Book 8
Imperial Marcus Valerius Martialis Latinpr. To the Emperor Domitian Caesar Augustus Germanicus Dacicus, Valerius Martialis sends greeting.
All my little books, my lord, to which you have given fame — that is, life — make their supplication to you; and on that account, I think, they will be read. This one, however, which is inscribed as the eighth of my work, enjoys the occasion of devotion more often. So there was less need to labour with my wit, since subject-matter had taken its place: this I have tried now and then to vary with some mixture of jests, lest every verse should heap up on your heavenly modesty its own praises, which might more easily weary you than satisfy me. Yet, although epigrams have been written even by the gravest men of the highest rank in such a way that they seem to have aimed at the verbal license of the mime, I have not allowed mine to speak as wantonly as they are wont. Since the part of the book that is both the larger and the better is bound to the majesty of your sacred name, let it remember that none should approach the temples unless cleansed by religious purification. That my readers may know I shall observe this, I have decided to declare it on the very threshold of this little book in a very brief epigram.
I Book, about to enter the laurelled household of our lord, learn to speak more holily, with modest lips. Withdraw, naked Venus; this little book is not yours: come to me, you, Caesar's own Pallas, come.
II Janus, begetter and father of the calendar, when he lately saw the conqueror of the Hister, thought all his faces not enough for himself, and wished he had more eyes: and, speaking at once with every tongue, he promised to the lord of the earth and god of all things the Pylian old age of Nestor, four times over. Add, father Janus, your own, we pray.
III 'Five would have been enough: for six or seven little books is too much: what pleasure is it still to play, Muse? Let there be shame and an end: now Fame can add nothing more to me — my book is thumbed everywhere; and when Messala's stones lie shattered by decay and Licinus' tall marbles are dust, still mouths will read me, and many a stranger will carry my songs home to his native land.' I had finished, when the ninth of the sisters answered thus, her hair and dress dirty with perfume: 'Can you, ingrate, abandon your sweet trifles? Tell me, what better will you do in your idleness? Or does it please you to change the slipper for the tragic buskin, or to thunder harsh wars in even measures, so that a swollen schoolmaster may declaim you in a raucous voice and the grown girl and the good boy may hate you? Let the over-grave and over-severe write such things, the wretches whom the lamp sees at midnight. But you, dip your charming little books in Roman salt: let life recognize and read its own ways. Though you may seem to sing on a narrow reed, let your reed outdo the trumpets of many.'
IV What a great gathering of the world, hurrah, at the Latin altars takes up and pays vows for its leader! These are not the joys of men alone, Germanicus, but the very gods, I think, are now performing rites.
V While you give rings to girls, Macer, you have ceased, Macer, to have any rings.
VI Nothing is more tiresome than old Euctus' antiques — I'd sooner have crockery shaped from Saguntine clay — when he tells the mad pedigree of his silver and, garrulous, turns wine musty with his words. 'These cups belonged to Laomedon's table: to win them, Apollo built the walls with his lyre. With this mixing-bowl fierce Rhoetus joined battle with the Lapiths: you see a piece weakened by the fight. These two bowls are reckoned of long-lived Nestor: a dove, polished by a Pylian thumb, gleams there. Here is the cup in which Aeacus' grandson bade neat wine be mixed more freely and stronger for his friends. In this dish most lovely Dido toasted Bitias when the banquet was given to the Phrygian man.' When you have marvelled much at the ancient embossings, you'll drink Astyanax from Priam's cups.
VII Is this pleading causes, is this speaking eloquently, Cinna — in ten hours, Cinna, to say nine words? But just now, in a mighty voice, you demanded four water-clocks. Oh, Cinna, how long you can keep silent!
VIII Though you give the swift years their beginning, Janus, and renew long ages with your face, though pious incense beg of you first, vows greet you, the lucky purple honour you, every dignity court you: yet you prefer this — that it fell to the Latin city in your month, Janus, to see its god come home.
IX Bleary-eyed Hylas lately wished to pay you, Quintus, three-quarters of the debt; now, one-eyed, he wants to give half. Take it as soon as you can; the chance of gain is brief: if Hylas goes blind, he'll pay you nothing at all.
X Bassus bought Tyrian cloaks of the finest dye for ten thousand. He made a profit. 'Did he buy so cheaply?' you say. No — he won't pay.
