The Satyricon — Complete
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Title: The Satyricon — Complete
Author: Petronius Arbiter
Translator: W. C. Firebaugh
Release date: June 1, 2004 [eBook #5225]
Most recently updated: July 28, 2025
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5225
Credits: Produced by David Widger
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THE SATYRICON OF
PETRONIUS ARBITER
Complete and unexpurgated translation by W. C. Firebaugh,
in which are incorporated the forgeries of Nodot and Marchena,
and the readings introduced into the text by De Salas.
Among the difficulties which beset the path of the conscientious
translator, a sense of his own unworthiness must ever take precedence;
but another, scarcely less disconcerting, is the likelihood of
misunderstanding some allusion which was perfectly familiar to the author
and his public, but which, by reason of its purely local significance,
is obscure and subject to the misinterpretation and emendation of a later
generation.
A translation worthy of the name is as much the product of a literary
epoch as it is of the brain and labor of a scholar; and Melmouth’s
version of the letters of Pliny the Younger, made, as it was, at a
period when the art of English letter writing had attained its highest
excellence, may well be the despair of our twentieth century apostles of
specialization. Who, today, could imbue a translation of the Golden Ass
with the exquisite flavor of William Adlington’s unscholarly version of
that masterpiece? Who could rival Arthur Golding’s rendering of the
Metamorphoses of Ovid, or Francis Hicke’s masterly rendering of Lucian’s
True History? But eternal life means endless change and in nothing is
this truth more strikingly manifest than in the growth and decadence of
living languages and in the translation of dead tongues into the ever
changing tissue of the living. Were it not for this, no translation
worthy of the name would ever stand in need of revision, except in
instances where the discovery and collation of fresh manuscripts had
improved the text. In the case of an author whose characters speak in
the argot proper to their surroundings, the necessity for revision is
even more imperative; the change in the cultured speech of a language is
a process that requires years to become pronounced, the evolution of
slang is rapid and its usage ephemeral. For example Stephen Gaselee, in
his bibliography of Petronius, calls attention to Harry Thurston Peck’s
rendering of “bell um pomum” by “he’s a daisy,” and remarks,
appropriately enough, “that this was well enough for 1898; but we would
now be more inclined to render it ‘he’s a peach.’” Again, Peck renders
“illud erat vivere” by “that was life,” but, in the words of our lyric
American jazz, we would be more inclined to render it “that was the
life.” “But,” as Professor Gaselee has said, “no rendering of this part
of the Satyricon can be final, it must always be in the slang of the
hour.”
“Some,” writes the immortal translator of Rabelais, in his preface,
“have deservedly gained esteem by translating; yet not many condescend
to translate but such as cannot invent; though to do the first well,
requires often as much genius as to do the latter. I wish, reader,
thou mayest be as willing to do the author justice, as I have strove
to do him right.”
Many scholars have lamented the failure of Justus Lipsius to comment upon
Petronius or edit an edition of the Satyricon. Had he done so, he might
have gone far toward piercing the veil of darkness which enshrouds the
authorship of the work and the very age in which the composer flourished.
To me, personally, the fact that Laurence Sterne did not undertake a
version, has caused much regret. The master who delineated Tristram
Shandy’s father and the intrigue between the Widow Wadman and Uncle Toby
would have drawn Trimalchio and his peers to admiration.
W. C. F.
CONTENTS:
PREFACE
INTRODUCTION
THE SATYRICON
NOTES
PROSTITUTION
PAEDERASTIA
CHAPTER NOTES
9 Gladiator obscene
17 Impotence
26 Peepholes in brothels
34 Silver Skeleton
36 Marsyas
40 A pie full of birds
56 Contumelia
116 Life in Rome
116 Legacy hunting
119 Castration
127 Circe’s voice
131 Sputum in charms
131 The “infamous finger”
138 The dildo
The Cordax
SIX NOTES BY MARCHENA
Introduction
I Soldiers in love
II Courtesans
III Greek love
IV Pollution
V Virginity
VI Pandars
INTRODUCTION.
Of the many masterpieces which classical antiquity has bequeathed to
modern times, few have attained, at intervals, to such popularity; few
have so gripped the interest of scholars and men of letters, as has this
scintillating miscellany known as the Satyricon, ascribed by tradition to
that Petronius who, at the court of Nero, acted as arbiter of elegance
and dictator of fashion. The flashing wit, the masterly touches which
bring out the characters with all the detail of a fine old copper
etching; the marvelous use of realism by this, its first prophet; the
sure knowledge of the perspective and background best adapted to each
episode; the racy style, so smooth, so elegant, so simple when the
educated are speaking, beguile the reader and blind him, at first, to the
many discrepancies and incoherences with which the text, as we have it,
is marred. The more one concentrates upon this author, the more apparent
these faults become and the more one regrets the lacunae in the text.
Notwithstanding numerous articles which deal with this work, some from
the pens of the most profound scholars, its author is still shrouded in
the mists of uncertainty and conjecture. He is as impersonal as
Shakespeare, as aloof as Flaubert, in the opinion of Charles Whibley,
and, it may be added, as genial as Rabelais; an enigmatic genius whose
secret will never be laid bare with the resources at our present command.
As I am not writing for scholars, I do not intend going very deeply into
the labyrinth of critical controversy which surrounds the author and the
work, but I shall deal with a few of the questions which, if properly
understood, will enhance the value of the Satyricon, and contribute, in
some degree, to a better understanding of the author. For the sake of
convenience the questions discussed in this introduction will be arranged
in the following order:
1. The Satyricon.
2. The Author.
a His Character.
b His Purpose in Writing.
c Time in which the Action is placed.
d Localization of the Principal Episode.
3. Realism.
a Influence of the Satyricon upon the Literature of the World.
4. The Forgeries.
I
THE SATYRICON. Heinsius and Scaliger derive the word from the Greek,
whence comes our English word satyr, but Casaubon, Dacier and Spanheim
derive it from the Latin ‘satura,’ a plate filled with different kinds
of food, and they refer to Porphyrion’s ‘multis et variis rebus hoc
carmen refertum est.’
The text, as we possess it, may be divided into three divisions: the
first and last relate the adventures of Encolpius and his companions, the
second, which is a digression, describes the Dinner of Trimalchio. That
the work was originally divided into books, we had long known from
ancient glossaries, and we learn, from the title of the Traguriensian
manuscript, that the fragments therein contained are excerpts from the
fifteenth and sixteenth books. An interpolation of Fulgentius (Paris
7975) attributes to Book Fourteen the scene related in Chapter 20 of the
work as we have it, and the glossary of St. Benedict Floriacensis cites
the passage ‘sed video te totum in illa haerere, quae Troiae halosin
ostendit (Chapter 89), as from Book Fifteen. As there is no reason to
suppose that the chapters intervening between the end of the Cena
(Chapter 79) and Chapter 89 are out of place, it follows that this
passage may have belonged to Book Sixteen, or even Seventeen, but that it
could not have belonged to Book Fifteen. From the interpolation of
Fulgentius we may hazard the opinion that the beginning of the fragments,
as we possess them (Chapters 1 to 26), form part of Book Fourteen. The
Dinner of Trimalchio probably formed a complete book, fifteen, and the
continuation of the adventures of Encolpius down to his meeting with
Eumolpus (end of Chapter 140) Book Sixteen. The discomfiture of Eumolpus
should have closed this book but not the entire work, as the exit of the
two principal characters is not fixed at the time our fragments come to
an end. The original work, then, would probably have exceeded Tom Jones
in length.
II
THE AUTHOR.
a--“Not often,” says Studer (Rheinisches Museum, 1843), “has there been
so much dispute about the author, the times, the character and the
purpose of a writing of antiquity as about the fragments of the Satyricon
of Petronius.” The discovery and publication of the Trau manuscript
brought about a literary controversy which has had few parallels, and
which has not entirely died out to this day, although the best
authorities ascribe the work to Caius Petronius, the Arbiter Elegantiarum
at the court of Nero. “The question as to the date of the narrative of
the adventures of Encolpius and his boon companions must be regarded as
settled,” says Theodor Mommsen (Hermes, 1878); “this narrative is
unsurpassed in originality and mastery of treatment among the writings of
Roman literature. Nor does anyone doubt the identity of its author and
the Arbiter Elegantiarum of Nero, whose end Tacitus relates.”
In any case, the author of this work, if it be the work of one brain,
must have been a profound psychologist, a master of realism, a
natural-born story teller, and a gentleman.
b--His principal object in writing the work was to amuse but, in amusing,
he also intended to pillory the aristocracy and his wit is as keen as the
point of a rapier; but, when we bear in mind the fact that he was an
ancient, we will find that his cynicism is not cruel, in him there is
none of the malignity of Aristophanes; there is rather the attitude of
the refined patrician who is always under the necessity of facing those
things which he holds most in contempt, the supreme artist who suffers
from the multitude of bill-boards, so to speak, who lashes the posters
but holds in pitying contempt those who know so little of true art that
they mistake those posters for the genuine article. Niebuhr’s estimate
of his character is so just and free from prejudice, and proceeds from
a mind which, in itself, was so pure and wholesome, that I will quote it:
“All great dramatic poets are endowed with the power of creating beings
who seem to act and speak with perfect independence, so that the poet is
nothing more than the relator of what takes place. When Goethe had
conceived Faust and Margarete, Mephistopheles and Wagner, they moved and
had their being without any exercise of his will. But in the peculiar
power which Petronius exercises, in its application to every scene, to
every individual character, in everything, noble or mean, which he
undertakes, I know of but one who is fully equal to the Roman, and that
is Diderot. Trimalchio and Agamemnon might have spoken for Petronius,
and the nephew Rameau and the parson Papin for Diderot, in every
condition and on every occasion inexhaustibly, out of their own nature;
just so the purest and noblest souls, whose kind was, after all, not
entirely extinct in their day.
