UNIVERSITY OF VICTORIA LIBRARY

BROADWAY

TRANSLATIONS

“ Age cannot wither her , nor custom stale Her infinite variety

TO

A. E. HOUSMAN

“ To whom this book as honour due ? Surely Apollo’s bays belong,

In Latin and in English song,

To you.”

Bvoabway translations

MARTIAL

THE TWELVE BOOKS OF

EPIGRAMS

Translated by

J. A. POTT, M.A.

and

F. A. WRIGHT, M.A.

CLASSICAL DEPARTMENT, BIUKBECK COLLEGE

With an Introduction by the latter

LONDON

GEORGE ROUTLEDGE y SONS LTD. NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON fcf CO.

UNIVERSITY OF VlCTORiAj

! iRtUAHY

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN IiY THE EDINBURGH PRESS, g AND ix YOUNG STREET, EDINBURGH

PREFACE

At the time of his lamented death in 1920, John Arthur Pott was engaged on a complete translation, in verse and prose, of the Epigrams of Martial. The manuscript, about half completed, was left to his friend, Mr W. R. Smale of Radley College, and he, after reading it through, and in part revising it, has decided that, for the moment, the publication of the verse renderings only is advisable.

In memory of an accomplished poet and scholar I have endeavoured to finish his work to the best of my ability, and have added a short Introduction, my own versions being marked with an asterisk.

F. A. W.

111

CONTENTS

PAGE

Preface ....... iii

Introduction

I Life of Martial . . v

II The Epigrams . . ... viii

III Martial as Poet . . . . . xii

The Epigrams Book I .						n
55	II .			•			43
55	Ill .			•			75
55	IV .			•			107
55	V .			•			137
55	VI .			'		•	167
55	VII .			•			197
55	VIII .			•			231
55	IX .			•			261
55	X .		#	•			. 299
55	XI .	•	•	•	•		• 337
55	XII .	.	.	.	•	.	• 37i

IV

INTRODUCTION

I

LIFE OF MARTIAL

Marcus Valerius Martialis was born about the year a.d. 40, during the short reign of the Emperor Caius, in the Spanish town of Bilbilis. The name by which he is now commonly known was probably due to the accident of his birth occurring on the first of March : ‘ Marcus Valerius ’ forms part of the Roman dress which his countrymen soon after the time of Julius Caesar had so readily adopted. In the first century of our era Spain passed through one of those periods of intellectual activity which diversify the torpor wherein that strange land normally reposes, and Martial is but one of the group of brilliant Spaniards who are among the chief glories of the silver age of Latin literature. Two of the galaxy, the critic Quintilian, bom at Calagurris a.d. 40, and the poet Lucan, born at Cordova a.d. 39, were his close con- temporaries, and when, abandoning Bilbilis and the rushing Salo, he came to Italy to seek his fortune in 63, Seneca had reached the highest point of his long and magnificent career and seemed all-powerful at Rome. As a humble dependent of the Senecas, and through them of the Pisos, the most literary of all the great Roman families, Martial made his first entry into Roman life ; and when in 65 b.c. on the discovery of the conspiracy Seneca and Piso were involved in a common ruin, the young stranger from Spain shared their downfall in his small degree, and was thrown upon his own resources. For many years existence for him must have been as hard a struggle as it was for Charles Dickens in his youth, and both writers owe much of their power to the forced realization of the most important fact in life, that a man must in some way or another get enough to eat. Being a Roman citizen Martial had a certain value as a client — if he could find a patron willing to employ him — but a

v

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

client’s pay, whether it took the form of rations or dole, was almost as scanty and precarious as that which a sandwich-man or a ‘ super ’ earns to-day. Moreover, competition in that particular branch of social service was excessively severe, for anyone then could be a client just as anyone now can be a clerk : there were only three requisites, a respectable appearance, a decent suit of clothes, and a dislike for hard manual labour. Prob- ably it was his pen that saved Martial from starvation, and the couplets that now appear as Books Thirteen and Fourteen of the Epigrams, tags written to order, like our cracker mottoes, for the presents that were usually given at the Saturnalia, performed at least one useful function ; they kept our poet alive. Moreover they gained for him some sort of reputation, and when the Colosseum was opened by the Emperor Titus in the year a.d. 8o a publisher was found ready to risk his first small book ‘ Liber Spectaculorum ’, a set of thirty- two short poems describing the games, the contests, and all the other wonders of the great building.

