Satire VII
All our hope and inducement to study329 rests on Cæsar330 alone. For he alone casts a favoring eye331 on the Muses, who in our days are in a forlorn state. When poets, now become famous and men of renown, would fain try and hire a little bath at Gabii, or a public oven at Rome. While others, again, would esteem it neither shocking nor degrading to turn public criers: since Clio herself, if starving, would quit the vales of Aganippe, and emigrate to courts.332 For if not a single farthing is offered you in the Pierian shades, be content with the name and calling of Machæra:333 and sooner sell what the auction duly set334 sells to those that stand around; wine-flagons, trivets, book-cases, chests; the “Alcyone” of Paccius, or the “Thebes” and “Tereus” of Faustus. This is preferable to asserting before the judge that you are a witness of what you never did see.[335] Even though Asiatic,336 and Cappadocian, and Bithynian knights stoop to this: fellows whom Gallo-Græcia transports hither with chalked feet.337 Hereafter, however, no one will be compelled to submit to an employment derogatory to his studies, who unites loftiness of expression to tuneful numbers, and has chewed the bay.338 Set vigorously to work then, young men! The kindness339 of the emperor is looking all around, and stimulates your exertions, while he is seeking worthy objects of his patronage. If you think that from any other quarter you may look for encouragement in your pursuits, and with that view fill the parchment of your yellow340 tablet; call with all speed for a fagot, and make a present of all your compositions, Telesinus, to Venus’ husband:341 or lock them up, and let the bookworm342 bore them through as they lie stowed away. Destroy your pens, poor wretch! Blot out your battles that have lost you your nights’ rest, you that write sublime poetry in your narrow garret,343 that you may come forth worthy of an ivy-crown and meagre image. You have nothing farther to hope for. The stingy patron of our days has learned only to admire and praise the eloquent as boys do Juno’s peacock.344 But your prime of life is ebbing away; that is able to bear the fatigue of the sea, the helmet, or the spade. Then weariness creeps over the spirits: and an old age, that is indeed learned but in rags,345 curses itself and the Muses that it courted. Now learn the devices of the great man you pay court to, to avoid laying out any money upon you: quitting the temple of the Muses, and Apollo, he composes verses himself, and only yields the palm to Homer himself on the score of his priority by a thousand years. But if inflamed by the charms of fame you recite your poetry, he kindly lends you a dirty mansion, and places at your service one that has been long barred up, whose front gate emulates those of a city in a state of siege. He knows how to place his freedmen in seats at the farther end of the audience, and how to arrange his clients who are to cheer you lustily.346 None of these great lords will give you as much as would pay for the benches,347 or the seats that rise one above another on the platform you have to hire; or your orchestra of chairs, which must be returned when your recitation is over. Yet still we ply our tasks, and draw furrows in the profitless dust, and keep turning up the sea-shore with sterile plow. For even if you try to abandon the pursuit, the long habit348 of indulging in this vain-glorious trifling,349 holds you fast in its fetters. An inveterate itch of writing, now incurable, clings to many, and grows old in their distempered body. But the poet that is above his fellows, whose vein is not that of the common herd; that is wont to spin out no stale or vulgar subject, and stamps no hackneyed verse from a die that all may use; such an one as I can not embody in words, and can only feel in my soul, is the offspring of a mind free from solicitude, exempt from all that can embitter life, that courts the quiet of the woods, and loves to drink the fountains of the Aonides. Nor can it be that poverty should sing in the Pierian cave, or handle the thyrsus, if forced to sobriety, and lacking that vile pelf the body needs both day and night. Well plied with food and wine is Horace when he shouts out his Evoe!350 What scope is there for fancy, save when our breasts are harassed by no thoughts but verse alone; and are hurried along351 under the influence of the lords of Cirrha and Nysa, admitting of no divided352 solicitude. It is the privilege of an exalted soul, and not of one bewildered how to get enough to buy a blanket, to gaze on chariots and horses and the forms of divinities, and in what dread shapes Erinnys353 appalls the Rutulian. For had Virgil lacked a slave and comfortable lodging, all the serpents would have vanished from Alecto’s hair: his trumpet, starved to silence, would have blazed no note of terror. Is it fair to expect that Rubrenus Lappa should not fall short of the buskin of the ancients, while his Atreus354 forces him to pawn his very sauceboats and his cloak?