“Diderot and a contemporary, related to him in spirit, Count Gaspar
Gozzi, are marked with the same cynicism which disfigures the Roman;
their age, like his, had become shameless. But as the two former were in
their heart noble, upright, and benevolent men, and as in the writings of
Diderot genuine virtue and a tenderness unknown to his contemporaries
breathe, so the peculiarity of such a genius can, as it seems, be given
to a noble and elevated being only. The deep contempt for prevailing
immorality which naturally leads to cynicism, and a heart which beats for
everything great and glorious,--virtues which then had no existence,
--speak from the pages of the Roman in a language intelligible to every
susceptible heart.”
e--Beck, in his paper, “The Age of Petronius Arbiter,” concluded that the
author lived and wrote between the years 6 A.D. and 34 A.D., but he
overlooked the possibility that the author might have lived a few years
later, written of conditions as they were in his own times, and yet laid
the action of his novel a few years before. Mommsen and Haley place the
time under Augustus, Buecheler, about 36-7 A.D., and Friedlaender under
Nero.
d--La Porte du Theil places the scene at Naples because of the fact the
city in which our heroes met Agamemnon must have been of some
considerable size because neither Encolpius nor Asclytos could find their
way back to their inn, when once they had left it, because both were
tired out from tramping around in search of it and because Giton had been
so impressed with this danger that he took the precaution to mark the
pillars with chalk in order that they might not be lost a second time.
The Gulf of Naples is the only bit of coastline which fits the needs of
the novel, hence the city must be Naples. The fact that neither of the
characters knew the city proves that they had been recent arrivals, and
this furnishes a clue, vague though it is, to what may have gone before.
Haley, “Harvard Studies in Classical Philology,” vol. II, makes out a
very strong case for Puteoli, and his theory of the old town and the new
town is as ingenious as it is able. Haley also has Trimalchio in his
favor, as has also La Porte du Theil. “I saw the Sibyl at Cumae,” says
Trimalchio. Now if the scene of the dinner is actually at Cumae this
sounds very peculiar; it might even be a gloss added by some copyist
whose knowledge was not equal to his industry. On the other hand,
suppose Trimalchio is speaking of something so commonplace in his
locality that the second term has become a generic, then the difficulty
disappears. We today, even though standing upon the very spot in Melos
where the Venus was unearthed, would still refer to her as the Venus de
Melos. Friedlaender, in bracketing Cumis, has not taken this
sufficiently into consideration. Mommsen, in an excellent paper (Hermes,
1878), has laid the scene at Cumae. His logic is almost unanswerable,
and the consensus of opinion is in favor of the latter town.
III
REALISM. Realism, as we are concerned with it, may be defined as the
literary effect produced by the marshaling of details in their exactitude
for the purpose of bringing out character. The fact that they may be
ugly and vulgar, or the reverse, makes not the slightest difference. The
modern realist contemplates the inanimate things which surround us with
peculiar complaisance, and it is right that he should as these things
exert upon us a constant and secret influence. The workings of the human
mind, in complex civilizations, are by no means simple; they are involved
and varied: our thoughts, our feelings, our wills, associate themselves
with an infinite number of sensations and images which play one upon the
other, and which individualize, in some measure, every action we commit,
and stamp it. The merit of our modern realists lies in the fact that
they have studied the things which surround us and our relations to them,
and thus have they been able to make their creations conform to human
experience. The ancients gave little attention to this; the man, with
them, was the important thing; the environment the unimportant. There
are, of course, exceptions; the interview between Ulysses and Nausiskaa
is probably the most striking. From the standpoint of environment,
Petronius, in the greater portion of his work, is an ancient; but one
exception there is, and it is as brilliant as it is important. The
entire episode, in which Trimalchio figures, offers an incredible
abundance of details. The descriptions are exhaustive and minute, but
the author’s prime purpose was not description, it was to bring out the
characters, it was to pillory the Roman aristocracy, it was to amuse!
Cicero, in his prosecution of Verres, had shown up this aristocracy in
all its brutality and greed, it remained for the author of the Cena to
hold its absurdity up to the light of day, to lash an extravagance which,
though utterly unbridled, was yet unable to exhaust the looted
accumulations of years of political double dealing and malfeasance in
office. Trimalchio’s introduction is a masterstroke, the porter at the
door is another, the effect of the wine upon the women, their jealousy
lest either’s husband should seem more liberal, their appraisal of each
other’s jewelry, Scintilla’s remark anent the finesse of Habinnas’
servant in the mere matter of pandering, the blear-eyed and black-toothed
slave, teasing a little bitch disgustingly fat, offering her pieces of
bread and when, from sheer inability, she refuses to eat, cramming it
down her throat, the effect of the alcohol upon Trimalchio, the little
old lady girded round with a filthy apron, wearing clogs which were not
mates, dragging in a huge dog on a chain, the incomparable humor in the
passage in which Hesus, desperately seasick, sees that which makes him
believe that even worse misfortunes are in store for him: these details
are masterpieces of realism. The description of the night-prowling
shyster lawyer, whose forehead is covered with sebaceous wens, is the
very acme of propriety; our first meeting; with the poet Eumolpus is a
beautiful study in background and perspective. Nineteen centuries have
gone their way since this novel was written, but if we look about us we
will be able to recognize, under the veneer of civilization, the
originals of the Satyricon and we will find that here, in a little corner
of the Roman world, all humanity was held in miniature. Petronius must
be credited with the great merit of having introduced realism into the
novel. By an inspiration of genius, he saw that the framework of
frivolous and licentious novels could be enlarged until it took in
contemporary custom and environment. It is that which assures for him
an eminent place, not in Roman literature alone, but in the literature
of the world.
a--INFLUENCE OF THE SATYRICON UPON LITERATURE. The vagrant heroes of
Petronius are the originals from whom directly, or indirectly, later
authors drew that inspiration which resulted in the great mass of
picaresque fiction; but, great as this is, it is not to this that the
Satyricon owes its powerful influence upon the literature of the world.
It is to the author’s recognition of the importance of environment,
of the vital role of inanimate surroundings as a means for bringing out
character and imbuing his episodes and the actions of his characters with
an air of reality and with those impulses and actions which are common to
human experience, that his influence is due. By this, the Roman created
a new style of writing and inaugurated a class of literature which was
without parallel until the time of Apuleius and, in a lesser degree, of
Lucian. This class of literature, though modified essentially from age
to age, in keeping with the dictates of moral purity or bigotry, innocent
or otherwise, has come to be the very stuff of which literary success in
fiction is made. One may write a successful book without a thread of
romance; one cannot write a successful romance without some knowledge of
realism; the more intimate the knowledge the better the book, and it is
frequently to this that the failure of a novel is due, although the
critic might be at a loss to explain it. Petronius lies behind Tristram
Shandy, his influence can be detected in Smollett, and even Fielding paid
tribute to him.
IV
FORGERIES OF PETRONIUS.
From the very nature of the writings of such an author as Petronius, it
is evident that the gaps in the text would have a marked tendency to
stimulate the curiosity of literary forgers and to tempt their sagacity,
literary or otherwise. The recovery of the Trimalchionian episode, and
the subsequent pamphleteering would by no means eradicate this “cacoethes
emendandi.”
When, circa 1650, the library of the unfortunate Nicolas Cippico yielded
up the Trau fragment, the news of this discovery spread far and wide and
about twelve years later, Statileo, in response to the repeated requests
of the Venetian ambassador, Pietro Basadonna, made with his own hand a
copy of the MS., which he sent to Basadonna. The ambassador, in turn,
permitted this MS. to be printed by one Frambotti, a printer endowed with
more industry than critical acumen, and the resultant textual conflation
had much to do with the pamphlet war which followed. Had this Paduan
printer followed the explicit directions which he received, and printed
exactly what was given him much good paper might have been saved and a
very interesting chapter in the history of literary forgery would
probably never have been written. The pamphlet war did not die out until
Bleau, in 1670-71, printed his exact reproduction of the Trau manuscript
and the corrections introduced by that licentiousness of emendation of
which we have spoken.
In October, 1690, Francois Nodot, a French soldier of fortune, a
commissary officer who combined belles lettres and philosophy with his
official duties, wrote to Charpentier, President of the Academy of
France, calling, his attention to a copy of a manuscript which he (Nodot)
possessed, and which came into his hands in the following manner: one
Du Pin, a French officer detailed to service with Austria, had been
present at the sack of Belgrade in 1688. That this Du Pin had, while
there, made the acquaintance of a certain Greek renegade, having, as a
matter of fact, stayed in the house of this renegade. The Greek’s
father, a man of some learning, had by some means come into possession of
the MS., and Du Pin, in going through some of the books in the house, had
come across it. He had experienced the utmost difficulty in deciphering
the letters, and finally, driven by curiosity, had retained a copyist and
had it copied out. That this Du Pin had this copy in his house at
Frankfort, and that he had given Nodot to understand that if he (Nodot)
came to Frankfort, he would be permitted to see this copy. Owing to the
exigencies of military service, Nodot had been unable to go in person to
Frankfort, and that he had therefore availed himself of the friendly
interest and services of a certain merchant of Frankfort, who had
volunteered to find an amanuensis, have a copy made, and send it to
Nodot. This was done, and Nodot concludes his letter to Charpentier by
requesting the latter to lay the result before the Academy and ask for
their blessing and approval. These Nodotian Supplements were accepted as
authentic by the Academics of Arles and Nimes, as well as by Charpentier.
In a short time, however, the voices of scholarly skeptics began to be
heard in the land, and accurate and unbiased criticism laid bare the
fraud. The Latinity was attacked and exception taken to Silver Age
prose in which was found a French police regulation which required newly
arrived travellers to register their names in the book of a police
officer of an Italian village of the first century. Although they are
still retained in the text by some editors, this is done to give some
measure of continuity to an otherwise interrupted narrative, but they can
only serve to distort the author and obscure whatever view of him the
reader might otherwise have reached. They are generally printed between
brackets or in different type.
In 1768 another and far abler forger saw the light of day. Jose
Marchena, a Spaniard of Jewish extraction, was destined for an
ecclesiastical career. He received an excellent education which served
to fortify a natural bent toward languages and historical criticism. In
his early youth he showed a marked preference for uncanonical pursuits
and heretical doctrines and before he had reached his thirtieth year
prudence counseled him to prevent the consequences of his heresy and
avoid the too pressing Inquisition by a timely flight into France.
He arrived there in time to throw himself into the fight for liberty,
and in 1800 we find him at Basle attached to the staff of General Moreau.
While there he is said to have amused himself and some of his cronies by
writing notes on what Davenport would have called “Forbidden Subjects,”
and, as a means of publishing his erotic lucubrations, he constructed
this fragment, which brings in those topics on which he had enlarged.
He translated the fragment into French, attached his notes, and issued
the book. There is another story to the effect that he had been
reprimanded by Moreau for having written a loose song and that he
exculpated himself by assuring the general that it was but a new fragment
of Petronius which he had translated. Two days later he had the fragment
ready to prove his contention.
