by Daisy Dunn
‘I live, my wife lives, barred from me for ever,
My home and household too, so loyal to me,
And my companions whom I loved as brothers,
Hearts bound to me with Theseus’ loyalty.
I’ll hug while I still may; perhaps I may not
Ever more. Each hour I’m granted gain will be.’
No lingering! I left my words unfinished
And in my arms held everything most dear.
While our tears fell, bright in the sky had risen
The Morning Star, that star to me so drear.
Sundered I was, as if my body’d lost its
Limbs and I left behind a part of me.
Such was the pain of Mettus when the horses
Were driven apart to avenge his treachery.
Ah, then arose my dear ones’ lamentations
And on bare breasts fell many a sad blow.
Ah, then, as I was leaving, my wife hugged me
And mingled with my tears her words of woe:
‘We can’t be parted. We shall go together:
An exiled wife, I’ll share an exile’s fate.
Mine too’s the way: there’s room for me at the world’s end;
To your ship in its flight I’ll add small freight.
‘You Caesar’s wrath compels to leave our country,
Me, love. For me that love shall Caesar be.’
She tried, as she had tried before, and hardly
Surrendered, yielding to expediency.
I left, more like a corpse without a funeral,
Bedraggled, cheeks unshaven, hanging hair.
She, mad with grief I’m told, and almost lifeless
Slumped where she was, her mind in darkness there.
And when she rose, the shameful dust befouling
Her tresses, from the cold ground where she lay,
She mourned herself, mourned Household Gods deserted,
Called often on her husband snatched away,
Groaning as if she’d seen me and my daughter’s
Corpses upon a pyre prepared that day.
She longed for death to end the pain of evil,
But, in her care for me, death could not be.
Long may she live, and since Fate thus has borne me
Afar, may her life ever succour me.
THE TOWN AND THE COUNTRY MOUSE
Satires, II.6
Horace
Translated by Philip Francis, 1746
The poet Horace (65–8 BC) divided his time between Rome, where life was always busy, and his idyllic country home beyond the city. His poem begins as a thanksgiving for his modest ‘Sabine’ farm and the generosity of his patron Maecenas. It then becomes a vivid retelling of the famous Aesopic fable of the town and the country mouse. The eighteenth-century writer, critic and lexicographer Samuel Johnson was full of admiration for his contemporary Philip Francis as a translator of Horace. ‘The lyrical part of Horace’, he wrote, ‘can never be perfectly translated; so much of the excellence is in the numbers and the expression. Francis has done it the best; I’ll take his, five out of six, against them all’.
I often wish’d I had a farm,
A decent dwelling snug and warm,
A garden, and a spring as pure
As crystal running by my door,
Besides a little ancient grove,
Where at my leisure I might rove.
The gracious gods, to crown my bliss,
Have granted this, and more than this;
I have enough in my possessing;
’Tis well: I ask no greater blessing,
O Hermes! than remote from strife
To have and hold them for my life.
If I was never known to raise
My fortune by dishonest ways,
Nor, like the spendthrifts of the times,
Shall ever sink it by my crimes:
If thus I neither pray nor ponder—
Oh! might I have that angle yonder,
Which disproportions now my field,
What satisfaction it would yield!
O that some lucky chance but threw
A pot of silver in my view,
As lately to the man, who bought
The very land in which he wrought!
If I am pleas’d with my condition,
O hear, and grant this last petition:
Indulgent, let my cattle batten,
Let all things, but my fancy, fatten,
And thou continue still to guard,
As thou art wont, thy suppliant bard.
Whenever therefore I retreat
From Rome into my Sabine seat,
By mountains fenc’d on either side,
And in my castle fortified,
What can I write with greater pleasure,
Than satires in familiar measure?
Nor mad ambition there destroys,
Nor sickly wind my health annoys;
Nor noxious autumn gives me pain,
The ruthless undertaker’s gain.
Whatever title please thine ear,
Father of morning, Janus, hear,
Since mortal men, by heaven’s decree,
Commence their toils, imploring thee,
Director of the busy throng,
Be thou the prelude of my song.
At Rome, you press me: “Without fail
A friend expects you for his bail;
Be nimble to perform your part,
Lest any rival get the start.
Though rapid Boreas sweep the ground,
Or winter in a narrower round
Contract the day, through storm and snow,
At all adventures you must go.”
When bound beyond equivocation,
Or any mental reservation,
By all the ties of legal traps,
And to my ruin, too, perhaps,
I still must bustle through the crowd,
And press the tardy; when aloud
A foul-mouth’d fellow reimburses
This usage with a peal of curses.
“What madness hath possess’d thy pate
To justle folk at such a rate,
When puffing through the streets you scour
To meet Maecenas at an hour?”
This pleases me, to tell the truth,
And is as honey to my tooth.