Poor Numitor is so unfortunate as to have nothing he can afford to send his protégé! Yet he can find something to give Quintilla—he managed to pay for a tame lion, that must have pounds of flesh to feed him. No doubt the huge beast is kept at far less expense; and a poet’s stomach is far more capacious! Let Lucan recline at his ease in his gardens among his marble statues, satisfied with fame alone. But to poor Serranus, and starving Saleius, of what avail will glory be, however great, if it be glory only? All flock in crowds to hear his sweet voice, and the tuneful strains of the Thebais, when Statius355 has gladdened the city, and fixed the day for reciting it. So great is the charm with which he captivates their souls; such the eager delight with which he is listened to by the multitude. But when the very benches are broken down by the ecstasies with which his verses are applauded, he may starve, unless he sells356 his unpublished “Agave”357 to Paris. It is he that bestows on many the honors due to military service, and encircles the fingers of poets with the ring that marks their six months’ command.358 What nobles will not give, a player will! And dost thou, then, still pay court to the Camerini and Bareæ, and the spacious halls of nobles? It is “Pelopea” that makes prefects, “Philomela” tribunes. Yet envy not the bard whom the stage maintains. Who is your Mæcenas now, or Proculeius, or Fabius? Who will act Cotta’s part again, or be a second Lentulus? In those days talent had its meet reward: then it was profitable to many to become pale, and abstain from wine359 the whole of December.
Your toil, forsooth, ye writers of histories! is more profitable, it requires more time and more oil. For regardless of all limit, it rises to the thousandth page; and grows in bulk, expensive from the mass of paper used. This the vast press of matter requires, and the laws of composition. Yet what is the crop that springs from it? what the profit from the soil upturned? Who will give an historian as much as he would a notary?360 “But they are an idle race, that delight in sofas and the cool shade.” Well, tell me then, what do the services rendered their fellow-citizens, and their briefs they carry about with them in a big bundle, bring in to the lawyers? Even of themselves they talk grandly enough, but especially when their creditor is one of their hearers; or if one still more pressing nudges their side, that comes with his great account-book to sue for a doubtful debt. Then the hollow bellows of their lungs breathe forth amazing lies; they foam at the mouth till their breast is covered. But if you like to calculate the actual harvest they reap, set in one scale the estate of a hundred lawyers, and you may balance it on the other side with the single fortune of Lacerna, the charioteer of the Red.361
The chiefs have taken their seats!362 You, like Ajax, rise with pallid cheek, and plead in behalf of liberty that has been called in question, before a neat-herd363 for a juryman! Burst your strained lungs, poor wretch! that, when exhausted, the green palm-branches364 may be affixed to crown your staircase with honor! Yet what is the reward of your eloquence? A rusty ham, or a dish of sprats; or some shriveled onions, the monthly provender of the Africans;365 or wine brought down the Tiber. Five bottles366 for pleading four times! If you have been lucky enough to get a single gold piece,367 even from that you must deduct the stipulated shares of the attorneys.368 Æmilius will get as much as the law allows;369 although we pleaded better than he. For he has in his court-yard a chariot of bronze with four tall horses370 yoked to it; and he himself, seated on his fierce charger, brandishes aloft his bending spear, and meditates battles with his one eye closed. So it is that Pedo gets involved, Matho fails. This is the end of Tongillus, who usually bathes with a huge rhinoceros’ horn of oil, and annoys the baths with his draggled train; and weighs heavily in his ponderous sedan on his sturdy Median slaves, as he presses through the forum to bid for371 slaves, and plate, and myrrhine vases, and villas. For it is his foreign372 purple with its Tyrian tissue that gets him credit. And yet this answers their purpose. It is the purple robe that gets the lawyer custom—his violet cloaks that attract clients. It suits their interest to live with all the bustle and outward show of an income greater then they really have. But prodigal Rome observes no bounds to her extravagance. If the old orators were to come to life again, no one now would give even Cicero himself two hundred sesterces, unless a huge ring sparkled on his finger. This is the first point he that goes to law looks to—whether you have eight slaves, ten attendants, a sedan to follow you, and friends in toga to go before. Paulus, consequently, used to plead in a sardonyx, hired for the occasion: and hence it was that Cossus’ fees were higher than those of Basilus. Eloquence is a rare quality in a threadbare coat!