‘ The Spectacles ’ mark the turning-point in Martial’s fortunes. Though they are of small literary value they had a considerable success, and, attracting imperial notice, brought to Martial such privileges as accompanied the grant of ‘ father’s right ’, ins trium liber ovum. His social position was now assured and his poetical fame also quickly increased, so that he was able in a.d. 84 to publish and sell the collection of his gift verses which we now possess. By the beginning of 86 he was ready for a more ambitious flight and published the first two books of the Epigrams, mostly composed of poems referring to the reigns of Vespasian and Titus. After this date he must have been in fairly easy circumstances, for he was raised to equestrian rank, acquired a house on the Quirinal, and a small estate at Nomentum, had many rich friends, and always remained a bachelor. But old habit was strong and he is never tired of enlarging on his poverty and the discomforts of life at Rome. On one occasion, at least, he retired for a time to Forum Corneli in Gaul, and there published the third book of the Epigrams in a.d. 87. He soon, however, returned to the capital again and brought out Books IV, V and VI, in the next three successive years. Book VII announces the coming return of Domitian from his Sarmatian campaigns, and must therefore have appeared about the

vi

INTRODUCTION

end of 92, while the next three books came out at yearly intervals. The death of Domitian decided Martial to leave Rome for good, and after sending the Emperor Nerva a selection from Books X and XI he finally returned to Bilbilis in 98. A Spanish lady, Marcella, gave him an estate, and there he ended his days, his last volume, Book XII, being mostly written in Spain, and published late in a.d. ioi. The date of his death can be approxi- mately fixed by a letter of Pliny the younger, written 104, which is so characteristic of that very superior person that it is worth quoting in full :

“ I was very grieved,” Pliny writes to his friend, Cornelius Priscus, “ to hear of Martial’s death. He was a talented fellow, of shrewd and vigorous understanding, his writings well seasoned with wit and sarcasm, and yet good-humoured withal. I did him the compliment of providing his travelling money when he left Rome : that I owed both to our friendship and to some trifles of verse which he wrote about me. It was an ancient custom to honour and reward those writers who sang the praises of individuals or states ; but in our times this, like many other excellent habits, has gone completely out of use. Since we have ceased to do praiseworthy deeds, we think that praise itself is silly. You ask what are the verses for which I thus repaid him. I would refer you to his book, but as a matter of fact I remember some of them : if you like these, you may look up the others later. He is addressing his Muse and tells her to seek my house on the Esquiline, and to knock respectfully.

‘ But do not with strong liquor flown Knock at a time that’s not your own.

His days to study he must give Composing speeches, that shall live With Tully’s best, to please the ears And win a verdict from the Peers.

More safe ’twill be to go a-calling If lamps are lit and night is falling.

That is your hour, when reigns the rose,

When brows are wet, and Bacchus flows ;

For when the Wine God wildly rages Stern Catos well may read my pages.’

“ As he wrote thus about me was I not right then to speed him on his way, and am I not right now to mourn for a true friend’s death ? He gave me what he could ; he would have given more if he had been able. And yet

vii

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

what greater gift can a man receive than glory and praise and eternity of fame ? You may say that Martial’s verses will not gain eternity : perhaps they will not ; but he wrote them with the supposition that they would.”

