A Tuscan boar, and hold hunting-spears with a naked breast: Who clipping, my beard troublesome to me a youth sounded: 25 Crispinus, his shoulder recalling the Tyrian cloaks, Cau ventilate the summer-gold on his sweating fingers, Nor can he bear the weight of a larger gem ; It is difficult not to write satire. For who can só endure The wicked city-who is so insensible, as to contain himself? When the new litter of lawyer Matho comes 30 Full of himself: and after him the secret accuser of a great friend, And who is soon about to seize from the devoured nobility others for the summer, which they wore according to the season. Ventilo signifies to wave any thing to and fro in the air. Crispinus is described as wearing a summer-ring, and cooling it by, perhaps, taking it off, and by waving it to and fro in the air with his hand-which motion might likewise contribute to the slipping back of the cloak. 31. So insensible.] Ferreus-literally signifies any thing made of iron, and is therefore used here, figuratively, to denote hardness. or insensibility. 32. The new litter.] The lectica was a sort of sedan, with a bed or couch in it, wherein the grandees were carried by their servants: probably something like the palanquins in the East. This was a piece of luxury which the rich indulged in. -Lawyer Matho.] He had been an advocate, but had amassed a large fortune by turning informer. The emperor Domitian gave so much encouragement to such people, that many made their fortunes by secret informations; insomuch that nobody was safe, however innocent; even one informer was afraid of another. See below, I. 35, 6, and notes. 33. Full of himself.] Now grown bulky and fat.-By this expression, the poet may hint at the self-importance of this upstart fellow. The secret accuser of a great friend.] This was probably Marcus Regulus, (mentioned by Pliny in his Epistles,) a most infamous informer, who occasioned, by his secret informations, the deaths of many of the nobility in the time of Domitian. Some think that the great friend here mentioned was some great man, an intimate of Domitian's; for this emperor spared not even his greatest and most intimate friends, on receiving secret informa tious against them. But, by the poet's manner of expression, it should rather seem, that the person meant was some great man, who had been a friend to Regulus, and whom Regulus had basely betrayed. 31. From the devoured nobility.] i. e. Destroyed through, secret accusations, or pillaged by informers for hush-money. Quod superest: quem Massa timet: quem munere palpat 25 40 45 35. Whom Massa fears.] Babius Massa, an eminent informer; but so much more eminent was M. Regulus, above mentioned, in this way, that he was dreaded even by Massa, lest he should inform against him.. 36. Carus sooths.] This was another of the same infamous profession, who bribed Regulus, to avoid some secret accusation. -Thymele.] The wife of Latinus the famous mimic; she was sent privately by her husband and prostituted to Regulus, in order to avoid some information which Latinus dreaded, and trembled under the apprehension of. 37. Can remove you.] i. e. Set you aside, supplant you in the good graces of testators. -Who earn last wills, &c.] Who procure wills to be made in their favour. The poet here satirizes the lewd and indecent practices of certain rich old women at Rome, who kept men for their criminal pleasures, and then, at their death, left them their heirs, in preference to all others. 39. The best way, &c.] By this the poet means to expose and condemn these monstrous indecencies. -Into heaven.] i. e. Into the highest state of affluence. 40. Proculeius-Gillo.] Two noted paramours of these old la, dies. -A small pittance—a large share.] Unciola, literally signifies a little ounce, one part in twelve.-Deunx-a pound lacking an ounce-eleven ounces-eleven parts of any other thing divided into twelve. 42. Of his blood.] i. e. Of the ruin of his health and constitution, by these abominable practices. 43. Pressed a snake.] By treading on it. See VIRG. Æn. ii. I. 379, 80. 44. The altar of Lyons.] The emperor Caligula instituted, at this place, games, wherein orators and rhetoricians were to contend for a prize. Those, whose performances were not approved, were to wipe them out with a spunge, or to lick them out with their 35 What remains: whom Massa fears: whom with a gift By night, and whom the lust of some rich old woman (The best way of the highest success now-a-days) lifts up into heaven. 40 Proculeius has a small pittance, Gillo has a large share: procures : Well let him receive the reward of his blood, and become as With flocks of attendants? and here condemned by a frivolous tongue or else to be punished with ferules, or thrown into the sea. 45. What shall I say?] Q. D.-How shall I find words to express the indignation which I feel? -My dry liver burns.] The ancients considered the liver as the seat of the irascible and concupiscible affections. So HoR. lib. I. od. xiii. 1. 4. says: Difficili bile tumet jecur-to express his resentment and jealousy, at hearing his mistress commend a rival. Again, lib. IV. od. i. l. 12. Si torrere jecur quæris idoneum-by - which he means-kindling the passion of love within the breast. Our poet here means to express the workings of anger and resentment within him, at seeing so many examples of vice and folly around him, and, particularly, in those instances which he is now going to mention. 