When is Basilus allowed to produce in court a weeping mother? Who could endure Basilus, however well he were to plead? Let Gaul become your home, or better still that foster-nurse of pleaders, Africa, if you are determined to let your tongue for hire.
Do you teach declamation? Oh what a heart of steel must Vectius have, when his numerous class kills cruel tyrants! For all that the boy has just conned over at his seat, he will then stand up and spout—the same stale theme in the same sing-song. It is the reproduction of the cabbage373 that wears out the master’s life. What is the plea to be urged: what the character of the cause; where the main point of the case hinges; what shafts may issue from the opposing party;—this all are anxious to know; but not one is anxious to pay! “Pay do you ask for? why, what do I know?” The blame, forsooth, is laid at the teacher’s door, because there is not a spark of energy in the breast of this scion of Arcadia,374 who dins his awful Hannibal into my ears regularly every sixth day. Whatever the theme be that is to be the subject of his deliberation; whether he shall march at once from Cannæ on Rome; or whether, rendered circumspect after the storms and thunderbolts, he shall lead his cohorts, drenched with the tempest, by a circuitous route. Bargain375 for any sum you please, and I will at once place it in your hands, on condition that his father should hear him his lesson as often as I have to do it! But six or more sophists are all giving tongue at once; and, debating in good earnest, have abandoned all fictitious declamations about the ravisher. No more is heard of the poison infused, or the vile ungrateful husband,376 or the drugs that can restore the aged blind to youth. He therefore that quits the shadowy conflicts of rhetoric for the arena of real debate, will superannuate himself, if my advice has any weight with him, and enter on a different path of life; that he may not lose even the paltry sum that will purchase the miserable ticket377 for corn. Since this is the most splendid reward you can expect. Just inquire what Chrysogonus receives, or Pollio, for teaching the sons of these fine gentlemen, and going into all the details378 of Theodorus’ treatise.
The baths will cost six hundred sestertia, and the colonnade still more, in which the great man rides whenever it rains. Is he to wait, forsooth, for fair weather? or bespatter his horses with fresh mud? Nay, far better here! for here the mule’s hoof shines unsullied.379 On the other side must rise a spacious dining-room, supported on stately columns of Numidian marble, and catch the cool380 sun. However much the house may have cost, he will have besides an artiste who can arrange his table scientifically; another, who can season made-dishes. Yet amid all this lavish expenditure, two poor sestertia will be deemed an ample remuneration for Quintilian. Nothing will cost a father less than his son’s education.
“Then where did Quintilian get the money to pay for so many estates?” Pass by the instances of good fortune that are but rare indeed. It is good luck that makes a man handsome and active; good luck that makes him wise, and noble, and well-bred, and attaches the crescent381 of the senator to his black shoe. Good luck too that makes him the best of orators and debaters, and, though he has a vile cold, sing well! For it makes all the difference what planets welcome you when you first begin to utter your infant cry, and are still red from your mother. If fortune so wills it, you will become consul instead of rhetorician; or, if she will, instead of rhetorician, consul! What was Ventidius382 or Tullius aught else than a lucky planet, and the strange potency of hidden fate? Fate, that gives kingdoms to slaves, and triumphs to captives. Yes! Quintilian was indeed lucky, but he is a greater rarity even than a white crow. But many a man has repented of this fruitless and barren employment, as the sad end of Thrasymachus383 proves, and that of Secundus Carrinas.384 And you, too, Athens, were witness to the poverty of him on whom you had the heart to bestow nothing save the hemlock that chilled385 his life-blood!