II

THE EPIGRAMS

The chief value of Martial’s Epigrams, disregarding for the moment their literary excellence, lies in the picture they give us of Roman society towards the end of the Erst century a.d., that period in the world’s history which, beyond all others, bears the closest resemblance to our own times. It is a picture drawn by a realist, and in its mingling of light and shade far more convincing than the lurid colours and unrelieved blackness with which Juvenal and Tacitus present us. Martial is a Sancho Panza who sees things as they are : the satirist and the historian have more likeness to the mad knight, and fired by their righteous indignation tilt as blindly against the established order of the Empire as Don Quixote did against his giant windmills. Their moral earnestness is certainly impressive, and as characters they are doubtless more deserving of our esteem than is the easy-going and pleasure-loving epigrammatist ; but if we wish to gain a true idea of Rome and Roman life, about the year a.d. 90, it is to the pages of Martial, rather than to Juvenal or Tacitus, that we should turn. Martial has three great advantages over the other two writers : he is good-tempered, while they are soured and disappointed men : he is a Spaniard, to whom the Empire has brought nothing but benefits, while they are Romans who can never forget the time when the world was ruled in the interests of Rome : he is one of the middle class, the great discovery of the new system, while they belong to the official hierarchy which had for centuries enjoyed the doubtful privilege of government.

And so, writing from the outside without temper and without bias, Martial is able to give us a complete panorama of Roman society from top to bottom. At the very summit comes His Most Gracious Majesty, the Emperor Domitian, ' dominus et dens ’, as he insisted on being called by the reluctant senate, whose shadowy

viii

INTRODUCTION

powers he refused to recognize. ‘ His most gracious majesty ’ — the words make an appropriate inscription for the portrait of Domitian that Martial gives us We see, not at all a cruel and detestable tyrant, ‘ calvus Nero ’, but rather a patriotic, popular, and — strangely enough — a rather Puritanical prince, whose benevolent activities at Rome run on much the same lines as those followed to-day by the London County Council. He curbs the enterprise of the pushing tradesmen who encroach upon the highway with their stalls ; he settles scales of fees, and regulates theatre accommodation ; he offers handsome prizes at the literary and musical competitions which take place in his Alban villa ; he employs a young and deserving architect to build for him a palace which shall be worthy of the world’s capital city ; he keeps a strict watch over the morals of the community, passes laws to protect young children from vicious degradation, endeavours to preserve the sanctity of marriage and family life, and discourages all licen- tiousness in literature, being himself so strict in his regard for propriety that our poet has to be far more careful than is his wont when he is writing for the imperial ear. These are some of the impressions of Domitian’s character that we get from a perusal of the Epigrams, and although Martial is commonly accused of shameless flattery and sycophantic adulation, it is well, for the sake of truth, that we have in him some corrective to the venom of Tacitus’ pen. Domitian had his faults, but for the historian his unforgivable sin was that, being himself something of a realist, he refused to acquiesce any longer in the legal fiction that made the senate ostensibly a co-partner in empire.

Immediately below the Emperor comes the imperial entourage : Crispinus, the commander of the body-

guard ; Regulus, the great orator, Domitian’s most trusted counsellor ; the freedmen, Parthenius, imperial chamberlain, Sextus, librarian, and Entellus, confidential secretary; the architect Rabirius, the butler Euphemus, the cup-bearer Earinos, and the actors Paris and Latinus. On all of these, high and low alike, Martial lavishes his most ingenious flattery, receiving in return such small rewards as the gift of a toga from Parthenius, described with a wealth of hyperbole in Book VIII, xxviii.

Next we have the leading lights of Roman society,

IX

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

political and literary, with nearly all of whom in their capacity of patrons Martial seems to have been acquainted, the word ‘friend ’ in their connection usually rhyming with “ send — me a present ” or “ lend — me some money Among the high officials, generals, administrators, and governors of provinces are Licinius Sura, Domitius Tullus, and his brother Lucanus, the Etrusci father and son, Macer, Avitus, Paulus, Vestinus, and Antonius Primus, the most brilliant commander of the Flavian armies, whose capture of Cremona is described in Tacitus’ Histories. The literary aristocrats include the younger Pliny, Silius Italicus, author of the Punica, the poet Stella and his wife Ianthis, the poetess Sulpicia and her husband Calenus, Frontinus the great authority on aqueducts, and Polla, widow of Lucan. Of contemporary writers Quintilian and Juvenal receive complimentary verses ; Statius alone is never mentioned.