XI The Rhine already knows you have reached your city; for it too hears the voices of your people: the Sarmatian tribes also, and the Hister and the Getae, the very shout of strange rejoicing has terrified. While long-drawn joys revere you in the sacred Circus, no one noticed the horses run, though sent forth four times. Rome has loved no leader, nor you, Caesar, so much: even she could not love you more, much as she'd wish.
XII Why I would not wish to marry a rich wife, you ask? I do not want to be the bride to my wife. Let the matron be beneath her husband, Priscus: not otherwise do woman and man become equals.
XIII He was called a fool: I bought him for twenty thousand. Give me back my money, Gargilianus: he has his wits.
XIV That his pale Cilician orchards may not fear the winter, and a too-strong breeze nip the tender grove, window-panes set against the wintry south-winds admit the clear suns and the cloudless day. But to me is given a cell, not wholly closed by a window, in which not even Boreas himself would care to stay. So you bid an old friend lodge, cruel man — better, then, that I be the guest of your tree.
XV While the new glory of the Pannonian war is recounted, and every altar makes offering to Jupiter the home-bringer, the people give, the grateful knights give, the senate gives incense, and a third gift enriches the Latin tribes: these secret triumphs too Rome has recorded, nor was that laurel of your peace any less, in that you trust to the holy devotion of your own. A prince's greatest virtue is to know his own.
XVI You who were long a baker, Cyperus, now plead causes and seek two hundred thousand: but you spend, and you keep on borrowing. You do not retreat from the baker's trade, Cyperus: you make bread, and you make flour-dust of your fortune.
XVII I pleaded your case, Sextus, agreed on two thousand: that you sent me a thousand coins — what is this? 'You told nothing,' you say, 'and the case was lost by you.' You owe so much the more, Sextus, because I blushed.
XVIII If you brought out your epigrams, Cerrinius, before the public, you could be read either alongside me or even ahead of me: but so great is your regard for an old friend, that my fame is dearer to you than your own. So Maro did not attempt the songs of Calabrian Flaccus, though he knew how to surpass the Pindaric measures, and yielded to Varius the glory of the Roman buskin, though he could speak more powerfully in the tragic voice. Gold and wealth and lands a friend will often give: he who is willing to yield in talent will be rare.
XIX Cinna wishes to seem poor; and he is poor.
XX Though you make two hundred verses every single day, Varus, you recite nothing. You have no sense — and you have sense.
XXI Phosphor, give back the day: why do you delay our joys? With Caesar coming, Phosphor, give back the day. Rome asks it. Do the sluggish wains of placid Boötes carry you, that you come on too slow an axle? You could have led off Cyllarus from the Ledaean star: Castor himself will now yield you his own horse. Why do you hold back the eager Titan? Already Xanthus and Aethon want the reins; Memnon's kindly mother is awake. Yet the slow stars do not yield to the shining light, and the moon longs to see the Ausonian leader. Now, Caesar, come even by night: though the stars stand still, the day will not fail the people when you come.
XXII You invite me to boar, Gallicus, you set pork before me. I'm a half-breed, Gallicus, if you fool me.
XXIII I seem to you savage and too much a glutton, Rusticus, because over a dinner I flog the cook. If that seems to you a trivial cause for the lash, then for what cause would you have the cook beaten?
XXIV If by chance I ask anything in a timid, slender little book, grant it, if my page has not been shameless. And if you will not grant it, Caesar, allow it to be asked: incense and prayers never offend Jupiter. He who shapes sacred faces in gold or marble does not make gods: the man who prays does.
XXV You saw me ill just once, Oppianus, hardly at all; I'll see you often.
XXVI The Gangetic ravisher feared not so many tigers in the Eastern fields, fleeing white on his Hyrcanian horse, as your Rome has seen, Germanicus, new tigers: it could not even count its own delights. Your arena, Caesar, surpasses the Erythraean triumphs and the wealth and riches of the conquering god: for when he drove captive Indians beneath his chariot, Bacchus was content with a pair of tigers.
XXVII The man who gives gifts to you, Gaurus, rich and old, if you have wit and sense, says this to you: 'Die.'