Light be the earth, ye gods!386 and void of weight, that presses on our grandsires’ shades, and round their urn bloom fragrant crocus and eternal spring, who maintained that a tutor should hold the place and honor of a revered parent. Achilles sang on his paternal hills, in terror of the lash, though now grown up; and yet in whom even then would not the tail of his master, the harper, provoke a smile? But now Rufus387 and others are beaten each by their own pupils; Rufus! who so often called Cicero “the Allobrogian!” Who casts into Enceladus’388 lap, or that of the learned Palæmon,389 as much as their grammarian labors have merited! And yet even from the wretched sum, however small (and it is smaller than the rhetorician’s pay), Acænonoëtus, his pupil’s pedagogue, first takes his slice; and then the steward who pays you deducts his fragment. Dispute it not, Palæmon! and suffer some abatement to be made, just as the peddler does that deals in winter rugs and snow-white sheetings.390 Only let not all be lost,391 for which you have sat from the midnight hour, when no smith would sit, nor even he that teaches how to draw out wool with the oblique iron. Lose not your whole reward for having smelled as many lamps as there were boys standing round you; while Horace was altogether discolored, and the foul smut clave to the well-thumbed Maro. Yet rare too is the pay that does not require enforcing by the Tribune’s court.392
But do you, parents, impose severe exactions on him that is to teach your boys; that he be perfect in the rules of grammar for each word—read all histories393—know all authors as well as his own finger-ends; that if questioned at hazard, while on his way to the Thermæ or the baths of Phœbus, he should be able to tell the name of Anchises’ nurse,394 and the name and native land of the step-mother of Anchemolus—tell off-hand how many years Acestes lived—how many flagons of wine the Sicilian king gave to the Phrygians. Require of him that he mould their youthful morals as one models a face in wax. Require of him that he be the reverend father of the company, and check every approach to immorality.
It is no light task to keep watch over so many boyish hands, so many little twinkling eyes. “This,” says the father, “be the object of your care!”—and when the year comes round again, Receive for your pay as much gold395 as the people demand for the victorious Charioteer!
Footnotes
329 Ratio studiorum. Cf. Tac., Ann., xi., 7, “Sublatis studiorum pretiis etiam studia peritura.”
330 Cæsare. Which Cæsar is intended is a matter of discussion among the commentators; whether Nero, Titus, Trajan, Hadrian, Nerva, or Domitian. Probably the last is meant: as in the beginning of his reign he affected the character of a patron of literature.
331 Respexit. “To view with favor or pity,” as a deity: so Virg., Ecl., i., 28, “Libertas, quæ sera tamen respexit inertem.”
332 Atria. Either “the antechambers of rich patrons,” or to “the Licinian and other courts,” near the forum, where auctions were held; the atria auctionaria of Cicero: cf. pro Quint., 12, 25, i. in Rull., 7.
333 Machæra, a famous Præco of his time. Lubin.
334 Commissa. Either from the goods being “intrusted” to the auctioneer by the owner or the magistrate; or from the parties that bid being as it were “pitted,” commissi, against each other, like gladiators.
335 Vidi. So xvi., 29, “Audeat ille Nescio quis, pugnos qui vidit, dicere vidi.”
336 Asiani. “Jam equites, olim servi Asiatici.” Lub. The next line is in all probability interpolated, being only a gloss. Heinrich.
337 Nudo talo. Vid. ad i., 111. Or, it may be “barefooted” simply. Galatia in Asia Minor, so called from the colony of Gauls who settled there, A.D. 278, at the invitation of Nicomedes. Liv., xxxviii., 16. Cf. Paus., Phoc., xxiii. Cramer’s Asia Minor, ii., 79. Clinton, Fast. Hell. in an.
“Sent from Bithynia’s realms with shoeless feet.” Badham.
338 Laurumque momordit. So δαφνηφάγοι. The chewing of the bay, as being sacred to Apollo, was supposed to convey divine inspiration. Grang. Cf. Lycoph., 6.
339 Indulgentia. “Lo! the imperial eye
Looks round attentive on each rising bard,
For worth to praise, for genius to reward.” Gifford.
340 Croceæ. Because parchment is always yellow on the side where the hair grew. Others think the parchment itself was dyed yellow. Cf. Pers., iii., 10.
341 Veneris marito, a burlesque phrase for “the fire.”
342 Tinea. Cf. Hor., Ep., I., xx., 12, “Tineas pasces taciturnus inertes.”
343 Cellâ. So Ben Jonson:
“I that spend half my nights and half my days
Here in a cell, to get a dark pale face,
To come forth worth the ivy or the bays,
And in this age can hope no other grace.”
344 Junonis avem.
“To praise and only praise the high-wrought strain.
As boys the bird of Juno’s glittering train.” Gifford.
345 Facunda et unda.
“Till gray-haired, helpless, humbled genius see
Its fault too late, and curse Terpsichore.” Badham.