Then follows a less distinguished gathering, men and women of Martial’s own station in life, for whom he shows in many poems a very real and sincere affection. His dearest friend perhaps is his namesake, Julius Martialis, on whose suburban villa he writes one of his most charming pieces ; but he has many other intimates, Quintus Ovidius, his neighbour at Nomentum, the centurion Pudens and his British wife Claudia, Canius Rufus of Gades, husband of the learned Theophila, his fellow poets, Castricus and Cerialis, Faustinus and Flaccus, his compatriots Decianus, Priscus, Licinianus, and Maternus. To all of these he writes with genuine warmth, and for many of them he obviously felt the same tender regard as inspires the three beautiful epigrams on the death of the little slave girl Erotion (V, xxxiv, xxxvii, X, lxi), poems which show that even if Martial was a bachelor and no great respecter of women, he was a true lover of children.

And then we are introduced to the more sordid side of life in the capital, to an anonymous world for whom Martial invents fictitious names — Zoilus, Caecilianus, Postumus, Galla, Lesbia, Gellia — a world consisting chiefly of needy clients and upstart parvenus, of old ladies of excessive temperament and young ladies of easy virtue. There is the captator , the adventurer who tries by flattery and small services to win the good graces of a childless millionaire, and to secure a legacy in his will : the delator , a pernicious rascal who makes a trade

x

INTRODUCTION

of spying on his neighbours and accusing them of some offence against the imperial regime : the recitator, less dangerous than the informer but even more annoying, the amateur poet who insists on boring his friends with recitals of his verses. Every aspect of Rome Martial presents to us. With him we pass through the crowded streets and the long muddy stairways up the hill-sides, along which the white-robed client in the early morning has to trudge his way in order to be present at his patron’s levee. We see the law courts beset by a crowd of litigants and hear the applause and cheers that greet some brilliant effort of eloquence by a great advocate. We visit the baths, public and private, each with its own regular clientele, and watch the masseurs anointing and rubbing down their customers, while sly thieves look for their opportunity to filch some bather’s gown. We sit among the audience in the theatre and smile as Leitus or Oceanus, the two chief ushers, touch some upstart on the shoulder and eject him from the rows of seats reserved for senators and knights. We smell the odour of the circus mingled of the blood of slain animals, the scent of liquid saffron and cinnamon, and the press of the great crowd. And finally we hear all the gossip of the town : the shameful behaviour of the priests of Cybele, the un- fortunate accident that befell an Etruscan at the sacrifice, how one boy was killed by a falling icicle, another by a snake lurking within a hollow statue, how a tame lion mauled the circus attendants, how a hare escaped un- harmed from the arena ; and so on and so on. There is hardly any incident however trivial which will not serve Martial as the subject for an epigram, and he always treats his theme with the lightest wit and the most dexterous skill. He is a realist, and one of the most extreme of that school : he shrinks from nothing, dull, coarse, and disgusting though it be ; and consequently many of his pieces are extremely offensive to a delicate reader. But the blame for them, if blame must be allotted — in this volume they are mostly left in their original Latin — does not rest solely with Martial : part must be assigned to the realistic method, part to the Roman character, and part to life itself.

