HKB
may do for you, This life, but I don't like it; so adieu: Give me my hole, secure from all alarms, I'll prove that tares and vetches still have charms."
SATIRE VII.
JAMDUDUM AUSCULTO.
DAVUS. HORACE.
DAVUS.
I've listened long, and fain a word would say, But, as a slave, I dare not.
H. Davus, eh?
D. Yes, Davus, true and faithful, good enough, But not too good to be of lasting stuff.
H. Well, take December's licence: I'll not balk Our fathers' good intentions: have your talk.
D. Some men there are take pleasure in what's ill Persistently, and do it with a will: The greater part keep wavering to and fro, And now all right, and now all wrong they go. Prisons, we all remember, oft would wear Three rings at once, then show his finger bare; First he'd be senator, then knight, and then In an hour's time a senator again; Flit from a palace to a crib so mean, A decent freedman scarce would there be seen; Now with Athenian wits he'd make his home, Now live with scamps and profligates at Rome; Born in a luckless hour, when every face Vertumnus wears was pulling a grimace. Shark Volanerius tried to disappoint The gout that left his fingers ne'er a joint By hiring some one at so much per day To shake the dicebox while he sat at play; Consistent in his faults, so less a goose Than your poor wretch who shifts from fast to loose.
H. For whom d'ye mean this twaddle, tell me now, You hang-dog?
D. Why, for you.
H. Good varlet, how?
D. You praise the life that people lived of old, When Rome was frugal and the age was gold, And yet, if on a sudden forced to dwell With men like those, you'd strenuously rebel, Either because you don't believe at heart That what you bawl for is the happier part, Or that you can't act out what you avow, But stand with one foot sticking in the slough. At Rome you hanker for your country home; Once in the country, there's no place like Rome. If not asked out to supper, then you bless The stars that let you eat your quiet mess, Vow that engagements are mere clogs, and think You're happy that you've no one's wine to drink. But should Maecenas, somewhat late, invite His favourite bard to come by candle-light, "Bring me the oil this instant! is there none Hears me?" you scream, and in a trice are gone: While Milvius and his brother beasts of prey, With curses best not quoted, walk away. Yet what says Milvius? "Honest truth to tell, I turn my nose up at a kitchen's smell; I'm guided by my stomach; call me weak, Coward, tavern-spunger, still by book you'll speak. But who are you to treat me to your raps? You're just as bad as I, nay worse perhaps, Though you've a cloak of decent words, forsooth, To throw at pleasure o'er the ugly truth." What if at last a greater fool you're found Than I, the slave you bought for twenty pound? Nay, nay, don't scare me with that threatening eye: Unclench your fist and lay your anger by, While I retail the lessons which of late The porter taught me at Crispinus' gate.
You're no adulterer:--nor a thief am I, When I see plate and wisely pass it by: But take away the danger, in a trice Nature unbridled plunges into vice. What? you to be my master, who obey More persons, nay, more things than words can say, Whom not the praetor's wand, though four times waved, Could make less tyrant-ridden, less enslaved? Press home the matter further: how d'ye call The thrall who's servant to another thrall? An understrapper, say; the name will do; Or fellow-servant: such am I to you: For you, whose work I do, do others' work, And move as dolls move when their wires we jerk.