346 Comitum voces. Cf. xiii., 32, “Vocalis sportula.”
347 Anabathra, the seats rising one above another in the form of a theatre. Subsellia, those in the body of the room. Orchestra, the hired chairs in front of all, for his knightly guests. Holyday quaintly says no patron cared
“What the orchestra cost raised for chief friends,
And chairs recarried when the reading ends.”
348 Laqueo.
“And would we quit at length th’ ambitious ill,
The noose of habit implicates us still.” Badham.
349 Vatem egregium. Cf. Hor., i., Sat. iv., 43, “Ingenium cui sit, cui mens divinior, atque os magna sonaturum, des nominis hujus honorem.” How immeasurably finer of the two is Juvenal’s description of a poet!
“But he, the bard of every age and clime,
Of genius fruitful, and of soul sublime,
Who from the glowing mint of fancy pours
No spurious metal, fused from common ores,
But gold to matchless purity refined,
And stamp’d with all the godhead in his mind:
He whom I feel, but want the power to paint,
Must boast a soul impatient of restraint,
And free from every care—a soul that loves
The Muses’ haunts, clear springs and shady groves.” Gifford.
Of this passage, Hodgson says, Gifford has drawn the prize in the lottery of translation, all others must be blanks after it.
350 Evoe! Vid. Hor., ii., Od. xix., 5. Cf. Milman’s Life.
351 Feruntur.
“Be hurried with resistless force along
By the two kindred powers of wine and song.” Gifford.
352 Duas.
“Nor wrestlings with the world will Genius own,
Destined to strive with song, and song alone.” Badham.
353 Erinnys. The splendid passage in the seventh Æneid, 445, seq., “Talibus Alecto dictis exarsit in iras. At juveni oranti subitus tremor occupat artus: Deriguere oculi: tot Erinnys sibilat hydris, Tantaque se facies aperit.” Cf. Æn., ii., 602, seq.; xii., 326.
354 Atreus. Some take Atreus to be the person who lends the money. Grangæus interprets it, “Qui dum componit tragædiam de Atreo, ut vitam sustentare possit pignori opponit alveolos.”
“Who writes his Atreus, as his friends allege,
With half his household goods and cloak in pledge.” Badham.
355 Statius employed twelve years upon his Thebais. (Cf. xii., 811.) It was not completed till after the Dacian war, but was written before the 1st book of the Silvæ, the date of the 4th book of which is known to be A.D. 95. We may therefore assume the date of the Thebais to be about 94.
356 Vendat. Holyday quotes from Brodæus the price given to Terence for his Eunuchus, viz., eight sestertia, about sixty-five pounds.
357 Agave. Probably a pantomimic ballet on a tragic subject; for, as Heinrich says, what had Paris, the mime, to do with a new tragedy? These and the following lines are said to have been the cause of Juvenal’s banishment.
358 Semestri is said to refer to an honorary military commission, conferred on favorites, even though not in the army, and called “Semestris tribunatus militum.” It lasted for six months only, but conferred the privilege of wearing the equestrian ring, with perhaps others. It is alluded to in Pliny, iv., Epist. 4, who begs of Sossius the consul in behalf of a friend, “Hunc rogo semestri tribunatu splendidiorem facias.” There are divers other interpretations, but this appears the simplest and most probable. To confound it with the “æstivum aurum” (i., 28), is a palpable absurdity.
359 Vinum nescire. Cf. Hor., ii., Sat. iii., 5, “At ipsis Saturnalibus huc fugisti Sobrius.” Stat., Sylv., I., vi., 4, “Saturnus mihi compede exsolutâ, et multo gravidus mero December.”
“Then all December’s revelries refuse,
And give the festive moments to the Muse.” Gifford.
360 Acta legenti. Either the “notary public,” or “keeper of the public records,” or the historian’s reader, who collected facts for the author, or “any one who read aloud the history itself.”
361 Russati. Cf. ad vi., 589. So the charioteer of “the white” was called Albatus. Lacerna, or Lacerta, was a charioteer in the reign of Domitian, some say of Domitian himself. One commentator takes Lacerna to be “any soldier wearing a red cloak;” as Paludatus is “one wearing the general’s cloak.” Cf. Mart., xiii., Ep. 78, “Prasinus Porphyrion.”