This is the account given by his Spanish biographer. In his preface,
dedicated to the Army of the Rhine, he states that he found the fragment
in a manuscript of the work of St. Gennadius on the Duties of Priests,
probably of the XI Century. A close examination revealed the fact that
it was a palimpsest which, after treatment, permitted the restoration of
this fragment. It is supposed to supply the gap in Chapter 26 after the
word “verberabant.”
Its obscenity outrivals that of the preceding text, and the grammar,
style, and curiosa felicitas Petroniana make it an almost perfect
imitation. There is no internal evidence of forgery. If the text is
closely scrutinized it will be seen that it is composed of words and
expressions taken from various parts of the Satyricon, “and that in every
line it has exactly the Petronian turn of phrase.”
“Not only is the original edition unprocurable,” to quote again from
Mr. Gaselee’s invaluable bibliography, “but the reprint at Soleure
(Brussels), 1865, consisted of only 120 copies, and is hard to find.
The most accessible place for English readers is in Bohn’s translation,
in which, however, only the Latin text is given; and the notes were a
most important part of the original work.”
These notes, humorously and perhaps sarcastically ascribed to Lallemand,
Sanctae Theologiae Doctor, “are six in number (all on various forms of
vice); and show great knowledge, classical and sociological, of unsavory
subjects. Now that the book is too rare to do us any harm, we may admit
that the pastiche was not only highly amusing, but showed a perverse
cleverness amounting almost to genius.”
Marchena died at Madrid in great poverty in 1821. A contemporary has
described him as being rather short and heavy set in figure, of great
frontal development, and vain beyond belief. He considered himself
invincible where women were concerned. He had a peculiar predilection
in the choice of animal pets and was an object of fear and curiosity
to the townspeople. His forgery might have been completely successful
had he not acknowledged it himself within two or three years after the
publication of his brochure. The fragment will remain a permanent
tribute to the excellence of his scholarship, but it is his Ode to Christ
Crucified which has made him more generally known, and it is one of the
ironies of fate that caused this deformed giant of sarcasm to compose a
poem of such tender and touching piety.
Very little is known about Don Joe Antonio Gonzalez de Salas, whose
connecting passages, with the exception of one which is irrelevant, are
here included.
The learned editors of the Spanish encyclopedia naively preface their
brief sketch with the following assertion: “no tenemos noticias de su
vida.” De Salas was born in 1588 and died in 1654. His edition of
Petronius was first issued in 1629 and re-issued in 1643 with a copper
plate of the Editor. The Paris edition, from which he says he supplied
certain deficiencies in the text, is unknown to bibliographers and is
supposed to be fictitious.
To distinguish the spurious passages, as a point of interest, in the
present edition, the forgeries of Nodot are printed within round
brackets, the forgery of Marchena within square brackets, and the
additions of De Salas in italics {In this PG etext in curly brackets}.
The work is also accompanied by a translation of the six notes, the
composition of which led Marchena to forge the fragment which first
appeared in the year 1800. These have never before been translated.
Thanks are due Ralph Straus, Esq., and Professor Stephen Gaselee.
THE SATYRICON OF
PETRONIUS ARBITER
BRACKET CODE:
(Forgeries of Nodot)
[Forgeries of Marchena]
{Additions of De Salas}
DW
VOLUME 1.--ADVENTURES OF ENCOLPIUS AND HIS COMPANIONS
CHAPTER THE FIRST.
(It has been so long since I promised you the story of my adventures,
that I have decided to make good my word today; and, seeing that we have
thus fortunately met, not to discuss scientific matters alone, but also
to enliven our jolly conversation with witty stories. Fabricius Veiento
has already spoken very cleverly on the errors committed in the name of
religion, and shown how priests, animated by an hypocritical mania for
prophecy, boldly expound mysteries which are too often such to
themselves. But) are our rhetoricians tormented by another species of
Furies when they cry, “I received these wounds while fighting for the
public liberty; I lost this eye in your defense: give me a guide who will
lead me to my children, my limbs are hamstrung and will not hold me up!”
Even these heroics could be endured if they made easier the road to
eloquence; but as it is, their sole gain from this ferment of matter and
empty discord of words is, that when they step into the Forum, they think
they have been carried into another world. And it is my conviction that
the schools are responsible for the gross foolishness of our young men,
because, in them, they see or hear nothing at all of the affairs of
every-day life, but only pirates standing in chains upon the shore,
tyrants scribbling edicts in which sons are ordered to behead their own
fathers; responses from oracles, delivered in time of pestilence,
ordering the immolation of three or more virgins; every word a honied
drop, every period sprinkled with poppy-seed and sesame.
CHAPTER THE SECOND.
Those who are brought up on such a diet can no more attain to wisdom than
a kitchen scullion can attain to a keen sense of smell or avoid stinking
of the grease. With your indulgence, I will speak out: you--teachers
--are chiefly responsible for the decay of oratory. With your well
modulated and empty tones you have so labored for rhetorical effect that
the body of your speech has lost its vigor and died. Young men did not
learn set speeches in the days when Sophocles and Euripides were
searching for words in which to express themselves. In the days when
Pindar and the nine lyric poets feared to attempt Homeric verse there was
no private tutor to stifle budding genius. I need not cite the poets for
evidence, for I do not find that either Plato or Demosthenes was given
to this kind of exercise. A dignified and, if I may say it, a chaste,
style, is neither elaborate nor loaded with ornament; it rises supreme by
its own natural purity. This windy and high-sounding bombast, a recent
immigrant to Athens, from Asia, touched with its breath the aspiring
minds of youth, with the effect of some pestilential planet, and as soon
as the tradition of the past was broken, eloquence halted and was
stricken dumb. Since that, who has attained to the sublimity of
Thucydides, who rivalled the fame of Hyperides? Not a single poem
has glowed with a healthy color, but all of them, as though nourished
on the same diet, lacked the strength to live to old age. Painting
also suffered the same fate when the presumption of the Egyptians
“commercialized” that incomparable art. (I was holding forth along these
lines one day, when Agamemnon came up to us and scanned with a curious
eye a person to whom the audience was listening so closely.)
CHAPTER THE THIRD.
He would not permit me to declaim longer in the portico than he himself
had sweat in the school, but exclaimed, “Your sentiments do not reflect
the public taste, young man, and you are a lover of common sense, which
is still more unusual. For that reason, I will not deceive you as to the
secrets of my profession. The teachers, who must gibber with lunatics,
are by no means to blame for these exercises. Unless they spoke in
accordance with the dictates of their young pupils, they would, as Cicero
remarks, be left alone in the schools! And, as designing parasites, when
they seek invitations to the tables of the rich, have in mind nothing
except what will, in their opinion, be most acceptable to their audience
--for in no other way can they secure their ends, save by setting snares
for the ears--so it is with the teachers of rhetoric, they might be
compared with the fisherman, who, unless he baits his hook with what he
knows is most appetizing to the little fish, may wait all day upon some
rock, without the hope of a catch.”
CHAPTER THE FOURTH.
What, then, is there to do? The parents who are unwilling to permit
their children to undergo a course of training under strict discipline,
are the ones who deserve the reproof. In the first place, everything
they possess, including the children, is devoted to ambition. Then, that
their wishes may the more quickly be realized, they drive these unripe
scholars into the forum, and the profession of eloquence, than which none
is considered nobler, devolves upon boys who are still in the act of
being born! If, however, they would permit a graded course of study to
be prescribed, in order that studious boys might ripen their minds by
diligent reading; balance their judgment by precepts of wisdom, correct
their compositions with an unsparing pen, hear at length what they ought
to imitate, and be convinced that nothing can be sublime when it is
designed to catch the fancy of boys, then the grand style of oratory
would immediately recover the weight and splendor of its majesty. Now
the boys play in the schools, the young men are laughed at in the forum,
and, a worse symptom than either, no one, in his old age, will confess
the errors he was taught in his school days. But that you may not
imagine that I disapprove of a jingle in the Lucilian manner, I will
deliver my opinions in verse,--
CHAPTER THE FIFTH.
“The man who emerges with fame, from the school of stern art,
Whose mind gropes for lofty ideals, to bring them to light,
Must first, under rigid frugality, study his part;
Nor yearn for the courts of proud princes who frown in their might:
Nor scheme with the riff-raf, a client in order to dine,
Nor can he with evil companions his wit drown in wine
Nor sit, as a hireling, applauding an actor’s grimace.
But, whether the fortress of arms-bearing Tritonis smile
Upon him, or land which the Spartan colonials grace,
Or home of the sirens, with poetry let him beguile
The years of young manhood, and at the Maeonian spring
His fortunate soul drink its fill: Then, when later, the lore
Of Socrates’ school he has mastered, the reins let him fling,
And brandish the weapons that mighty Demosthenes bore.
Then, steeped in the culture and music of Greece, let his taste
Be ripened and mellowed by all the great writers of Rome.
At first, let him haunt not the courts; let his pages be graced
By ringing and rhythmic effusions composed in his home
Next, banquets and wars be his theme, sung in soul-stirring chant,
In eloquent words such as undaunted Cicero chose.
Come! Gird up thy soul! Inspiration will then force a vent
And rush in a flood from a heart that is loved by the muse!”
CHAPTER THE SIXTH.
I was listening so attentively to this speech that I did not notice the
flight of Ascyltos, and while I was pacing the gardens, engulfed in this
flood-tide of rhetoric, a large crowd of students came out upon the
portico, having, it would seem, just listened to an extemporaneous
declamation, of I know not whom, the speaker of which had taken
exceptions to the speech of Agamemnon. While, therefore, the young men
were making fun of the sentiments of this last speaker, and criticizing
the arrangement of the whole speech, I seized the opportunity and went
after Ascyltos, on the run; but, as I neither held strictly to the road,
nor knew where the inn was located, wherever I went, I kept coming back
to the same place, until, worn out with running, and long since dripping
with sweat, I approached a certain little old woman who sold country
vegetables.
CHAPTER THE SEVENTH.
“Please, mother,” I wheedled, “you don’t know where I lodge, do you?”