XXVIII Tell me, toga, welcome gift of an eloquent friend, of what flock do you wish to be the fame and pride? Did the Apulian grass of Ledaean Phalanthus bloom for you, where Galaesus waters the tilled fields with Calabrian streams? Or did Baetis, the Tartessian nurse of the Spanish fold, also wash you in a Hesperian sheep? Or did your wool number among many-branched Timavus, which pious Cyllarus drank with his star-bearing mouth? It became you not to be stained with Amyclaean dye, nor was Miletus worthy of your fleece. You outdo the lilies and the privet not yet fallen, and the ivory that chills on the Tiburtine hill; the Spartan swan will yield to you, and the Paphian doves, the gem dug from the Erythraean shallows will yield: but though these gifts rival the first snows, they are not whiter than their Parthenius. I would not prefer the embroidered weavings of proud Babylon, which the Semiramian needle makes various; nor would I admire myself more in Athamantian gold, should you give me, Phrixus, the Aeolian sheep. Oh, what laughter will my cloak stir up, when seen together with my Palatine toga!
XXIX He who writes couplets, I think, wants to please by brevity. But what good is brevity, tell me, if it makes a book?
XXX The show now watched in Caesar's arena was the highest glory in the days of Brutus. You see how the brave hand holds the flames and delights in its punishment and reigns over the astonished fire! He stands as his own spectator, and loves the noble death of his right hand: it feeds on the whole sacrifice; and had the punishment not been snatched from the unwilling man, the fiercer left hand was getting ready to go into the failing flames. After such a glorious deed, it irks me to know what it did before: it is enough for me to know the hand I saw.
XXXI You confess something not very pretty about yourself, Dento, you who, having taken a wife, seek the rights of a father. But now stop wearying our lord with begging little books, and return at last from the city to your homeland: for while you are far off, your wife long deserted, and you seek three sons, you'll find four.
XXXII Gliding down through the silent air, a coaxing dove flowed into the very lap of seated Aretulla. Chance would have made sport of this, but the bird stayed unwatched and, though free to fly, would not go off. If a pious sister may hope for better things, and if prayers avail to bend the lord of the world, this bird perhaps comes to you from the Sardinian shores of the exile as a messenger that your brother will return.
XXXIII From your praetorian crown you send me a leaf, Paulus, and bid it bear the name of a saucer. With this gauze your stage-platform was lately smeared, which the wave of red saffron washed pale. Or is it gold-leaf scraped off by the nail of a crafty servant, which I think comes from the foot of your couch? That leaf can feel a gnat flying far off and be stirred by the wing of the tiniest butterfly; it flutters, suspended on the heat of a small lamp, and breaks at the light touch of poured wine. With this spit are smeared the date-palms of January's Kalends, which the shabby client brings with his stingy penny. Less limp grow the colocasia on their slender stalk, more fully the lilies fall in too much sun; nor does the wandering spider run on so thin a web, nor does the hanging silkworm press out so light a work. Thicker stands the chalk on old Fabulla's face, thicker the bubble swells on struck water; stronger is the bladder that keeps curled hair, and the Batavian foam that changes Latin locks. With such a skin the chick is clothed in the Ledaean egg, such patches sit on the crescent-marked brow. What have you to do with a saucer, when you could send a spoon, when you could send me even a little ladle — I speak too grandly — when you could send a snail-shell, in short, when you could send, Paulus, nothing?
XXXIV You say you own the original silver of Mys. A thing made without you — is that the more original?
XXXV Since you are alike and matched in life, a wretched wife, a wretched husband, I wonder you don't get on well together.
XXXVI Laugh, Caesar, at the royal wonder of the pyramids; now barbaric Memphis is silent about her Eastern work: how small a part is the Mareotic labour beside the Parrhasian hall? The day sees nothing brighter in the whole world. You'd think the seven hills rise together; Thessalian Pelion bore a lower Ossa; it so enters the air that, hidden among the bright stars, its serene peak thunders below the cloud and is filled with the secret godhead of Phoebus before Circe sees the face of her rising father. Yet this house, Augustus, which strikes the stars with its summit, is the equal of heaven — but less than its lord.
XXXVII That you give back the bills to Caietanus, Polycharmus, do you suppose you have made him a gift of a hundred thousand? 'He owed it,' you say. Keep the bills to yourself, Polycharmus, and lend Caietanus another two thousand.