xi

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

III

MARTIAL AS POET

In the history of the Epigram Martial is indisputably the greatest name. As regards bulk of poems, variety of subject, general interest, and posthumous fame, he easily surpasses all his Greek rivals, while among his own countrymen there is no one who in this particular field can be even compared with him. He is certainly indebted in some degree — and handsomely acknowledges his debt — to Catullus and Ovid for his style ; but if it is possible to improve upon the dainty lightness of the one and the glittering polish of the other, Martial accomplishes that miraculous feat. He is the epigrammatist, and it is largely owing to his predominance that the word ‘ epigram ’ in English bears a somewhat different meaning from that which it has in Greek. Originally an inscrip- tion, whether in verse or in prose, such as might be placed on a tomb, a statue, or a temple offering, it came to mean for the Greeks a short poem having, as Mr Mackail says, “ the compression and conciseness of a real inscrip- tion, highly finished, evenly balanced, simple, lucid.” To this definition most of the pieces in the Greek Anthology answer, but to the wit and point which form the chief essentials of a modern epigram they make little pretension. It is of Martial that the Oxford Dic- tionary is thinking when it says : “ An epigram is a short poem ending in a witty and ingenious turn of thought to which the rest of the composition is intended to lead up.” Martial’s reputation as satirist and wit has indeed rather obscured his more definitely poetical qualities In the Epigrams he confines himself practically to three metres, the elegiac couplet, the hendecasyllabic, and the iambic scazon ; and it is interesting to notice the con- nection that obviously exists between the choice of metre and the writer’s thoughts. Though Martial lived most of his days in Rome, he was in a very genuine sense a lover of the country, of the simple life, and of his own native land. When he is treating of these three subjects and writing rather to please himself than his Roman audience, he is apt to escape from the confined limits of the epigram, and to employ the ‘ limping iambic ’ as his metre. The bizarre effect obtained by the unexpected

xii

INTRODUCTION

spondee at the end of each line probably seemed to him exactly suitable ; for in those days of strained rhetoric and formal antithesis it was an unusual novelty to have simple ideas and to express them in simple language. His model, of course, is the ‘ Sirmio ' of Catullus, and in several pieces he, at least, equals his predecessor. There is the beautiful description (III, lviii) of Faustinus’ farm, and of the suburban retreat of Julius Martialis (IV, lxiv), the outburst on the glories of Spain (IV, lv), and the ecstatic picture of the seaside at Formiae (X, xxx) ; best known of all perhaps the poem on the death of little Erotion (V, xxxvii), with whom compared, ‘inamabilis sciurus et frequens phoenix/ These poems indeed are studded with gems of phrasing — ‘ grandes proborum virgines colonorum ’, ‘ sub urbe possides, famem mundam ’,

‘ caelo perfruitur sereniore ’, * viva sed quies ponti ’, — and they show that Martial had latent in him a vein of imagination not unlike that which Goldsmith worked when he wrote ' The Deserted Village ’.

While the best and longest of the iambic pieces treat of the picturesque, the most striking of the hendeca- syllabics are concerned with personal emotions. Here again Martial follows Catullus in the ‘ Passer ’ poems, but for him the place of Lesbia is taken by male friends, above all by his dear Julius Martialis. To him the three most charming of the series are addressed, the invitation to holiday, with its reminder of the hours — ‘ qui nobis pereunt et imputantur ’ (V, xx) ; the description of the happy life and all that it needs (X, xlvii) ; and the final poem of farewell written in sorrow from Spain — ‘ nulli te facias nimis sodalem \

It would be possible to collect from Martial a small anthology, in which each piece was of high poetical quality, and most of these pieces would be either in iambics or in hendecasyllabics. But this was not the sort of thing that really pleased Martial’s public ; what they wanted was humorous realism, and if the humour was somewhat gross, that was rather a recommendation than a fault. Consequently the large majority of the Epigrams are of the humorous type, and are written in the elegiac metre. Pieces more than twelve lines in length are comparatively rare, and a very large number are either in four lines or in two. Generally speaking, the shorter the epigram is, the stronger is the effect that it produces, and the device whereby the sting of the sarcasm is kept for the very last word is often used with wonderful effect.

xiii

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

Many of the two-line pieces in particular reach perfection within their limited sphere, and defy translation. To take one simple example, no better and no worse than a score of similar cases — (Bk. I, xxviii) :

hesterno fetere mero qui credit Acerram fallitur : in lucem semper Acerra bibit.

“ If you think it is yesterday’s wine smells so strong On Acerra, you’re wrong.