Delighted with such humorous affability, “What’s the reason I don’t” she
replied, and getting upon her feet, she commenced to walk ahead of me. I
took her for a prophetess until, when presently we came to a more obscure
quarter, the affable old lady pushed aside a crazy-quilt and remarked,
“Here’s where you ought to live,” and when I denied that I recognized the
house, I saw some men prowling stealthily between the rows of name-boards
and naked prostitutes. Too late I realized that I had been led into a
brothel. After cursing the wiles of the little old hag, I covered my
head and commenced to run through the middle of the night-house to the
exit opposite, when, lo and behold! whom should I meet on the very
threshold but Ascyltos himself, as tired as I was, and almost dead; you
would have thought that he had been brought by the self-same little old
hag! I smiled at that, greeted him cordially, and asked him what he was
doing in such a scandalous place.
CHAPTER THE EIGHTH.
Wiping away the sweat with his hands, he replied, “If you only knew what
I have gone through!” “What was it?” I demanded. “A most respectable
looking person came up to me,” he made reply, “while I was wandering all
over the town and could not find where I had left my inn, and very
graciously offered to guide me. He led me through some very dark and
crooked alleys, to this place, pulled out his tool, and commenced to beg
me to comply with his appetite. A whore had already vacated her cell for
an as, and he had laid hands upon me, and, but for the fact that I was
the stronger, I would have been compelled to take my medicine.” (While
Ascyltos was telling me of his bad luck, who should come up again but
this same very respectable looking person, in company with a woman not at
all bad looking, and, looking at Ascyltos, he requested him to enter the
house, assuring him that there was nothing to fear, and, since he was
unwilling to take the passive part, he should have the active. The
woman, on her part, urged me very persistently to accompany her, so we
followed the couple, at last, and were conducted between the rows of
name-boards, where we saw, in cells, many persons of each sex amusing
themselves in such a manner) that it seemed to me that every one of them
must have been drinking satyrion. (On catching sight of us, they
attempted to seduce us with paederastic wantonness, and one wretch, with
his clothes girded up, assaulted Ascyltos, and, having thrown him down
upon a couch, attempted to gore him from above. I succored the sufferer
immediately, however,) and having joined forces, we defied the
troublesome wretch. (Ascyltos ran out of the house and took to his
heels, leaving me as the object of their lewd attacks, but the crowd,
finding me the stronger in body and purpose, let me go unharmed.)
CHAPTER THE NINTH.
(After having tramped nearly all over the city,) I caught sight of Giton,
as though through a fog, standing at the end of the street, (on the very
threshold of the inn,) and I hastened to the same place. When I inquired
whether my “brother” had prepared anything for breakfast, the boy sat
down upon the bed and wiped away the trickling tears with his thumb.
I was greatly disturbed by such conduct on the part of my “brother,” and
demanded to be told what had happened. After I had mingled threats with
entreaties, he answered slowly and against his will, “That brother or
comrade of yours rushed into the room a little while ago and commenced to
attempt my virtue by force. When I screamed, he pulled out his tool and
gritted out--If you’re a Lucretia, you’ve found your Tarquin!” When I
heard this, I shook my fists in Ascyltos’ face, “What have you to say for
yourself,” I snarled, “you rutting pathic harlot, whose very breath is
infected?” Ascyltos pretended to bristle up and, shaking his fists more
boldly still, he roared: “Won’t you keep quiet, you filthy gladiator, you
who escaped from the criminal’s cage in the amphitheatre to which you
were condemned (for the murder of your host?) Won’t you hold your
tongue, you nocturnal assassin, who, even when you swived it bravely,
never entered the lists with a decent woman in your life? Was I not a
‘brother’ to you in the pleasure-garden, in the same sense as that in
which this boy now is in this lodging-house?” “You sneaked away from the
master’s lecture,” I objected.
CHAPTER THE TENTH. “What should I have done, you triple fool, when I was
dying of hunger? I suppose I should have listened to opinions as much to
the purpose as the tinkle of broken glass or the interpretation of
dreams. By Hercules, you are much more deserving of censure than I, you
who will flatter a poet so as to get an invitation to dinner!” Then we
laughed ourselves out of a most disgraceful quarrel, and approached more
peaceably whatever remained to be done. But the remembrance of that
injury recurred to my mind and, “Ascyltos,” I said, “I know we shall not
be able to agree, so let us divide our little packs of common stock and
try to defeat our poverty by our individual efforts. Both you and I know
letters, but that I may not stand in the way of any undertaking of yours,
I will take up some other profession. Otherwise, a thousand trifles will
bring us into daily collision and furnish cause for gossip through the
whole town.” Ascyltos made no objection to this, but merely remarked,
“As we, in our capacity of scholars, have accepted an invitation to
dinner, for this date, let us not lose our night. Since it seems to be
the graceful thing to do, I will look out for another lodging and another
‘brother,’ tomorrow.” “Deferred pleasures are a long time coming,”
I sighed. It was lust that made this separation so hasty, for I had, for
a long time, wished to be rid of a troublesome chaperon, so that I could
resume my old relations with my Giton. (Bearing this affront with
difficulty, Ascyltos rushed from the room, without uttering a word.
Such a headlong outburst augured badly, for I well knew his ungovernable
temper and his unbridled passion. On this account, I followed him out,
desirous of fathoming his designs and of preventing their consequences,
but he hid himself skillfully from my eyes, and all in vain, I searched
for him for a long time.)
CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH.
After having had the whole town under my eyes, I returned to the little
room and, having claimed the kisses which were mine in good faith, I
encircled the boy in the closest of embraces and enjoyed the effect of
our happy vows to a point that might be envied. Nor had all the
ceremonies been completed, when Ascyltos stole stealthily up to the
outside of the door and, violently wrenching off the bars, burst in upon
me, toying with my “brother.” He filled the little room with his
laughter and hand-clapping, pulled away the cloak which covered us, “What
are you up to now, most sanctimonious ‘brother’?” he jeered. “What’s
going on here, a blanket-wedding?” Nor did he confine himself to words,
but, pulling the strap off his bag, he began to lash me very thoroughly,
interjecting sarcasms the while, “This is the way you would share with
your comrade, is it!” (The unexpectedness of the thing compelled me to
endure the blows in silence and to put up with the abuse, so I smiled at
my calamity, and very prudently, too, as otherwise I should have been put
to the necessity of fighting with a rival. My pretended good humor
soothed his anger, and at last, Ascyltos smiled as well. “See here,
Encolpius,” he said, “are you so engrossed with your debaucheries that
you do not realize that our money is gone, and that what we have left is
of no value? In the summer, times are bad in the city. The country is
luckier, let’s go and visit our friends.” Necessity compelled the
approval of this plan, and the repression of any sense of injury as well,
so, loading Giton with our packs, we left the city and hastened to the
country-seat of Lycurgus, a Roman knight. Inasmuch as Ascyltos has
formerly served him in the capacity of “brother,” he received us royally,
and the company there assembled, rendered our stay still more delightful.
In the first place, there was Tryphaena, a most beautiful woman, who had
come in company with Lycas, the master of a vessel and owner of estates
near the seashore. Although Lycurgus kept a frugal table, the pleasures
we enjoyed in this most enchanting spot cannot be described in words.
Of course you know that Venus joined us all up, as quickly as possible.
The lovely Tryphaena pleased my taste, and listened willingly to my vows,
but hardly had I had time to enjoy her favors when Lycas, in a towering
rage because his preserves had been secretly invaded, demanded that I
indemnify him in her stead. She was an old flame of his, so he broached
the subject of a mutual exchange of favors. Burning with lust, he
pressed his suit, but Tryphaena possessed my heart, and I said Lycas nay.
By refusal, however, he was only made more ardent, followed me
everywhere, entered my room at night, and, after his entreaties had met
with contempt, he had recourse to violence against me, at which I yelled
so lustily that I aroused the entire household, and, by the help of
Lycurgus, I was delivered from the troublesome assault and escaped. At
last, perceiving that the house of Lycurgus was not suitable to the
prosecution of his design, he attempted to persuade me to seek his
hospitality, and when his suggestion was refused, he made use of
Tryphaena’s influence over me. She besought me to comply with Lycas’
desires, and she did this all the more readily as by that she hoped to
gain more liberty of action. With affairs in this posture, I follow my
love, but Lycurgus, who had renewed his old relations with Ascyltos,
would not permit him to leave, so it was decided that he should remain
with Lycurgus, but that we would accompany Lycas. Nevertheless, we had
it understood among ourselves that whenever the opportunity presented
itself, we would each pilfer whatever we could lay hands upon, for the
betterment of the common stock. Lycas was highly delighted with my
acceptance of his invitation and hastened our departure, so, bidding our
friends good-bye, we arrived at his place on the very same day. Lycas
had so arranged matters that, on the journey, he sat beside me, while
Tryphaena was next to Giton, the reason for this being his knowledge
of the woman’s notorious inconstancy; nor was he deceived, for she
immediately fell in love with the boy, and I easily perceived it.
In addition, Lycas took the trouble of calling my attention to the
situation, and laid stress upon the truth of what we saw. On this
account, I received his advances more graciously, at which he was
overjoyed. He was certain that contempt would be engendered from the
inconstancy of my “sister,” with the result that, being piqued at
Tryphaena, I would all the more freely receive his advances. Now this
was the state of affairs at the house of Lycas, Tryphaena was desperately
in love with Giton, Giton’s whole soul was aflame for her, neither of
them was a pleasing sight to my eyes, and Lycas, studying to please me,
arranged novel entertainments each day, which Doris, his lovely wife,
seconded to the best of her ability, and so gracefully that she soon
expelled Tryphaena from my heart. A wink of the eye acquainted Doris of
my passion, a coquettish glance informed me of the state of her heart,
and this silent language, anticipating the office of the tongue, secretly
expressed that longing of our souls which we had both experienced at the
same instant. The jealousy of Lycas, already well known to me, was the
cause of my silence, but love itself revealed to the wife the designs
which Lycas had upon me. At our first opportunity of exchanging
confidences, she revealed to me what she had discovered and I candidly
confessed, telling her of the coldness with which I had always met his
advances. The far-sighted woman remarked that it would be necessary for
us to use our wits. It turned out that her advice was sound, for I soon
found out that complacency to the one meant possession of the other.