XXXVIII He who excels in stubborn devotion toward one who will feel the good of his generosity may perhaps be angling, or claiming a return: but he who keeps on giving to a name left behind, after the shade and the tomb, what does he seek, except to grieve more sparingly? It matters whether you are good or wish to seem so. This you do, Melior, with Fame for witness, you who, careful of the rites of the buried, do not let the name of Blaesus perish, and, lavish from your bountiful coffer, to honour his birthday, what you give to the mindful and pious band of scribes you make a thing of Blaesus. This will be your tribute long, while life remains, this too after your ashes.
XXXIX There was no place before to hold the banquets of the Palatine table and its ambrosial feasts: here it is fitting to drink the sacred nectar, Germanicus, and the cups mixed by a Ganymede-hand. Be willing, I beg, to be a late guest of the Thunderer: but if you are in a hurry, Jupiter, come yourself.
XL Not of a garden nor of a happy vine, but of a thin grove, Priapus, are you guardian, from which you were born and can be born again; I warn you, keep off thieving hands and save the wood for your master's hearths: if this fails, you too are firewood.
XLI 'Gloomy Athenagoras has not sent us the gifts he is wont to send in mid-winter's month.' Whether Athenagoras is gloomy, Faustinus, I shall see: certainly Athenagoras has made me gloomy.
XLII If a bigger dole among the rich has not corrupted you, as it does, then, Matho, you may bathe a hundred times at my expense.
XLIII Fabius buries his wives, Chrestilla her husbands, and each shakes a funeral torch over the marriage-bed. Match the victors, Venus: the end that waits these two is that one Libitina carry the pair away together.
XLIV Titullus, I warn you, live: it is always too late; even were you to begin under your tutor, it is too late. But you, poor Titullus, do not live even as an old man, but wear down every threshold as a caller, and in the morning sweat, wet with the kisses of the city, and, splashed before all the horses in the triple forum and the temple of Mars and the colossus of Augustus, you run through them all, at the third hour and the fifth. Snatch, heap up, carry off, possess: it must be left behind. Though your proud strongbox grow pale with packed coins, though a hundred pages of account-books be unrolled, your heir will swear you left nothing, and over your bier, while you lie there — a board or a stone — while your couch, stuffed with paper, swells for you, he will proudly kiss your weeping eunuchs; and your sorrowing son, whether you will or no, the first night will sleep with your catamite.
XLV Priscus Terentius is given back to me, Flaccus, from the shores of Etna: let a milk-white gem mark this day; let the cloudy amphora drip and grow bright through the slow strainer, the jar made smaller under its hundredth consul. When will so fair a night fall to my table? When shall I be allowed to grow warm with so deserved a wine? When Cytherean Cyprus gives you back to me, Flaccus, there will be so good a cause for my excess.
XLVI As great as your honesty, so great is the innocence of your beauty, boy Cestus, chaster than chaste Hippolytus! Diana would wish you with her and teach you to swim, Cybele would rather have you whole, a Phrygian; you could succeed to Ganymede's couch, but, hard, you'd give your lord kisses only. Happy the bride who will vex her tender husband, and the girl who will first make a man of you!
XLVII Part of your jaws is clipped, part of you is shaved, part is plucked. Who would think it is one head?
XLVIII Crispinus does not know to whom he gave his Tyrian mantle, while he changes his dress and puts on the toga. Whoever has it, give the cloak back to its shoulders, we beg: it is not Crispinus who asks you this, but the mantle. Not just anyone is fit for garments steeped in purple, nor does that colour suit any but the elegant. If loot delights you and the madness of foul gain, take the toga — with it you can cheat better.
XLIX As great as the table of the Giants' triumph is recounted, and as great a night as that was for all the gods above, when the good father reclined with the common folk of the gods and the Fauns were allowed to ask Jupiter for wine: so great are the banquets that celebrate your laurels, Caesar; our joys gladden the very gods. Every knight feasts with you, and the people and the fathers, and Rome takes ambrosial fare with her leader. Having promised great things, how much greater you have given! A dole was promised us; a full dinner was served.