Acerra this morning was still drinking deep,

While you were asleep.”

An English translation may give the sense, but owing to the character of our language it cannot reproduce the finer points of sound and position of words on which Martial depends for his effect. In his epigram the vital points are the position of hesterno and fallitur, and the sound of the syllable — er — six times repeated in the two lines ; and these must almost inevitably disappear. Still the joke remains, and although slight, it is a good one, as chance once proved to me many years ago when I was a master at a certain public school on the south coast. I had been spending the night at the club and was returning home about 3 a.m. one bright summer morning, when, to my joy, I met my colleague, the Reverend Mr X., who was in the habit of rising with the sun to enjoy a walk over the downs. To ask him to take my form to-morrow and to be assured of his willingness was the work of a moment, and I went on to sleep the sleep of the just. About half-past nine, however, my landlady ushered the school porter into my bedroom — “ There’s no one with your lads, sir, and they’re making a bit of a noise ”. Jumping up in haste I ran across and reproached my friend with his breach of trust. “ My dear boy ”, said he, “ you asked me to take them to- morrow ”. I was forced to apologize, and since then I have always regarded this epigram with especial respect.

F. A. W.

xiv

BOOK ONE

BOOK ONE

PREFA CE

I hope that in these little books of mine I have observed such due proportion that no man who is conscious of his own rectitude can complain about them , seeing that their sportive mood preserves, even towards the meanest individuals, that decent respect in which the authors of old were so lacking that they not only made wrongfid use of real names, but even did this in the case of the great. For myself I would seek reputation at a lower price than that, and the last thing for which I desire to be commended is mere smartness

May the malicious commentator abstain from meddling with the plain meaning of my jokes, and from writing my epigrams anew ; for he is dishonourable who misapplies ingenuity upon another’s book. I would make no apology for immodest unreserve in word — that is, for the language of epigram — were I the first to use it, but this is the manner in which Catullus writes, and Marsus, Redo, Gaetulicus, and every other author whose works are read all through ; yet if there be any man so ostentatiously prim, that one may not, even on a single page, speak plain Latin to him, he can be content to go no further than this preface — or rather no further than the title. Epigrams are written for those who are used to look on at the games of Flora ; therefore let no Cato come into our playhouse ; or if he come let him watch the show — and methinks I shall be within my rights if I close this preface with some verse —

* When you knew that the games of gay Flora were on You might from the theatre refrain :

Or did you, stern Cato, come in with a frown Just to make a grim exit again ?

2

BOOK ONE

I

* PREFACE

See, at your service, if you list, Martial the epigrammatist ;

To whom, kind reader, here below, While he the joys of fame could know, Such meed of glory you have given As poets seldom reap in heaven.

II

THE BOOK SPEAKS

If you would choose a book to be

Your travelling comrade, I remind you To buy a handy one like me,

And leave your heavy tomes behind you.

One that a single hand can hold Is best of all, and Twere a pity Should you forget where such are sold And wander vaguely through the city.

Near Pallas’ forum you shall see

The shrine of Peace, and close behind them Secundus’ shop — a freedman he

Of Lucca’s sage — there you shall find them.

Ill

THE AUTHOR TO HIS BOOK

Poor little book, but you’re safer here ; Why seek Booksellers’ Row — and Fame ? Mistress Rome is a blasee dame,

All her children will gibe and jeer :

Even her babies can sniff and sneer,

Young and old, they are all the same, Poor little book, but you’re safer here,

Why seek Booksellers’ Row — and Fame ? They whose applause may seem sincere Soon will toss you aside to shame.

Think you my pen is too austere ?

Go then fly ere it harm and maim,

Poor little book — but you’re safer here.

3

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

IV

TO DOMITIAN

Caesar, if thou shouldst read what I have writ, Wear not the frown a world doth quake to see Even in triumphs may the soldiers’ wit

Flow unreproved, aye tho’ they jest at thee ; But let the smile thou grantest Thymele,

Or gay Latinus, deck thy brow serene ;

From censure may my harmless mirth be free, My page is wanton but my life is clean.