Giton, in the meantime, was recruiting his exhausted strength, and
Tryphaena turned her attention to me, but, meeting with a repulse, she
flounced out in a rage. The next thing this burning harlot did was to
discover my commerce with both husband and wife. As for his wantonness
with me, she flung that aside, as by it she lost nothing, but she fell
upon the secret gratifications of Doris and made them known to Lycas,
who, his jealousy proving stronger than his lust, took steps to get
revenge. Doris, however, forewarned by Tryphaena’s maid, looked out
for squalls and held aloof from any secret assignations. When I became
aware of all this, I heartily cursed the perfidy of Tryphaena and the
ungrateful soul of Lycas, and made up my mind to be gone. Fortune
favored me, as it turned out, for a vessel sacred to Isis and laden with
prize-money had, only the day before, run upon the rocks in the vicinity.
After holding a consultation with Giton, at which he gladly gave consent
to my plan, as Tryphaena visibly neglected him after having sapped his
virility, we hastened to the sea-shore early on the following morning,
and boarded the wreck, a thing easy of accomplishment as the watchmen,
who were in the pay of Lycas, knew us well. But they were so attentive
to us that there was no opportunity of stealing a thing until, having
left Giton with them, I craftily slipped out of sight and sneaked aft
where the statue of Isis stood, and despoiled it of a valuable mantle and
a silver sistrum. From the master’s cabin, I also pilfered other
valuable trifles and, stealthily sliding down a rope, went ashore. Giton
was the only one who saw me and he evaded the watchmen and slipped away
after me. I showed him the plunder, when he joined me, and we decided
to post with all speed to Ascyltos, but we did not arrive at the home of
Lycurgus until the following day. In a few words I told Ascyltos of the
robbery, when he joined us, and of our unfortunate love-affairs as well.
He was for prepossessing the mind of Lycurgus in our favor, naming the
increasing wantonness of Lycas as the cause of our secret and sudden
change of habitation. When Lycurgus had heard everything, he swore
that he would always be a tower of strength between us and our enemies.
Until Tryphaena and Doris were awake and out of bed, our flight remained
undiscovered, for we paid them the homage of a daily attendance at the
morning toilette. When our unwonted absence was noted, Lycas sent out
runners to comb the sea-shore, for he suspected that we had been to the
wreck, but he was still unaware of the robbery, which was yet unknown
because the stern of the wreck was lying away from the beach, and the
master had not, as yet, gone back aboard. Lycas flew into a towering
rage when our flight was established for certain, and railed bitterly at
Doris, whom he considered as the moving factor in it. Of the hard words
and the beating he gave her I will say nothing, for the particulars are
not known to me, but I will affirm that Tryphaena, who was the sole cause
of the unpleasantness, persuaded Lycas to hunt for his fugitives in the
house of Lycurgus, which was our most probable sanctuary. She
volunteered to accompany him in person, so that she could load us with
the abuse which we deserved at her hands. They set out on the following
day and arrived at the estate of Lycurgus, but we were not there, for he
had taken us to a neighboring town to attend the feast of Hercules, which
was there being celebrated. As soon as they found out about this, they
hastened to take to the road and ran right into us in the portico of the
temple. At sight of them, we were greatly put out, and Lycas held forth
violently to Lycurgus, upon the subject of our flight, but he was met
with raised eyebrows and such a scowling forehead that I plucked up
courage and, in a loud voice, passed judgment upon his lewd and base
attempts and assaults upon me, not in the house of Lycurgus alone, but
even under his own roof: and as for the meddling Tryphaena, she received
her just deserts, for, at great length, I described her moral turpitude
to the crowd, our altercation had caused a mob to collect, and, to give
weight to my argument, I pointed to limber-hamed Giton, drained dry, as
it were, and to myself, reduced almost to skin and bones by the raging
lust of that nymphomaniac harlot. So humiliated were our enemies by the
guffaws of the mob, that in gloomy ill-humor they beat a retreat to plot
revenge. As they perceived that we had prepossessed the mind of Lycurgus
in our favor, they decided to await his return, at his estate, in order
that they might wean him away from his misapprehension. As the
solemnities did not draw to a close until late at night, we could not
reach Lycurgus’ country place, so he conducted us to a villa of his,
situated near the halfway point of the journey, and, leaving us to sleep
there until the next day, he set off for his estate for the purpose of
transacting some business. Upon his arrival, he found Lycas and
Tryphaena awaiting him, and they stated their case so diplomatically that
they prevailed upon him to deliver us into their hands. Lycurgus, cruel
by nature and incapable of keeping his word, was by this time striving to
hit upon the best method of betraying us, and to that end, he persuaded
Lycas to go for help, while he himself returned to the villa and had us
put under guard. To the villa he came, and greeted us with a scowl as
black as any Lycas himself had ever achieved, clenching his fists again
and again, he charged us with having lied about Lycas, and, turning
Ascyltos out, he gave orders that we were to be kept confined to the room
in which we had retired to rest. Nor would he hear a word in our
defense, from Ascyltos, but, taking the latter with him, he returned to
his estate, reiterating his orders relative to our confinement, which was
to last until his return. On the way back, Ascyltos vainly essayed to
break down Lycurgus’ determination, but neither prayers nor caresses, nor
even tears could move him. Thereupon my “brother” conceived the design
of freeing us from our chains, and, antagonized by the stubbornness of
Lycurgus, he positively refused to sleep with him, and through this he
was in a better position to carry out the plan which he had thought out.
When the entire household was buried in its first sleep, Ascyltos loaded
our little packs upon his back and slipped out through a breach in the
wall, which he had previously noted, arriving at the villa with the dawn.
He gained entrance without opposition and found his way to our room,
which the guards had taken the precaution to bar. It was easy to force
an entrance, as the fastening was made of wood, which same he pried off
with a piece of iron. The fall of the lock roused us, for we were
snoring away, in spite of our unfortunate situation. On account of the
long vigil, the guard was in such a deep sleep that we alone were wakened
by the crashing fall of the lock, and Ascyltos, coming in, told us in a
few words what he had done for us; but as far as that goes, not many were
necessary. We were hurriedly dressing, when I was seized with the notion
of killing the guard and stripping the place. This plan I confided to
Ascyltos, who approved of the looting, but pointed out a more desirable
solution without bloodshed: knowing all the crooks and turns, as he did,
he led us to a store-room which he opened. We gathered up all that was
of value and sallied forth while it was yet early in the morning.
Shunning the public roads; we could not rest until we believed ourselves
safe from pursuit. Ascyltos, when he had caught his breath, gloatingly
exulted of the pleasure which the looting of a villa belonging to
Lycurgus, a superlatively avaricious man, afforded him: he complained,
with justice of his parsimony, affirming that he himself had received no
reward for his k-nightly services, that he had been kept at a dry table
and on a skimpy ration of food. This Lycurgus was so stingy that he
denied himself even the necessities of life, his immense wealth to the
contrary notwithstanding.)
The tortured Tantalus still stands, to parch in his shifting pool,
And starve, when fruit sways just beyond his grasp:
The image of the miser rich, when his avaricious soul
Robs him of food and drink, in Plenty’s clasp.
(Ascyltos was for going to Naples that same day, but I protested the
imprudence of going to any place where they would be on the lookout for
us. “Let’s absent ourselves, for a while, and travel in the country. We
are well supplied with means.” This advice took his fancy and we set out
for a part of the country noted for the beauty of its estates, and where
not a few of our acquaintances were enjoying the sports of the season.
Scarcely had we covered half the distance, however, before it began to
pour down rain by the bucketful, compelling us to run for the nearest
village. Upon entering the inn, we noticed many other wayfarers, who had
put up there to escape the storm. The jam prevented our being watched,
and at the same time made it easier for us to pry about with curious
eyes, on the alert for something to appropriate. Ascyltos, unseen by
anyone, picked up off the ground a little pouch in which he found some
gold pieces. We were overjoyed with this auspicious beginning, but,
fearing that some one would miss the gold, we stealthily slipped out by
the back door. A slave, who was saddling a horse in the courtyard,
suddenly left his work and went into the house, as if he had forgotten
something, and while he was gone I appropriated a superb mantle which was
tied fast to the saddle, by untying the thongs, then, utilizing a row of
outbuildings for cover, we made off into the nearest wood. When we had
reached the depths of the grove, where we were in safety, we thoroughly
discussed the surest method of secreting our gold, so that we would
neither be accused of robbery nor robbed ourselves, and we finally
decided to sew it into the hem of a ragged tunic, which I threw over my
shoulders, after having turned the mantle over to Ascyltos for
safekeeping; we then made ready to start for the city via the
unfrequented roads. We were just about to emerge from the shelter of
the wood when we heard, from somewhere on our left, “They can’t get away,
they came into this wood; let’s spread out and beat, and they will easily
be caught!” On hearing this, we were thrown into such a terrible fright
that Ascyltos and Giton dashed away city-ward, through the underbrush,
and I retreated in such a hurry that the precious tunic slipped off my
shoulders without my knowing it. At last, completely fagged out, and
unable to take another step, I lay down under a tree, and there I first
became aware of the loss of the tunic. Chagrin restored my strength and
I leaped to my feet to look for the treasure, and for a long time I beat
around in vain. Worn out with work and vexation, I forced my way into
the thickest part of the grove and remained there for four mortal hours,
but at last, bored to extinction by the horrible solitude, I sought a way
out. As I went ahead, I caught sight of a peasant; then I had need of
all my nerve, and it did not fail me. Marching boldly up to him, I asked
my way to the city, complaining that I had been lost in the wood for
several hours. Seeing my condition, he took pity upon me, for I was
covered with mud and paler than death, and asked me whether I had seen
anyone in the place. “Not a soul,” I replied, whereupon he kindly
conducted me to the high road, where he met two of his companions, who
informed him that they had beaten along every path in the forest without
having found anything except a tunic, which they showed him. As may be
readily supposed, I did not have the audacity to claim it, though well
aware of its value, and my chagrin became almost insupportable as I
vented many a groaning curse over my lost treasure. The peasants paid
no attention to me, and I was gradually left behind, as my weakness
increased my pace decreased. For this reason, it was late when I reached
the city, and, entering the inn, beheld Ascyltos, stretched out, half
dead, upon a cot. Too far gone to utter a single syllable, I threw
myself upon another. Ascyltos became greatly excited at not seeing the
tunic which he had entrusted to me, demanding it insistently, but I was
so weak that my voice refused its office and I permitted the apathy of my
eyes to answer his demand, then, by and by, regaining my strength little
by little, I related the whole affair to Ascyltos, in every detail. He
thought that I was joking, and although my testimony was fortified by a
copious flood of tears, it could easily be seen that he remained
unconvinced, believing that I wanted to cheat him out of the gold.