362 Consedere. Cf. Ov., Met., xiii., 1, “Consedere duces; et, vulgi stante corona, Surgit ad hos clypei dominus septemplicis Ajax.” Cf. ad xi., 30.
363 Bubulco.” Before some clod-pate judge thy vitals strain.” Badham.
364 Palmæ. Cf. ad ix., 85.
“So shall the verdant palm be duly tied
To the dark staircase where such powers reside.” Badham.
365 Afrorum Epimenia. Most probably alluding to the “monthly rations of onions” allowed to African slaves, who were accustomed to plenty of them in their own country (cf. Herod., ii., 125. Numb., xi., 5), where they grew in great abundance. Martial, ix., Ep. xlvi., 11, enumerates “bulbi” among the presents sent at the Saturnalia to the causidicus Sabellus.
366 Lagenæ. Mart., u. s. “Five jars of meagre down-the-Tiber wine.” Badham.
367 Aureus. About sixteen shillings English at this time.
368 Pragmaticorum. Cicero describes their occupation, de Orat., i., 45, “Ut apud Græcos infimi homines, mercedula adducti, ministros se præbent judiciis oratoribus ii qui apud illos πραγματικοὶ vocantur.” Cf. c. 59. Quintil., iii., 6; xii., 3. Mart., xii., Ep. 72. They appear afterward to have been introduced at Rome, and are sometimes called “Tabelliones.”
369 Licet. The Lex Cincia de Muneribus, as amended by Augustus, forbade the receipt of any fees. A law of Nero fixed the fee at 100 aurei at most. Vid. Tac., Ann., xi., 5 (Ruperti’s note). Suet., Ner., 17. Plin., v., Ep. iv., 21.
370 Quadrijuges. It appears to have been an extraordinary fancy with lawyers of this age to be represented in this manner; cf. Mart., ix., Ep. lxix., 5, seq.; but the details of the picture have puzzled the commentators. “Curvatum” is supposed to mean that “the spear actually seems quivering in his hand,” or that it is “bent with age,” or that the arm is “bent back,” as if in the act of throwing. Cf. Xen., Anab., V., ii., 12, διηγκυλωμένους. “Luscâ” may imply that the statue imitated to the life the personal defect of Æmilius; or simply the absence of the pupil (ὀμμάτων ἀχηνία), inseparable from statuary; or that Æmilius is represented as closing one eye to take better aim.
“Lifts his poised javelin o’er the crowd below,
And from his blinking statue threats the blow.” Hodgson.
371 Cf. Mart., ix., Ep. 60.
372 Stlataria. Stlata is said to be an old form of lata, as stlis for lis, stlocus for locus. Therefore Stlataria is the same as the “Latus Clavus,” according to some commentators; or a “broad-beamed” merchant ship; and therefore means simply “imported.” Others say it is a “piratical ship,” such as the Illyrians used, and the word is then taken to imply “deceitful.” Facciolati explains, it by “peregrina et pretiosa: longè navi advecta.”
373 Crambe. The old Schol. quotes a proverb—δὶς κράμβε θάνατος, Grangæus another, which forcibly expresses a schoolmaster’s drudgery—οἰ αὐτοὶ περὶ τῶν αὐτῶν τοῖς αὐτοῖς τὰ ἀυτά.
“Till, like hash’d cabbage, served for each repast,
The repetition kills the wretch at last.” Gifford.
374 Arcadia was celebrated for its breed of asses. Cf. Pers., Sat. iii., 9, “Arcadiæ pecuaria rudere credas.” Auson., Epigr. 76, “Asinos quoque rudere dicas, cum vis Arcadium fingere, Marce, pecus.”
375 Stipulare.
“Get me his father but to hear his task
For one short week, I’ll give you all you ask.” Bad.
376 Maritus.
“The faithless husband and abandon’d wife,
And Æson coddled to new light and life.” Gifford.
377 Tessera. The poorer Romans received every month tickets, which appear to have been transferable, entitling them to a certain quantity of corn from the public granaries. These tesseræ or symbola were made, Lubinus says, of wood or lead, and distributed by the “Frumentorum Curatores.” In the latter days, bread thus distributed was called “Panis Gradilis,” quia gradibus distribuebatur. The Congiarium consisted of wine, or oil only. The Donativum was only given to soldiers. Several of these tickets of wood and lead are preserved in the museum at Portici.