46. A spoiler of his pupil, &c.] The tutelage of young men, who had lost their parents, was committed to guardians, who were to take care of their estates and education. Here one is represented as spoliator-a spoiler-i. e. a plunderer or pillager of his ward as to his affairs, and then making money of his person, by hiring him out for the vilest purposes. Hence, he says-Prostantis pupilli. Presses on the people.] Grown rich by the spoils of his ward, he is supposed to be carried, in a litter, along the streets, with such a crowd of attendants, as to incommode other passengers. 47-8. By a frivolous judgment.] Inani judicio - because, though inflicted on Marius, it was of no service to the injured province; for, instead of restoring to it the treasures of which it had been plundered, part of these, to a vast amount, were put into the public treasury. As for Marius himself, he lived in as much festivity as if nothing had happened, as the next two verses inform us. Exul ab octavâ Marius bibit, et fruitur Dis 50 55 49. The exile Marius.] Marius Priscus, proconsul of Africa, who, for pillaging the province of vast sums of money, was condemned to be banished. From the eighth hour.] Began his carousals from two o'clock in the afternoon, which was reckoned an instance of dissoluteness and luxury, it being an hour sooner than it was customary to sit down to meals. See note on sat. xi. 1. 204, and on Persius, sat. iii. 1. 4. 49-50, He enjoys the angry gods.] Though Marius had incurred the anger of the gods by his crimes, yet, regardless of this, he enjoyed himself in a state of the highest jollity and festivity. Vanquishing province, &c.] Victrix-was used as a forensic term, to denote one who had got the better in a law-suit. The province of Africa had sued Marius, and had carried the cause against him, but had still reason to deplore her losses: for though Marius was sentenced to pay an immense fine, which came out of what he had pillaged, yet this was put into the public treasury, and no part of it given to the Africans; and, besides this, Marius had reserved sufficient to maintain himself in a luxurious manner. See above, note on I. 47, 8. 51. Worthy the Venusinian lamp?] i. e. The pen of Horace himself? This charming writer was born at Venusium, a city of ApuWhen the poets wrote by night they made use of a lamp. lia. 52. Shall I not agitate, &c.] Agitem-implies pursuing, as hunters do wild beasts-hunting-chasing. So inveighing against by satire, driving such vices as he mentions out of their lurking places, and hunting them down, as it were, in order to destroy them. But why rather Heracleans.] Juvenal here anticipates the supposed objections of some, who might, perhaps, advise him to employ his talents on some fabulous, and more poetical subjectssuch as the labours of Hercules, &c.-" Why should I prefer these (as if he had said) when so many subjects in real life occur, to "exercise my pen in a more useful way?" 53. Or Diomedeans.] i. e. Verses on the exploits of Diomed, a king of Thrace, who fed his horses with man's flesh. Hercules slew him, and threw him to be devoured by his own horses. The lowing of the labyrinth.] The story of the Minotaur, the monster kept in the labyrinth of Crete, who was half a bull, and slain by Theseus. See AINSW. Minotaurus, 50 The exile Marius drinks from the eighth hour, and enjoys the 54. The sea stricken by a boy.] The story of Icarus, who flying too near the sun, melted the wax by which his wings were fastened together, and fell into the sea; from him called Icarian. See HOR. lib. IV. od. ii. 1. 2-4. The flying artificer.] Dædalus-who invented and made wings for himself and his son Icarus, with which they fled from Crete. See AINSW. Dædalus. 55. The bawd.] The husband-who turns bawd by prostituting his wife for gain, and thus receives the goods of the adulterer, as the price of her chastity. 56. There is no right to the wife.] Domitian made a law to forbid the use of litters (see note, 1. 32.) to adulterous wives, and to deprive them of taking legacies or inheritances by will. This was evaded, by making their husbands panders to their lewdness, and so causing the legacies to be given to them. Taught to look upon the ceiling.] As inobservant of his wife's infamy then transacting before him-this he was well skilled in. See HOR. lib. III. od. vi. l. 25-32. 57. At a cup, &c.] Another device was to set a large cup on the table, which the husband was to be supposed to have emptied of the liquor which it had contained, and to be nodding over it, as if in a drunken sleep. To snore with a vigilant nose.] Snoring is an evidence that a man is fast asleep, therefore, the husband knew well how to exhibit this proof, by snoring aloud, which is a peculiar symptom of a drunken sleep. The poet uses the epithet vigilanti, here, very humourously, to denote, that though the man seemed to be fast asleep by his snoring, yet his nose seemed to be awake by the noise it made. So PLAUT. in Milite. An dormit Sceledrus intus? Non naso quidem, Nam eo magno magnum clamat. Is Sceledrus asleep within? Why, truly, not with his nose; for with that large instrument he makes noise enough. Our Farquhar, in the description which he makes Mrs. Sullen give of her drunken husband, represents her as mentioning a like particular: "My whole night's comfort is the tunable serenade of that "wakeful nightingale-his nose." |