Giton, who was standing by during all this, was as downcast as myself,
and the suffering of the lad only served to increase my own vexation, but
the thing which bothered me most of all, was the painstaking search which
was being made for us; I told Ascyltos of this, but he only laughed it
off, as he had so happily extricated himself from the scrape. He was
convinced that, as we were unknown and as no one had seen us, we were
perfectly safe. We decided, nevertheless, to feign sickness, and to keep
to our room as long as possible; but, before we knew it, our money ran
out, and spurred by necessity we were forced to go abroad and sell some
of our plunder.)
CHAPTER THE TWELFTH.
Twilight was falling, as we entered the market-place, in which we noticed
a quantity of things for sale, not any of much value, it is true, but
such as could be disposed of to the best advantage when the semi-darkness
would serve to hide their doubtful origin. As we had brought our stolen
mantle, we proceeded to make use of so favorable an opportunity, and, in
a secluded spot, displayed a corner of it, hoping the splendid garment
would attract some purchaser. Nor was it long before a certain peasant,
whose face was familiar to my eyes, came up, accompanied by a young
woman, and began to examine the garment very closely. Ascyltos, in turn,
cast a glance at the shoulders of our rustic customer, and was instantly
struck dumb with astonishment. Nor could I myself look upon this man
without some emotion, for he seemed to be the identical person who had
picked up the ragged tunic in the lonely wood, and, as a matter of fact,
he was! Ascyltos, afraid to believe the evidence of his own eyes for
fear of doing something rash, approached the man, as a prospective buyer,
took the hem of the tunic from the rustic’s shoulders, and felt it
thoroughly.
CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH.
Oh wonderful stroke of Fortune! The peasant had not yet laid his
meddling hands upon the seams, but was scornfully offering the thing for
sale, as though it had been the leavings of some beggar. When Ascyltos
had assured himself that the hoard was intact, and had taken note of the
social status of the seller, he led me a little aside from the crowd and
said, “Do you know, ‘brother,’ that the treasure about which I was so
worked up has come back to us? That is the little tunic, and it seems
that the gold pieces are still untouched. What ought we to do, and how
shall we make good our claim?” I was overjoyed, not so much at seeing
our booty, as I was for the reason that Fortune had released me from a
very ugly suspicion. I was opposed to doing anything by devious methods,
thinking that should he prove unwilling to restore to the proper owner an
article not his own, it ought to come to a civil action and a judgment
secured.
CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH.
Not so Ascyltos, who was afraid of the law, and demurred, “Who knows us
here? Who will place any credence in anything we say? It seems to me
that it would be better to buy, ours though it is, and we know it, and
recover the treasure at small cost, rather than to engage in a doubtful
lawsuit.”
Of what avail are any laws, where money rules alone,
Where Poverty can never win its cases?
Detractors of the times, who bear the Cynic’s scrip, are known
To often sell the truth, and keep their faces!
So Justice is at public auction bought,
The knight gives judgement as Gold says he ought.
But, with the exception of a two-as piece with which we had intended
purchasing peas and lupines, there was nothing to hand; so, for fear our
loot should escape us in the interim, we resolved to appraise the mantle
at less, and, through a small sacrifice, secure a greater profit.
Accordingly, we spread it out, and the young woman of the covered head,
who was standing by the peasant’s side, narrowly inspected the markings,
seized the hem with both hands, and screamed “Thieves!” at the top of her
voice. We were greatly disconcerted at this and, for fear that
inactivity on our part should seem to lend color to her charges, we
laid hold of the dirty ragged tunic, in our turn, and shouted with equal
spite, that this was our property which they had in their possession; but
our cases were by no means on an equality, and the hucksters who had
crowded around us at the uproar, laughed at our spiteful claim, and very
naturally, too, since one side laid claim to a very valuable mantle,
while the other demanded a rag which was not worth a good patch.
CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH.
Ascyltos, when he had secured silence, adroitly put a stop to their
laughter by exclaiming, “We can see that each puts the greater value upon
his own property. Let them return our tunic to us, and take back their
mantle!” This exchange was satisfactory enough to the peasant and the
young woman, but some night-prowling shyster lawyers, who wished to get
possession of the mantle for their own profit, demanded that both
articles be deposited with them, and the judge could look into the case
on the morrow, for it would appear that the ownership of the articles was
not so much to the point as was the suspicion of robbery that attached
to both sides. The question of sequestration arose, and one of the
hucksters, I do not remember which, but he was bald, and his forehead was
covered with sebaceous wens, and he sometimes did odd jobs for the
lawyers, seized the mantle and vowed that HE would see to it that it was
produced at the proper time and place, but it was easily apparent that he
desired nothing but that the garment should be deposited with thieves,
and vanish; thinking that we would be afraid to appear as claimants for
fear of being charged with crime. As far as we were concerned, we were
as willing as he, and Fortune aided the cause of each of us, for the
peasant, infuriated at our demand that his rags be shown in public, threw
the tunic in Ascyltos’ face, released us from responsibility, and
demanded that the mantle, which was the only object of litigation, be
sequestered. As we thought we had recovered our treasure, we returned
hurriedly to the inn, and fastening the door, we had a good laugh at the
shrewdness of the hucksters, and not less so at that of our enemies, for
by it they had returned our money to us. (While we were unstitching the
tunic to get at the gold pieces, we overheard some one quizzing the
innkeeper as to what kind of people those were, who had just entered his
house. Alarmed at this inquiry, I went down, when the questioner had
gone, to find out what was the matter, and learned that the praetor’s
lictor, whose duty it was to see that the names of strangers were entered
in his rolls, had seen two people come into the inn, whose names were not
yet entered, and that was the reason he had made inquiry as to their
names and means of support. Mine host furnished this information in such
an offhand manner that I became suspicious as to our entire safety in his
house; so, in order to avoid arrest, we decided to go out, and not to
return home until after dark, and we sallied forth, leaving the
management of dinner to Giton. As it suited our purpose to avoid the
public streets, we strolled through the more unfrequented parts of the
city, and just at dusk we met two women in stolas, in a lonely spot, and
they were by no means homely. Walking softly, we followed them to a
temple which they entered, and from which we could hear a curious
humming, which resembled the sound of voices issuing from the depths of a
cavern. Curiosity impelled us also to enter the temple. There we caught
sight of many women, who resembled Bacchantes, each of whom brandished in
her right hand an emblem of Priapus. We were not permitted to see more,
for as their eyes fell upon us, they raised such a hubbub that the vault
of the temple trembled. They attempted to lay hands upon us, but we ran
back to our inn as fast as we could go.)
CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH.
We had just disposed of the supper prepared by Giton, when there came a
timid rapping at the door. We turned pale. “Who is there?” we asked.
“Open and you will find out,” came the answer. While we were speaking,
the bar fell down of its own accord, the doors flew open and admitted our
visitor. She was the selfsame young lady of the covered head who had but
a little while before stood by the peasant’s side. “So you thought,”
said she, “that you could make a fool of me, did you? I am Quartilla’s
handmaid: Quartilla, whose rites you interrupted in the shrine. She has
come to the inn, in person, and begs permission to speak with you. Don’t
be alarmed! She neither blames your mistake nor does she demand
punishment; on the contrary, she wonders what god has brought such
well-bred young gentlemen into her neighborhood!”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH.
We were still holding our tongues and refraining from any expression of
opinion, when the lady herself entered the room, attended by a little
girl. Seating herself upon the bed, she wept for a long time. Not even
then did we interject a single word, but waited, all attention, for what
was to follow these well ordered tears and this show of grief. When the
diplomatic thunderstorm had passed over, she withdrew her haughty head
from her mantle and, ringing her hands until the joints cracked, “What is
the meaning of such audacity?” she demanded; “where did you learn such
tricks? They are worthy of putting to shame the assurance of all the
robbers of the past! I pity you, so help me the God of Truth, I do; for
no one can look with impunity upon that which it is unlawful for him to
see. In our neighborhood, there are so many gods that it is easier to
meet one than it is to find a man! But do not think that I was actuated
by any desire for revenge when I came here: I am more moved by your age
than I am by my own injury, for it is my belief that youthful imprudence
led you into committing a sacrilegious crime. That very night, I tossed
so violently in the throes of a dangerous chill that I was afraid I had
contracted a tertian ague, and in my dreams I prayed for a medicine. I
was ordered to seek you out, and to arrest the progress of the disease by
means of an expedient to be suggested by your wonderful penetration! The
cure does not matter so much, however, for a deeper grief gnaws at my
vitals and drags me down, almost to the very doors of death itself. I am
afraid that, with the careless impulsiveness of youth, you may divulge,
to the common herd, what you witnessed in the shrine of Priapus, and
reveal the rites of the gods to the rabble. On this account, I stretch
out my suppliant hands to your knees, and beg and pray that you do not
make a mockery and a joke of our nocturnal rites, nor lay bare the
secrets of so many years, into which scarcely a thousand persons are
initiated.”
CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH.
The tears poured forth again, after this appeal, and, shaken by deep
sobs, she buried her whole face and breast in my bed; and I, moved by
pity and by apprehension, begged her to be of good cheer and to make
herself perfectly easy as to both of those issues, for not only would we
not betray any secrets to the rabble, but we would also second divine
providence, at any peril to ourselves, if any god had indicated to her
any cure for her tertian ague. The woman cheered up at this promise, and
smothered me with kisses; from tears she passed to laughter, and fell to
running her fingers through the long hair that hung down about my ears.
“I will declare a truce with you,” she said, “and withdraw my complaint.
But had you been unwilling to administer the medicine which I seek, I had
a troop in readiness for the morrow, which would have exacted
satisfaction for my injury and reparation for my dignity!
To be flouted is disgraceful, but to dictate terms, sublime
Pleased am I to choose what course I will,
Even sages will retort an insult at the proper time.
Victor most is he who does not kill.”
Then she suddenly clapped her hands, and broke into such a peal of
laughter that we were alarmed. The maid, who had been the first to
arrive, did likewise, on one side of us, as also did the little girl who
had entered with the madame herself.
CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH.