378 Scindens. “Præcepta ejus artis minutatim dividens.” Lubin. On the principle, perhaps, that “Qui benè dividit benè docet.” Britannicus, whom Heinrich follows, explains it by “deridet.” Theodorus of Gadara was a professor of rhetoric in the reigns of Augustus and Tiberius. Vid. Suet., Tib., 57. It was he who so well described the character of the latter; calling him πήλον αἵματι πεφύρμενον. Chrysogonus, in vi., 74, is a singer, and Pollio, vi., 387, a musician (cf. Mart., iv., Ep. lxi., 9); but, as Lubinus says, the persons mentioned here are professors of rhetoric, and probably therefore not the same.
379 Mundæ.
“He splash his fav’rite mule in filthy roads!
With ample space at his command, to tire
The well-groom’d beast, with hoof unstain’d by mire.” Badham.
380 Algentem. They had dining-rooms facing different quarters, according to the season of the year, with a southern aspect for the winter, and an eastern for the summer. Cf. Plin., ii., Ep. 17. Rapiat rather seems to imply the former case. So Badham—
“Courts the brief radiance of the winter’s noon.”
“Algentem” favors the other view—
“Front the cool east, when now the averted sun
Through the mid ardors of his course has run.” Hodgson.
381 Lunam. Senators wore black shoes of tanned leather: they were a kind of short boot reaching to the middle of the leg (hence, “Nigris medium impediit crus pellibus,” Hor., I., Sat. vi., 27), with a crescent or the letter C in front, because the original number of senators was a hundred.—Aluta, “steeped in alum,” to soften the skin.
382 Ventidius Bassus, son of a slave; first a carman, then a muleteer; afterward made in one year prætor and consul. Being appointed to command against the Parthians, he was allowed a triumph; having been himself, in his youth, led as a captive in the triumphal procession of Pompey’s father. Cf. Val. Max., vi., 10.
383 Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, the pupil of Plato and Isocrates, wrote a treatise on Rhetoric, and set up as a teacher of it at Athens; but, meeting with no encouragement, shut up his school and hanged himself.
384 Secundus Carrinas is said to have been driven by poverty from Athens to Rome; and was banished by Caligula for a declamation against tyrants. He is mentioned, Tac., Ann., xv., 45.
385 Gelidas. “Cicutæ refrigeratoria vis: quos enecat incipiunt algere ab extremitatibus corporis.” Plin., xxv., 13. Plat., Phædo, fin. Pers., iv., 1.
386 Dii Majorum, etc.
“Shades of our sires! O sacred be your rest,
And lightly lie the turf upon your breast;
Flowers round your urns breathe sweets beyond compare,
And spring eternal bloom and flourish there!
Your honor’d tutors, now a slighted race,
And gave them all a parent’s power and place!” Gifford.
387 Rufus, according to the old Schol., was a native of Gaul. Grangæus calls him Q. Curtius Rufus, and says nothing more is known of him than that he was an eminent rhetorician. He is here represented as charging Cicero with barbarisms or provincialisms, such as a Savoyard would use.
388 Enceladus. Nothing is known of him.
389 Palæmon. Vid. ad vi., 451.
390 Cadurci. Cf. vi., 537.
391 Non pereat.
“Yes, suffer this! while something’s left to pay
Your rising, hours before the dawn of day;
When e’en the lab’ring poor their slumbers take,
And not a weaver, not a smith’s awake.” Gifford.
392 Cognitione Tribuni. Not a tribune of the people, but one of the Tribuni Ærarii, to whom the cognizance of such complaints belonged.
393 Historias. Tiberius was exceedingly fond of propounding to grammarians, a class of men whom he particularly affected (quod genus hominum præcipuè appetebat), questions of this nature, to sound their “notitia historiæ usque ad ineptias atque derisum.” Cf. Suet., Tib., 70, 57.
394 Nutricem. The names of these two persons are said to have been Casperia and Tisiphone.
395 Aurum. i. e., 5 aurei, the highest reward allowed to be given. The aureus, which varied in value, was at this time worth 25 denarii; a little more than 16 shillings English. Cf. Mart., x., Ep. lxxiv., 5.