L What labour is in this dish? Learned Mys' work, or Myron's? Is this the hand of Mentor, or, Polyclitus, yours? It is not dulled by any dark tarnish, nor does the cloudy mass hate the fires that test it; true amber gleams less than this yellow metal, and the lucky boss outshines snowy ivory. The work does not yield to its material: so it rings the disc round, as the full moon shines with all its lamp. A goat stands, decked with the Aeolian fleece of Theban Phrixus: his sister might have wished to be carried by this one; not even the Cinyphian shearer would harm him, and you, Lyaeus, would yourself wish him fed on your vine. On the beast's back rides a golden Cupid with twin wings, and the Pallas-lotus sounds from his tender mouth: so the dolphin, delighting in Methymnaean Arion, bore the languid burden, not silent, through the seas. Let your hand, Cestus, steep this fine gift for me with worthy nectar — not one of the master's herd, but your own; Cestus, glory of the table, mix Setine wine: the boy himself, the goat himself, seem to us to thirst. Let the letter of Instantius Rufus give the number of cyathi: for he is the author to me of so great a gift: if Telethusa comes and brings the promised joys, I'll be kept for my mistress, Rufus, by your four measures; if she's doubtful, I'll be dragged on through seven; if she fails her lover, to cut my cares' throat I'll drink both names.
LI A truly beautiful woman — but Asper loves her blind. So Asper, as the case stands, loves more than he sees.
LII A boy barber, but of such skill as not even Nero's Thalamus had, to whom the beards of the Drusi fell, I lent to Rufus, Caedicianus, when asked for once, to even out his cheeks. While, as bidden, he goes over the same hairs, his judgement guided by the mirror in his hand, and paints the skin and makes a long second going-over of the close-cut hairs, my barber came back to me with a beard.
LIII As loud a roar as is heard through the Massylian wilds, whenever the wood rages with countless lions, when the pale shepherd calls back to the Punic huts his frightened bulls and his witless flock: so great a terror lately growled in the Ausonian sand. Who would not have thought it a herd? It was one, but one whose laws even the lions themselves would tremble at, to whom the marble-painted Nomad would give a diadem. Oh, what glory round his neck, what honour the golden shadow of his crescent mane scattered, when he stood! How the great hunting-spears became his broad breast, and what joys he took from a noble death! Whence, Libya, came so happy a glory to your forests? Had he come, perhaps, from the yoke of Cybele? Or rather, Germanicus, did your brother or father himself send this beast to you from the Herculean star?
LIV Of women most beautiful, who have been or are, but most worthless, who have been or are, oh, how I would wish you to become, Catulla, either less beautiful or more chaste!
LV Since the age of our grandfathers yields to our times, and Rome has grown greater with her leader, you wonder that the genius of sacred Maro is wanting, and that no one sounds wars with so great a trumpet. Let there be Maecenases, Flaccus, and Marones will not be lacking; even your own farm will give you a Virgil. Tityrus had lost the acres next to wretched Cremona, and grieved, sick at heart, for his sheep driven away: the Tuscan knight laughed, and pushed back grudging poverty and bade it depart in swift flight. 'Take riches,' he said, 'and be the greatest of bards; you may even love our Alexis.' That loveliest boy stood by his master's table, pouring dark Falernian with a marble hand, and gave the sipped cups from rosy lips, cups that could have tempted Jupiter himself. The astonished poet forgot plump Galatea and Thestylis, her red cheeks burnt at harvest; at once he conceived Italy and 'arms and the man,' he who lately had barely wept the Gnat with rude lips. Why speak of the Varii and Marsi and the enriched names of bards whom it would be great labour to count? So I'll be a Virgil, if you give me Maecenas' gifts? A Virgil I'll not be: I'll be a Marsus.
LVI Though you bestow great gifts so often, about to give greater, conqueror of leaders, conqueror even of yourself, you are loved by the people not for your rewards, Caesar; for you the people love your rewards, Caesar.
LVII He had three teeth, all of which he spat out together while Picens himself sat at his own tomb; and he gathered in his lap the last fragments of his loose mouth, and buried them in heaped-up earth. Though some day his heir need not gather the dead man's bones, Picens has already done himself this office.
LVIII Since your cloaks are so thick, Artemidorus, I could rightly call you Sagaris.
LIX Do you see this man content with one eye, beneath whose worn brow a bleary socket gapes? Don't despise the fellow: nothing is more thievish than he; not even Autolycus' hand was so peppered. Take care to keep a wary eye on this dinner-guest: then he rages, and one-eyed sees with both eyes; the anxious servants lose their cups and spoons, and many a napkin hides in his warm bosom; nor does he fail to filch a cloak slipped from an elbow, and often goes off covered with two mantles; nor was the cheat ashamed to cheat a drowsing slave of the lamp, though it be burning. If he has seized nothing, then with crafty art he goes round a boy and steals his own slippers.