V

THE EMPEROR’S REPLY

I showed a pageant of the sea And in return you send to me

Your wretched lines, you mocker ; Perhaps for this reward you look,

That I should send both bard and book To Davy Jones’ locker.

VI

THE HARE AND THE LIONS

Safely the Eagle bore young Ganymede In careful talons through the empty air ;

So now the lions hear their Quarry plead,

Safe in their mighty jaws doth sport the hare ! A God of power supreme each marvel wrought — Is Jove’s or Caesar’s greater in thy thought ?

VII

THE RIVALS

Although Verona hears, I dare to say That Stella’s lovely cushat soars above The pretty sparrow of Catullus’ love. Aye, lesser is thy singer’s vaunted lay As is the sparrow lesser than the dove.

4

BOOK ONE

VIII

TO DEC I AN US

In that you follow Cato’s perfect way

And Thrasea’s law, but choose to live your day,

Nor seek a naked blade your cares to end,

You live as I would have you live, my friend ; Fame cheaply won doth mere self-slaughter give, I choose for praise the worth that dares to live.

IX

TO COTTA

You long to be a pretty spark and win a hero’s fame,

But ‘ pretty spark ’ and ‘ petty fop ’ are mostly much the same.

X

LOVE’S CHARM

Maronilla, Gemellus doth adore thee,

With instant prayers and vows doth oft implore thee, And many a lover’s gift he lays before thee ;

Since neither beauty, grace, nor charm attend thee What makes him seek thee so, and thus commend thee ? A churchyard cough that promises to end thee.

XI

TO SEXTILIANUS

As a knight they allow you ten shillings a day,

But your wine bill alone is just double your pay,

So the servants would have a hard service, I think,

If they served you hot water to mix with your drink, For to bring you enough’s an impossible feat —

But you save them the trouble by taking it neat.

5

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

XII

TO REGULUS

Near to Alcides’ town, cool Tivoli,

White Albula doth spread her misty mere,

And close, at the fourth milestone, thou shalt see An holy grove and fields to Muses dear ;

A farm with rugged porch for shade was here That nigh had wrought a dreadful deed — ah me So suddenly it fell ! — And thou wert near,

Scarce from beneath thy steeds had carried thee !

I wot that even Fortune shrank aghast

From crime so foul, lest hate should be her meed. Now is that ruin gain : for perils past

Are things of price to all that give them heed,

Dear Regulus, for had thy roof stood fast,

It had not proved that there are Gods indeed.

* XIII

ARRIA AND PAETUS

When Arria, that model wife,

Drew from her breast the blood-stained knife —

‘ This does not hurt, dear lord/ she said,

Tis of your hurt I am afraid/

* XIV

THE HARE AND THE LIONS

The other day we witnessed, Sire, a very funny thing,

When lions wantoned merrily and sported in the ring,

The while a hare leaped gaily forth from out their open jaws And gambolled with the fearsome beasts amid our loud applause.

We wondered how the captured prey escaped the lions wild Till we were told that they were yours — and so of course were mild.

XV

TO HIS FRIEND

Ah Julius mine, I count no friend more dear,

So faithful love and friendship have we known ; And now your sixtieth consulate is near,

How few the days that you can call your own ; Defer not joy, but claim the past alone ;

6

BOOK ONE

Trust not a fortune that may ne’er appear,

Too oft we find that winged joys are flown ;

But care and linked toils are ever here.

Nay, with both hands, we needs must grasp delight And hold her to our heart while yet we may :

Yet even thus she oft doth mock our might And from the fond embrace doth glide away. True wisdom saith not ‘ Life shall soon be bright ’ ; To-morrow is too late — Live thou to-day.

XVI

OLLA PODRIDA

Good work you’ll find, some poor, and much that’s worse. It takes all sorts to make a book of verse.

XVII

DECLINED WITH THANKS

You say, ‘ There’s need of men to plead ’ ;

You bid me don the gown ;

There’s need, I vow, of men to plough — But must I turn a clown ?

