial dignity.[[465]] Nero, however, outraged public decency by himself appearing in pantomime.[[466]] Fortunate was it for the dignity of Rome that the face of the emperor was concealed behind a mask which, unlike the performers in the mimes, the pantomimic actors always wore. The players not only exhibited the human figure in the most graceful attitudes, but represented every passion and emotion with such truth, that the spectators could without difficulty understand the story. Sometimes the scenes represented were founded upon the Greek tragic drama; but for its purifying effect was substituted the awakening of licentious passions.
These were the exhibitions which threw such discredit on the stage—which called forth the well-deserved attacks of the early Christian fathers, and caused them to declare that whoever attended them was unworthy of the name of Christians. Had the drama not been so abused, had it retained its original purity, and carried out the object attributed to it by Aristotle, they would have seen in it not a nursery of vice, but a school of virtue—not only an innocent amusement, but a powerful engine to form the taste, to improve the morals, and to purify the feelings of a people.
The principal actors of pantomime in the reign of Augustus were Bathyllus, Hylas, and Pylades. In the reign of Nero the art was practised by Latinus,[[467]] and Paris, who taught the emperor to dance, and subsequently was put to death by Nero when he became his rival for popular applause.[[468]] But those who attained the highest degree of popularity were another Latinus, and another Paris, who flourished in the reign of Domitian. Both have been immortalized in the epigrams of Martial.[[469]] To the former, Martial attributes the power to fascinate such stern and rigid moralists as resembled Cato, the Curii, and Fabricii. The epitaph concludes with these lines:—
Vos me laurigeri parasitum dicite Phœbi,