LX You could equal the summit of the Palatine colossus, Claudia, if you became a foot and a half shorter.
LXI Charinus is livid, he bursts, he rages, he weeps, and seeks high branches to hang himself from: not now because I am sung and read throughout the world, nor because, smart with bosses and cedar-oil, I am scattered through all the nations Rome holds: but because I have a summer place in the country near the city, and ride on mules not, as before, hired. What shall I call down, O Severus, on the livid man? This I pray: may he have mules and a suburban farm.
LXII Picens writes epigrams on the back of the paper, and grieves that he does it with the god turned away.
LXIII Aulus loves Thestylus, but burns no less for Alexis, and perhaps now loves my Hyacinthus too. Go now and doubt whether he loves the bards themselves, when my Aulus loves the bards' darlings.
LXIV That you may beg a gift and exact it, Clytus, you are born eight times in one year, and you have only, I think, three or four Kalends that are not your birthday. Though your face be smoother than the worn pebbles of a dry shore, though your hair be blacker than the falling mulberry, though you outdo trembling feathers in softness, or a lump of curdled milk just now, and such a swelling rouse your nipples as an unripe girl keeps for a man, you seem to us, Clytus, already an old man: for who would believe that even Priam or Nestor had so many birthdays? Let there be at last some shame and limit to your robberies. But if you keep playing, and to be born once in one year is not now enough for you, I'll think, Clytus, you were not born even once.
LXV Here, where the temples of Fortune the Home-Bringer gleam wide and bright, was lately a happy open space: here stood Caesar, handsome with the dust of Northern war, pouring a purple radiance from his face; here Rome, her hair wreathed with laurel and bright in dress, greeted her leader with voice and hand. Other gifts attest the great merit of the place: a sacred arch stands and exults over conquered nations; here twin chariots count many an elephant, the golden figure himself suffices for the huge teams. This gate is worthy of your triumphs, Germanicus; such entrances befit the city of Mars to have.
LXVI Pious incense and victims for Augustus, Camenae, give on behalf of your Silius. Lo, he bids twice six fasces return, his son made consul, and with noble rod he bids the Castalian house of the bard resound — Caesar, the first and only safety of the world. There remains still for the rejoicing man to wish for: the lucky purple and a third consul. Though the senate and Caesar may have given sacred honours to Pompey and his son-in-law, whose names peace-making Janus thrice enlarged: Silius prefers thus to count frequent consulships.
LXVII The boy has not yet announced the fifth hour to you, and already you come as my dinner-guest, Caecilianus, though the courts of the hoarse fourth have just put off their sureties and the arena still tires the Floralian beasts. Run, come, Callistus, call back the unwashed servants; let the couches be spread: Caecilianus, sit down. You ask for hot water: cold has not yet come to me; the kitchen is shut and chills still with bare hearth. Come in the morning rather; for why should the fifth hour keep you? To breakfast, Caecilianus, you come late.
LXVIII He who has seen the orchards of the Corcyraean king will prefer, Entellus, the country of your house. That envious winter may not scorch the purple clusters and cold frost devour the gifts of Bacchus, the vintage lives shut in transparent glass, and the happy grape is covered, yet not hidden: so a woman's body shines through silk, so a pebble is counted in clear water. What did Nature not wish to allow to genius? Barren winter is bidden to bear an autumn.
LXIX You admire only the ancients, Vacerra, and praise no poets but the dead. We beg your pardon, Vacerra: it is not worth dying, just to please you.
LXX As great as gentle Nerva's calm, so great his eloquence, but modesty restrains his powers and his genius. Though he could drain the sacred Permessis with a full mouth, he chose rather to keep his thirst modest, content to wreathe his Pierian brow with a slender crown, and not to spread sail to his own fame. Yet whoever knows the famous songs of learned Nero knows that this man is the Tibullus of our age.
LXXI Four pounds of silver you sent me at winter time, Postumianus, ten years ago, to one expecting more — for gifts ought to stand or grow — two came, more or less; the third and fourth brought much less; in the fifth it was a Septician pound indeed; in the sixth year we came down to an eight-ounce dish; after this a half-pound, scraped, in a small cup, was given; the eighth sent a spoon weighing less than two ounces; the ninth scarcely brought a little ladle lighter than a needle. Now the tenth year has nothing left to send us: go back, Postumianus, to your four pounds.