The whole place was filled with mocking laughter, and we, who could see
no reason for such a change of front, stared blankly at each other and
then at the women. (Then Quartilla spoke up, finally,) “I gave orders
that no mortal man should be admitted into this inn, this day, so that I
could receive the treatment for my ague without interruption!” Ascyltos
was, for the moment, struck dumb by this admission of Quartilla’s, and I
turned colder than a Gallic winter, and could not utter a word; but the
personnel of the company relieved me from the fear that the worst might
be yet to come, for they were only three young women, too weak to attempt
any violence against us, who were of the male sex, at least, even if we
had nothing else of the man about us, and this was an asset. Then, too,
we were girded higher, and I had so arranged matters that if it came to a
fight, I would engage Quartilla myself, Ascyltos the maid, and Giton the
girl. (While I was turning over this plan in my mind, Quartilla came to
close quarters, to receive the treatment for her ague, but having her
hopes disappointed, she flounced out in a rage and, returning in a little
while, she had us overpowered by some unknown vagabonds, and gave orders
for us to be carried away to a splendid palace.) Then our determination
gave place to astonishment, and death, sure and certain, began to obscure
the eyes of suffering.
CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH.
“Pray; madame,” I groaned, “if you have anything worse in store, bring it
on quickly for we have not committed a crime so heinous as to merit death
by torture.” The maid, whose name was Psyche, quickly spread a blanket
upon the floor (and) sought to secure an erection by fondling my member,
which was already a thousand times colder than death. Ascyltos, well
aware by now of the danger of dipping into the secrets of others, covered
his head with his mantle. (In the meantime,) the maid took two ribbons
from her bosom and bound our feet with one and our hands with the other.
(Finding myself trussed up in this fashion, I remarked, “You will not be
able to cure your mistress’ ague in this manner!” “Granted,” the maid
replied, “but I have other and surer remedies at hand,” she brought me a
vessel full of satyrion, as she said this, and so cheerfully did she
gossip about its virtues that I drank down nearly all of the liquor, and
because Ascyltos had but a moment before rejected her advances, she
sprinkled the dregs upon his back, without his knowing it.) When this
repartee had drawn to a close, Ascyltos exclaimed, “Don’t I deserve a
drink?” Given away by my laughter, the maid clapped her hands and cried,
“I put one by you, young man; did you drink so much all by yourself?”
“What’s that you say?”, Quartilla chimed in. “Did Encolpius drink all
the satyrion there was in the house?” And she laughed delightfully until
her sides shook. Finally not even Giton himself could resist a smile,
especially when the little girl caught him around the neck and showered
innumerable kisses upon him, and he not at all averse to it.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIRST.
We would have cried aloud in our misery but there was no one to give us
any help, and whenever I attempted to shout, “Help! all honest
citizens,” Psyche would prick my cheeks with her hairpin, and the little
girl would intimidate Ascyltos with a brush dipped in satyrion. Then a
catamite appeared, clad in a myrtle-colored frieze robe, and girded round
with a belt. One minute he nearly gored us to death with his writhing
buttocks, and the next, he befouled us so with his stinking kisses that
Quartilla, with her robe tucked high, held up her whalebone wand and
ordered him to give the unhappy wretches quarter. Both of us then took a
most solemn oath that so dread a secret should perish with us. Several
wrestling instructors appeared and refreshed us, worn out as we were, by
a massage with pure oil, and when our fatigue had abated, we again donned
our dining clothes and were escorted to the next room, in which were
placed three couches, and where all the essentials necessary to a
splendid banquet were laid out in all their richness. We took our
places, as requested, and began with a wonderful first course. We were
all but submerged in Falernian wine. When several other courses had
followed, and we were endeavoring to keep awake Quartilla exclaimed, “How
dare you think of going to sleep when you know that the vigil of Priapus
is to be kept?”
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND.
Worn out by all his troubles, Ascyltos commenced to nod, and the maid,
whom he had slighted, and of course insulted, smeared lampblack all over
his face, and painted his lips and shoulders with vermillion, while he
drowsed. Completely exhausted by so many untoward adventures, I, too,
was enjoying the shortest of naps, the whole household, within and
without, was doing the same, some were lying here and there asleep at our
feet, others leaned against the walls, and some even slept head to head
upon the threshold itself; the lamps, failing because of a lack of oil,
shed a feeble and flickering light, when two Syrians, bent upon stealing
an amphora of wine, entered the dining-room. While they were greedily
pawing among the silver, they pulled the amphora in two, upsetting the
table with all the silver plate, and a cup, which had flown pretty high,
cut the head of the maid, who was drowsing upon a couch. She screamed at
that, thereby betraying the thieves and wakening some of the drunkards.
The Syrians, who had come for plunder, seeing that they were about to be
detected, were so quick to throw themselves down besides a couch and
commence to snore as if they had been asleep for a long time, that you
would have thought they belonged there. The butler had gotten up and
poured oil in the flickering lamps by this time, and the boys, having
rubbed their eyes open, had returned to their duty, when in came a female
cymbal player and the crashing brass awoke everybody.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-THIRD.
The banquet began all over again, and Quartilla challenged us to a
drinking-bout, the crash of the cymbals lending ardor to her revel.
A catamite appeared, the stalest of all mankind, well worthy of that
house. Heaving a sigh, he wrung his hands until the joints cracked,
and spouted out the following verses,
“Hither, hither quickly gather, pathic companions boon;
Artfully stretch forth your limbs and on with the dance and play!
Twinkling feet and supple thighs and agile buttocks in tune,
Hands well skilled in raising passions, Delian eunuchs gay!”
When he had finished his poetry, he slobbered a most evil-smelling kiss
upon me, and then, climbing upon my couch, he proceeded with all his
might and main to pull all of my clothing off. I resisted to the limit
of my strength. He manipulated my member for a long time, but all in
vain. Gummy streams poured down his sweating forehead, and there was so
much chalk in the wrinkles of his cheeks that you might have mistaken his
face for a roofless wall, from which the plaster was crumbling in a rain.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FOURTH.
Driven to the last extremity, I could no longer keep back the tears.
“Madame,” I burst out, “is this the night-cap which you ordered served to
me?” Clapping her hands softly she cried out, “Oh you witty rogue, you
are a fountain of repartee, but you never knew before that a catamite was
called a k-night-cap, now did you?” Then, fearing my companion would come
off better than I, “Madame,” I said, “I leave it to your sense of
fairness: is Ascyltos to be the only one in this dining-room who keeps
holiday?” “Fair enough,” conceded Quartilla, “let Ascyltos have his
k-night-cap too!” On hearing that, the catamite changed mounts, and,
having bestridden my comrade, nearly drove him to distraction with his
buttocks and his kisses. Giton was standing between us and splitting his
sides with laughter when Quartilla noticed him, and actuated by the
liveliest curiosity, she asked whose boy he was, and upon my answering
that he was my “brother,” “Why has he not kissed me then?” she
demanded. Calling him to her, she pressed a kiss upon his mouth, then
putting her hand beneath his robe, she took hold of his little member, as
yet so undeveloped. “This,” she remarked, “shall serve me very well
tomorrow, as a whet to my appetite, but today I’ll take no common fare
after choice fish!”
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIFTH.
She was still talking when Psyche, who was giggling, came to her side and
whispered something in her ear. What it was, I did not catch. “By all
means,” ejaculated Quartilla, “a brilliant idea! Why shouldn’t our
pretty little Pannychis lose her maidenhead when the opportunity is so
favorable?” A little girl, pretty enough, too, was led in at once; she
looked to be not over seven years of age, and she was the same one who
had before accompanied Quartilla to our room. Amidst universal applause,
and in response to the demands of all, they made ready to perform the
nuptial rites. I was completely out of countenance, and insisted that
such a modest boy as Giton was entirely unfitted for such a wanton part,
and moreover, that the child was not of an age at which she could receive
that which a woman must take. “Is that so,” Quartilla scoffed, “is she
any younger than I was, when I submitted to my first man? Juno, my
patroness, curse me if I can remember the time when I ever was a virgin,
for I diverted myself with others of my own age, as a child then as the
years passed, I played with bigger boys, until at last I reached my
present age. I suppose that this explains the origin of the proverb,
‘Who carried the calf may carry the bull,’ as they say.” As I feared
that Giton might run greater risk if I were absent, I got up to take
part in the ceremony.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH.
Psyche had already enveloped the child’s head in the bridal-veil, the
catamite, holding a torch, led the long procession of drunken women which
followed; they were clapping their hands, having previously decked out
the bridal-bed with a suggestive drapery. Quartilla, spurred on by the
wantonness of the others, seized hold of Giton and drew him into the
bridal-chamber. There was no doubt of the boy’s perfect willingness to
go, nor was the girl at all alarmed at the name of marriage. When they
were finally in bed, and the door shut, we seated ourselves outside the
door of the bridal-chamber, and Quartilla applied a curious eye to a
chink, purposely made, watching their childish dalliance with lascivious
attention. She then drew me gently over to her side that I might share
the spectacle with her, and when we both attempted to peep our faces were
pressed against each other; whenever she was not engrossed in the
performance, she screwed up her lips to meet mine, and pecked at me
continually with furtive kisses. [A thunderous hammering was heard at
the door, while all this was going on, and everyone wondered what this
unexpected interruption could mean, when we saw a soldier, one of the
night-watch, enter with a drawn sword in his hand, and surrounded by a
crowd of young rowdies. He glared about him with savage eyes and
blustering mien, and, catching sight of Quartilla, presently, “What’s up
now, you shameless woman,” he bawled; “what do you mean by making game of
me with lying promises, and cheating me out of the night you promised me?
But you won’t get off unpunished! You and that lover of yours are going to
find out that I’m a man!” At the soldier’s orders, his companion bound
Quartilla and myself together, mouth to mouth, breast to breast, and
thigh to thigh; and not without a great deal of laughter. Then the
catamite, also at the soldier’s order, began to beslaver me all over with
the fetid kisses of his stinking mouth, a treatment I could neither fly
from, nor in any other way avoid. Finally, he ravished me, and worked
his entire pleasure upon me. In the meantime, the satyrion which I had
drunk only a little while before spurred every nerve to lust and I began
to gore Quartilla impetuously, and she, burning with the same passion,
reciprocated in the game. The rowdies laughed themselves sick, so moved
were they by that ludicrous scene, for here was I, mounted by the stalest
of catamites, involuntarily and almost unconsciously responding with as
rapid a cadence to him as Quartilla did in her wriggling under me. While
this was going on, Pannychis, unaccustomed at her tender years to the
pastime of Venus, raised an outcry and attracted the attention of the
soldier, by this unexpected howl of consternation, for this slip of a
girl was being ravished, and Giton the victor, had won a not bloodless
victory. Aroused by what he saw, the soldier rushed upon them, seizing
Pannychis, then Giton, then both of them together, in a crushing embrace.