Yet when I reach th’ Esquilian Hill
(That deathful scene, and gloomy still),
A thousand busy cares surround me,
Distract my senses, and confound me.
“Roscius entreated you to meet
At court to-morrow before eight—
The secretaries have implor’d
Your presence at their council-board—
Pray, take this patent, and prevail
Upon your friend to fix the seal—”
Sir, I shall try—replies the man,
More urgent, “If you please you can—”
’Tis more than seven years complete,
It hardly wants a month of eight,
Since great Maecenas’ favour grac’d me,
Since first among his friends he plac’d me,
Sometimes to carry in his chair,
A mile or two, to take the air,
And might intrust with idle chat,
Discoursing upon this or that,
As in a free familiar way,
“How, tell me, Horace, goes the day?
Think you the Thracian can engage
The Syrian Hector of the stage?
This morning air is very bad
For folks who are but thinly clad.”
Our conversation chiefly dwells
On these, and such like bagatelles,
As might the veriest prattler hear,
Or be repos’d in leaky ear.
Yet every day, and every hour,
I’m more enslav’d to envy’s power.
“Our son of fortune (with a pox)
Sate with Maecenas in the bo
x,
Just by the stage: you might remark,
They play’d together in the park.”
Should any rumour, without head
Or tail, about the streets be spread,
Whoever meets me gravely nods,
And says, “As you approach the gods,
It is no mystery to you,
What do the Dacians mean to do?”
Indeed I know not—“How you joke,
And love to sneer at simple folk!”
Then vengeance seize this head of mine,
If I have heard or can divine—
“Yet, prithee, where are Caesar’s bands
Allotted their debenture-lands?”
Although I swear I know no more
Of that than what they ask’d before,
They stand amaz’d, and think me grown
The closest mortal ever known.
Thus, in this giddy, busy maze
I lose the sun-shine of my days,
And oft with fervent wish repeat—
“When shall I see my sweet retreat?
Oh! when with books of sages deep,
Sequester’d ease, and gentle sleep,
In sweet oblivion, blissful balm!
The busy cares of life becalm?
Oh! when shall I enrich my veins,
Spite of Pythagoras, with beans?
Or live luxurious in my cottage,
On bacon ham and savoury pottage?
O joyous nights! delicious feasts!
At which the gods might be my guests.”
My friends and I regal’d, my slaves
Enjoy what their rich master leaves.
There every guest may drink and fill,
As much, or little, as he will,
Exempted from the bedlam-rules
Or roaring prodigals and fools:
Whether, in merry mood or whim,
He fills his bumper to the brim,
Or, better pleas’d to let it pass.
Grows mellow with a moderate glass.
Nor this man’s house, nor that’s estate,
Becomes the subject of debate;
Nor whether Lepos, the buffoon,
Can dance, or not, a rigadoon;
But what concerns us more, I trow,
And were a scandal not to know;
Whether our bliss consist in store
Of riches, or in virtue’s lore:
Whether esteem, or private ends,
Should guide us in the choice of friends:
Or what, if rightly understood,
Man’s real bliss, and sovereign good.
While thus we spend the social night,
Still mixing profit with delight,
My neighbour Cervius never fails
To club his part in pithy tales:
Suppose, Arellius, one should praise
Your anxious opulence: he says—
A country mouse, as authors tell,
Of old invited to his cell
A city mouse, and with his best
Would entertain the courtly guest.
Thrifty he was, and full of cares
To make the most of his affairs,
Yet in the midst of his frugality
Would give a loose to hospitality.
In short, he goes, and freely fetches
Whole ears of hoarded oats, and vetches;
Dry grapes and raisins cross his chaps,
And dainty bacon, but in scraps,
If delicacies could invite
My squeamish courtier’s appetite,
Who turn’d his nose at every dish,
And saucy piddled, with a—Pish!
The master of the house, reclin’d
On downy chaff, more temperate din’d
On wheat, and darnel from a manger,
And left the dainties for the stranger.
The cit, displeas’d at his repast,
Address’d our simple host at last:
“My friend, what pleasure can you find,
To live this mountain’s back behind?
Would you prefer the town and men,
To this wild wood, and dreary den,
No longer, moping, loiter here,
But go with me to better cheer.
“Since animals but draw their breath,
And have no being after death;
Since nor the little, nor the great.
Can shun the rigour of their fate;
At least be merry while you may,
The life of mice is but a day:
Come then, my friend, to pleasure give
The little life you have to live.”
Encourag’d thus, the country mouse,
Transported, sallies from his house:
They both set out, in hopes to crawl
At night beneath the city wall;
And now the night, elaps’d eleven,
Possess’d the middle space of heaven,
When in a rich and splendid dome
They stopp’d, and found themselves at home,
Where ivory couches, overspread
With Tyrian carpets, glowing, fed
The dazzled eye. To lure the taste,
The fragments of a costly feast,
Remaining, drest but yesterday,
In baskets, pil’d on baskets, lay.