LXXII Not yet decked with purple, nor smoothed by the rough bite of dry pumice, you hurry to follow Arcanus, little book, whom most lovely Narbo bids return — Narbo, the home of learned Votienus Paternus — to her laws and her yearly fasces: what with equal vows you must wish for, that place and this friend will be granted you. How I'd wish to become my own little book!
LXXIII Instantius, than whom no other is held more sincere in heart, nor first in snow-white candour, if you wish to give strength and spirit to my Thalia and seek songs that will live, give me something to love. Cynthia made you a bard, wanton Propertius; fair Lycoris was the genius of Gallus; lovely Nemesis is the fame of smart Tibullus; Lesbia dictated to you, learned Catullus: neither the Paeligni nor Mantua will scorn me as a bard, if I have some Corinna, some Alexis.
LXXIV A gladiator now, you were an eye-doctor before. You did as a doctor what you do as a gladiator.
LXXV While the Lingonian, fresh from the Tecta and the Flaminian Way, sought his hired lodgings late at night, he struck his thumb and dislocated his injured ankle and lay stretched full-length upon the ground. What was the Gaul to do, by what means move himself? The huge master had but one little slave, so thin he could scarcely carry the smallest lamp: chance came to the wretch's aid and brought him help. Four branded slaves were carrying a cheap corpse, such as the poor man's pyre receives by the thousand; the feeble companion begs them in a lowered voice to carry the empty body wherever they wish: the load is exchanged, and the great bundle, crammed, is lifted high on the narrow bier. This man of many, Lucanus, seems to me one to whom 'dead Gaul' can rightly be said.
LXXVI 'Tell me the truth, Marcus, tell me, please; there is nothing I would hear more gladly.' So both when you recite your little books, and whenever you plead a client's case, you beg me, Gallicus, and always ask. It is hard for me to deny you what you ask. So hear what is truer than truth: the truth, Gallicus, you do not gladly hear.
LXXVII Liber, sweetest care of your friends, Liber, worthy to live in eternal roses, if you are wise, let your hair forever gleam with Assyrian balm, and flowery garlands ring your head; let bright crystal grow dark with old Falernian, and the soft couch grow warm with charming love. He who has so lived, though cut off even in mid-course, has made his life longer than the life that was given him.
LXXVIII Such games as Phlegraean victory would wish its own, such, Lyaeus, as the Indian procession would wish yours, Stella, celebrant of the Hyperborean triumph, has staged — O modesty! O devotion! — and thinks it too little. Not enough for him is Hermus, dirty with churned gold, and Tagus, which sounds in the Hesperian world. Every day has its gifts: nor does the rich line of prizes cease, and much plunder falls upon the crowd; now wanton tokens come in sudden showers, now the lavish ticket gives the beasts on show, now the bird rejoices to fill safe bosoms and, absent, chooses its owners by lot, that it not be torn apart. Why count the chariots and the thirty prizes of the palm, which not even both consuls are always wont to give? But all is surpassed, Caesar, by so great an honour, that your laurel has you for its spectator.
LXXIX All your women friends are either old hags or ugly and fouler than old hags. These you lead as companions and drag with you through banquets, porticoes, theatres. So you are beautiful, Fabulla, so you are a girl.
LXXX You give us back the wonders of our holy forefathers, nor do you let the hoary ages die, Caesar, when the old rites of the Latin sand are renewed and valour fights with a simpler hand. So with you as guardian, honour is kept for ancient temples, and the hut has its godhead under so cultured a Jupiter; so, while you found new things, you call back the old, Augustus — both what is owed to you and what once was.
LXXXI Not by the mystic rites of Dindymene, nor by the bull of the Nile's heifer, nor, in short, by any gods or goddesses does Gellia swear, but by her pearls. These she embraces, these she covers with kisses, these she calls brothers, these she calls sisters, these she loves more fiercely than her two children. If by some chance the poor wretch should lose them, she says she would not live a single hour. Alas, how well now, Papirianus, the hand of Annaeus Serenus would do its work!
LXXXII Since the crowd gives you their querulous little books, Augustus, and we too give our small songs to our lord, we know that a god can find leisure alike for affairs and the Muses, and that these garlands too please you. Bear with your bards, Augustus: we are your sweet glory, we are your earlier care and your delight. Not the oak alone becomes you, nor Phoebus' laurel: let our civic crown of ivy be made for you too.