* XVIII TO TUCCA

Why with this new cheap Vatican your old Falernian smother ?

What wrong has the good liquor done, what benefit the other ? Your guests perhaps deserve to die : for them I do not care. But ’tis a shame that all must blame to slay a vintage rare.

XIX

THE LAST STRAW

Four teeth, I think, were left to you Until, my ancient dame,

A fit of coughing shot out two,

A second did the same.

7

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

And now the third to come shall find There’s nothing in the way,

So, Aelia, calm your anxious mind And cough the livelong day.

XX

TO CAECILIANUS

What crazy trick is this you do ?

Your guests look on amazed and rueful : You bade them come to dine with you,

And now you gobble every truffle !

What sort of dainty ought to fill

That monstrous maw, you greedy sinner ? You’d eat if I could have my will

The truffles served for Claudius' dinner.

XXI

MUCIUS AND PORSENA

The hand that sought a King but slew a slave Was thrust to perish in the altar flame,

And Porsena his hardy foe forgave

And bade him go, touched by a generous shame. While Mucius endured his hand to maim The monarch dared not to behold the deed ;

And thus that hand has earned the greater fame,

A truer blow had won a lesser meed.

XXII

THE HARE AND THE LIONS

Fear not the lion, little hare,

Those dreadful fangs thou needst not flee, For these have never learned to tear A puny little beast like thee ;

On mightier foes he spends his rage,

From weakling necks doth he refrain,

And shall thy blood his thirst assuage ?

That petty draught would he disdain.

8

BOOK ONE

As tliou, for hounds a fitting prey. His hunger canst not satisfy,

So Caesar’s might doth turn away And pass the Dacian stripling by.

* XXIII

BOON COMPANIONS

If you would feast at Cotta’s board, The baths your only chance afford To get an invitation.

I never yet with him have dined.

My naked charms do not, I find, Excite his admiration.

XXIV

TO DEC I ANUS

To look on yonder fellow’s brow austere And shaggy locks might fill the soul with fear, But hear him speak and you would surely say,

‘ The Curius or Camillus of to-day.’

Trust not to looks, they are a treacherous guide ; But yesterday one took him for a bride !

XXV

TO FA USTINUS

Publish your works — too long have you forborne — Let not your polished work in darkness lie ;

’Tis such as Cecrops’ city should not scorn,

Nor Rome’s ripe scholars pass in silence by.

Nay, doth it irk you that reward is nigh ?

Why bar out fame who standeth at the gate ?

Give birth to what must live, before you die,

For honour paid to ashes comes too late.

XXVI

TO SEXTILIANUS

All the seats to knights allotted Cannot vie with you, I think ; At this rate you’d be besotted E’en if water were your drink.

9

MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS

You’re a beggar most persistent,

For you cadge from all at hand And you send to seats far distant Your importunate demand ;

Yet the liquor that you favour In Abruzzi never grew,

And no Tuscan hill could flavour Clusters sweet enough for you ; Nay, you quaff a vintage classic That Opimius knew of yore,

And the blackened cask of Massic Yields for you its ripened store. Ten full cups I don’t deny you,

But if more you wish to drain, Then a pot-house should supply you With the dregs of Laletane.

XXVII

‘ T IS WISE TO FORGET *

•

I may have asked you here to dine, But that was late at night,

And none of us had spared the wine If I remember right.

You thought the invitation meant, Though wine obscured my wit ! And — O most parlous precedent — You made a note of it !

The maxim that in Greece was true Is true in Rome to-day —

‘ I hate a fellow-toper who Remembers what I say.’

XXVIII ON AC ERR A

He reeks, you might think, of his yesterday’s drink ;

But knowing his customs and ways,

You are wrong, I’ll be sworn, for he drank till the morn, So the savour is truly to-day’s.

io

BOOK ONE

XXIX

TO FIDENTINUS

A rumour says that you recite As yours the verses