De Bissula
De Bissula Late Antiquity Ausonius, Decimus Magnus Latinpr. Ausonius to his Paulus, greeting. You prevail at last, and you break in upon the hidden things of my Muses, which the obscurity of the initiated veiled — although not profane, dearest Paulus. For though I esteem you not of that common herd which Horace bars from entering, yet each has his own sacred rites, nor is the same offering due to Ceres as to Liber, even among the same worshippers. The little poems which I had composed for my foster-child, rough and unfinished, for the solace of a domestic ditty — while they lay hidden without fear and enjoyed a secret security — you have forced me to bring forth, blinking, into the light. You have coveted, forsooth, the spoil of my modesty; or how much right you had over me, to have it betrayed by me against my will. Surely you have surpassed the stubbornness of Alexander of Macedon, who, when he could not loose the thongs of the fated yoke, cut them; and who penetrated the cave of the Pythia on a day when it was not lawful for it to be open. Use them, then, as your own, by an equal right, but with unequal confidence: for yours can be unafraid of the public; over mine I blush even within myself. Farewell.
PREFACE. As you wished, Paulus, you have all the verses of Bissula, which I composed for the favour of the little Suebian maiden, fostering my leisure rather than studying for glory. You, the troublesome dunner, read these troublesome songs by a troublesome law: what you have crumbled in, you must eat up — so the old proverb bids: that the smith himself should wear the fetters he himself has made.
TO THE READER OF THIS LITTLE BOOK. You who are about to read the slender little book of an unpolished song, lay aside your raised brow; do not weigh these serious poems with knit wrinkles: I follow Thymele (the comic Muse). Bissula shall be sung in this offhand piece, not Erasinus: I advise you, drink first. To the fasting I write nothing; if anyone read my work after the cups, he will be wise. But he will be the wiser if he sleeps, and thinks these things dreams sent to him.
WHERE BISSULA WAS BORN, AND HOW SHE CAME INTO HER MASTER'S HANDS. Bissula, sprung in stock and household beyond the cold Rhine, Bissula, who knew the new-born Danube, captured by the hand, but freed by the hand, holds sway among the delights of him whose spoil of war she was. Without a mother, lacking a nurse, she who knows not a mistress's command, she herself rules her master's house; she who has felt no reproaches of her fortune and her homeland, free at once, with servitude untried. So changed by Latin goods, yet her German look would remain: blue in the eyes, golden in the hair. Now her tongue makes the girl ambiguous, now her form: this proclaims her born of the Rhine, that of Latium.
ON THE SAME BISSULA. Darling, charm, sport, love, delight, a barbarian, but one who conquers the Latin dolls, the foster-child Bissula — a rustic name for a tender girl, a little uncouth to those not used to it, but lovely to her master.
TO THE PAINTER, ON THE PORTRAIT OF BISSULA. Bissula, imitable by no wax nor any dye, lends not her natural beauty to feigning art. Vermilion and white-lead, counterfeit other girls: this temper of the face the hand knows not. So come, painter, blend the crimson roses and mingle the lilies; and whatever colour comes from them of the air, let that be the colour of her face.
TO THE PAINTER, ON PAINTING BISSULA. If you plan, painter, to paint our foster-child, let your rival art imitate the Cecropian (Attic) bees.