The courtier on a purple seat
Had plac’d his rustic friend in state,
Then bustled, like a busy host,
Supplying dishes boil’d and roast,
Nor yet omits the courtier’s duty
Of tasting, ere he brings the booty.
The country-mouse, with rapture strange,
Rejoices in his fair exchange,
And lolling, like an easy guest,
Enjoys the cheer, and cracks his jest—
When, on a sudden, opening gates,
Loud-jarring, shook them from their seats.
They ran, affrighted, through the room,
And, apprehensive of their doom,
Now trembled more and more; when, hark!
The mastiff-dogs began to bark;
The dome, to raise the tumult more,
Resounded to the surly roar.
The bumpkin then concludes, Adieu!
This life, perhaps, agrees with you:
My grove, and cave, secure from snares,
Shall comfort me with chaff and tares.
THE EMPEROR’S SLAVE
Aesop’s Fables
Phaedrus
Translated by Laura Gibbs, 2002
Phaedrus is said to have been a former slave and tutor in the imperial household at Rome. In the first century AD he set about translating Aesop’s fables into Latin verse and gathering them into collections. This is one of his own tales. Set in Misenum, in the Bay of Naples, it describes the condition of slavery in the time of Tiberius, who was Roman emperor from AD 14 to 37. Roman slaves aspired to ‘manumission’ or freedom, the literal meaning of manumission being ‘sending forth from the hand’, from the Latin words manus, ‘hand’ and mittere, ‘to send’, which they were granted to the accompaniment of a customary slap from their master.
There is a whole imputation of busybodies at Rome running all over the place excitedly, occupied without any true occupation huffing and puffing at frivolous pursuits, and making much out of nothing. They are an annoyance to each other and utterly despised by everyone else. Yet I would like to try to correct this crowd, if possible, by means of a true story: it is one worth listening to.
Tiberius Caesar was on his way to Naples, and had arrived at his estate in Misenum which had been built by Lucullus1 on a high hill overlooking the Sicilian sea on one side and the Tuscan sea on the other. When Caesar was walking about in the cheerful greenery, one of his household stewards turned up, dressed in a fancy-fringed tunic of Egyptian cotton hanging down from his shoulders. The man began to sprinkle the sizzling hot ground with water from a wooden basin, making a great show of his diligence as Caesar’s attendant, but everyo
ne just laughed at him. The man then ran ahead to the next walkway, using some shortcuts known only to himself, and he started settling the dust in that spot as well. When Caesar recognized the man and realized what he was doing, he said, ‘Hey you!’ The man scampered up to Caesar, excited at the joyful prospect of what seemed a sure reward. Then Caesar’s majestic person made the following joke: ‘You have not accomplished much and your efforts have come to naught; if you want me to give you the slap that makes you a freedman, it will cost you much more than that!’
1 Lucullus was a general in the first century BC who was notorious for his luxurious lifestyle and fishponds.
THE RICHES OF CALIGULA
Life of Caligula
Suetonius
Translated by Robert Graves, 1957
Robert Graves may be best known for I, Claudius, his tremendous novel of 1934, but he was also a keen-eyed translator of classical texts. The following extract comes from his translation of Suetonius’ (c. AD 69–c. 122) biography of Claudius’ nephew and predecessor, Caligula. Emperor from AD 37 until his assassination in AD 41, Caligula was renowned for his excesses, which frequently defy belief. Suetonius’ celebrated Lives of the Caesars, which date to the early second century AD, often seem to blur the line between reality and fiction. It is for each of us to decide how much of what Suetonius wrote is true.
No parallel can be found for Caligula’s far-fetched extravagances. He invented new kinds of baths, and the most unnatural dishes and drinks—bathing in hot and cold perfumes, drinking valuable pearls dissolved in vinegar, and providing his guests with golden bread and golden meat; and would remark that Caesar alone could not afford to be frugal. For several days in succession he scattered largesse from the roof of the Julian Basilica; and built Liburnian galleys, with ten banks of oars, jewelled poops, multi-coloured sails, and with huge baths, colonnades and banqueting halls aboard—not to mention growing vines and apple-trees of different varieties. In these vessels he used to take early-morning cruises along the Campanian coast, reclining on his couch and listening to songs and choruses. Villas and country-houses were run up for him regardless of expense—in fact, Caligula seemed interested only in doing the apparently impossible—which led him to construct moles in deep, rough water far out to sea, drive tunnels through exceptionally hard rocks, raise flat ground to the height of mountains, and reduce mountains to the level of plains; and all at immense speed, because he punished delay with death. But why give details? Suffice it to record that, in less than a year he squandered Tiberius’s entire fortune of 27 million gold pieces, and an enormous amount of other treasure besides.