The virgin burst into tears and plead with him to remember her age, but
her prayers availed her nothing, the soldier only being fired the more by
her childish charms. Pannychis covered her head at last, resolved to
endure whatever the Fates had in store for her. At this instant, an old
woman, the very same who had tricked me on that day when I was hunting
for our lodging, came to the aid of Pannychis, as though she had dropped
from the clouds. With loud cries, she rushed into the house, swearing
that a gang of footpads was prowling about the neighborhood and the
people invoked the help of “All honest men,” in vain, for the members of
the night-watch were either asleep or intent upon some carouse, as they
were nowhere to be found. Greatly terrified at this, the soldier rushed
headlong from Quartilla’s house. His companions followed after him,
freeing Pannychis from impending danger and relieving the rest of us from
our fear.] (I was so weary of Quartilla’s lechery that I began to
meditate means of escape. I made my intentions known to Ascyltos, who,
as he wished to rid himself of the importunities of Psyche, was
delighted; had not Giton been shut up in the bridal-chamber, the plan
would have presented no difficulties, but we wished to take him with us,
and out of the way of the viciousness of these prostitutes. We were
anxiously engaged in debating this very point, when Pannychis fell out of
bed, and dragged Giton after her, by her own weight. He was not hurt,
but the girl gave her head a slight bump, and raised such a clamor that
Quartilla, in a terrible fright, rushed headlong into the room, giving us
the opportunity of making off. We did not tarry, but flew back to our
inn where,) throwing ourselves upon the bed, we passed the remainder of
the night without fear. (Sallying forth next day, we came upon two of
our kidnappers, one of whom Ascyltos savagely attacked the moment he set
eyes upon him, and, after having thrashed and seriously wounded him,
he ran to my aid against the other. He defended himself so stoutly,
however, that he wounded us both, slightly, and escaped unscathed.) The
third day had now dawned, the date set for the free dinner (at
Trimalchio’s,) but battered as we were, flight seemed more to our taste
than quiet, so (we hastened to our inn and, as our wounds turned out to
be trifling, we dressed them with vinegar and oil, and went to bed. The
ruffian whom we had done for, was still lying upon the ground and we
feared detection.) Affairs were at this pass, and we were framing
melancholy excuses with which to evade the coming revel, when a slave of
Agamemnon’s burst in upon our trembling conclave and said, “Don’t you
know with whom your engagement is today? The exquisite Trimalchio, who
keeps a clock and a liveried bugler in his dining-room, so that he can
tell, instantly, how much of his life has run out!” Forgetting all our
troubles at that, we dressed hurriedly and ordered Giton, who had very
willingly performed his servile office, to follow us to the bath.
ETEXT EDITOR’S BOOKMARKS:
Boys play in the schools, the young men are laughed at
Deferred pleasures are a long time coming
Egyptians “commercialized” that incomparable art
Errors committed in the name of religion
Everything including the children, is devoted to ambition
Laughed ourselves out of a most disgraceful quarrel
No one will confess the errors he was taught in his school days
Priests, animated by an hypocritical mania for prophecy
See or hear nothing at all of the affairs of every-day life
The teachers, who must gibber with lunatics
They secure their ends, save by setting snares for the ears
VOLUME 2.--THE DINNER OF TRIMALCHIO
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH.
Having put on our clothes, in the meantime, we commenced to stroll around
and soon, the better to amuse ourselves, approached the circle of
players; all of a sudden we caught sight of a bald-headed old fellow,
rigged out in a russet colored tunic, playing ball with some long haired
boys. It was not so much the boys who attracted our attention, although
they might well have merited it, as it was the spectacle afforded by this
beslippered paterfamilias playing with a green ball. If one but touched
the ground, he never stooped for it to put it back in play; for a slave
stood by with a bagful from which the players were supplied. We noted
other innovations as well, for two eunuchs were stationed at opposite
sides of the ring, one of whom held a silver chamber-pot, the other
counted the balls; not those which bounced back and forth from hand to
hand, in play, but those which fell to the ground. While we were
marveling at this display of refinement, Menelaus rushed up, “He is the
one with whom you will rest upon your elbow,” he panted, “what you see
now, is only a prelude to the dinner.” Menelaus had scarcely ceased
speaking when Trimalchio snapped his fingers; the eunuch, hearing the
signal, held the chamber-pot for him while he still continued playing.
After relieving his bladder, he called for water to wash his hands,
barely moistened his fingers, and dried them upon a boy’s head.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH.
To go into details would take too long. We entered the bath, finally,
and after sweating for a minute or two in the warm room, we passed
through into the cold water. But short as was the time, Trimalchio had
already been sprinkled with perfume and was being rubbed down, not with
linen towels, however, but with cloths made from the finest wool.
Meanwhile, three masseurs were guzzling Falernian under his eyes, and
when they spilled a great deal of it in their brawling, Trimalchio
declared they were pouring a libation to his Genius. He was then wrapped
in a coarse scarlet wrap-rascal, and placed in a litter. Four runners,
whose liveries were decorated with metal plates, preceded him, as also
did a wheel-chair in which rode his favorite, a withered, blear eyed
slave, even more repulsive looking than his master. A singing boy
approached the head of his litter, as he was being carried along, and
played upon small pipes the whole way, just as if he were communicating
some secret to his master’s ear. Marveling greatly, we followed, and met
Agamemnon at the outer door, to the post of which was fastened a small
tablet bearing this inscription:
NO SLAVE TO LEAVE THE PREMISES
WITHOUT PERMISSION FROM THE MASTER.
PENALTY ONE HUNDRED LASHES.
In the vestibule stood the porter, clad in green and girded with a
cherry-colored belt, shelling peas into a silver dish. Above the
threshold was suspended a golden cage, from which a black and white
magpie greeted the visitors.
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-NINTH.
I almost fell backwards and broke my legs while staring at all this, for
to the left, as we entered, not far from the porter’s alcove, an enormous
dog upon a chain was painted upon the wall, and above him this
inscription, in capitals:
BEWARE THE DOG.
My companions laughed, but I plucked up my courage and did not hesitate,
but went on and examined the entire wall. There was a scene in a slave
market, the tablets hanging from the slaves’ necks, and Trimalchio
himself, wearing his hair long, holding a caduceus in his hand, entering
Rome, led by the hand of Minerva. Then again the painstaking artist had
depicted him casting up accounts, and still again, being appointed
steward; everything being explained by inscriptions. Where the walls
gave way to the portico, Mercury was shown lifting him up by the chin,
to a tribunal placed on high. Near by stood Fortune with her horn of
plenty, and the three Fates, spinning golden flax. I also took note of a
group of runners, in the portico, taking their exercise under the eye of
an instructor, and in one corner was a large cabinet, in which was a very
small shrine containing silver Lares, a marble Venus, and a golden casket
by no means small, which held, so they told us, the first shavings of
Trimalchio’s beard. I asked the hall-porter what pictures were in the
middle hall. “The Iliad and the Odyssey,” he replied, “and the
gladiatorial games given under Laenas.” There was no time in which to
examine them all.
CHAPTER THE THIRTIETH.
We had now come to the dining-room, at the entrance to which sat a
factor, receiving accounts, and, what gave me cause for astonishment,
rods and axes were fixed to the door-posts, superimposed, as it were,
upon the bronze beak of a ship, whereon was inscribed:
TO GAIUS POMPEIUS TRIMALCHIO
AUGUSTAL, SEVIR
FROM CINNAMUS HIS
STEWARD.
A double lamp, suspended from the ceiling, hung beneath the inscription,
and a tablet was fixed to each door-post; one, if my memory serves me,
was inscribed,
ON DECEMBER THIRTIETH AND
THIRTY FIRST
OUR
GAIUS DINES OUT
the other bore a painting of the moon in her phases, and the seven
planets, and the days which were lucky and those which were unlucky,
distinguished by distinctive studs. We had had enough of these novelties
and started to enter the dining-room when a slave, detailed to this duty,
cried out, “Right foot first.” Naturally, we were afraid that some of us
might break some rule of conduct and cross the threshold the wrong way;
nevertheless, we started out, stepping off together with the right foot,
when all of a sudden, a slave who had been stripped, threw himself at our
feet, and commenced begging us to save him from punishment, as it was no
serious offense for which he was in jeopardy; the steward’s clothing had
been stolen from him in the baths, and the whole value could scarcely
amount to ten sesterces. So we drew back our right feet and intervened
with the steward, who was counting gold pieces in the hall, begging him
to remit the slave’s punishment. Putting a haughty face on the matter,
“It’s not the loss I mind so much,” he said, “as it is the carelessness
of this worthless rascal. He lost my dinner clothes, given me on my
birthday they were, by a certain client, Tyrian purple too, but it had
been washed once already. But what does it amount to? I make you a
present of the scoundrel!”
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-FIRST.
We felt deeply obligated by his great condescension, and the same
slave for whom we had interceded, rushed up to us as we entered the
dining-room, and to our astonishment, kissed us thick and fast, voicing
his thanks for our kindness. “You’ll know in a minute whom you did a
favor for,” he confided, “the master’s wine is the thanks of a grateful
butler!” At length we reclined, and slave boys from Alexandria poured
water cooled with snow upon our hands, while others following, attended
to our feet and removed the hangnails with wonderful dexterity, nor were
they silent even during this disagreeable operation, but they all kept
singing at their work. I was desirous of finding out whether the whole
household could sing, so I ordered a drink; a boy near at hand instantly
repeated my order in a singsong voice fully as shrill, and whichever one
you accosted did the same. You would not imagine that this was the
dining-room of a private gentleman, but rather that it was an exhibition
of pantomimes. A very inviting relish was brought on, for by now all the
couches were occupied save only that of Trimalchio, for whom, after a new
custom, the chief place was reserved.
On the tray stood a donkey made of Corinthian bronze, bearing panniers
containing olives, white in one and black in the other. Two platters
flanked the figure, on the margins of which were engraved Trimalchio’s
name and the weight of the silver in each. Dormice sprinkled with
poppy-seed and honey were served on little bridges soldered fast to the
platter, and hot sausages on a silver gridiron, underneath which were
damson plums and pomegranate seeds.
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-SECOND.
We were in the midst of these delicacies when, to the sound of music,
Trimalchio himself was carried in and bolstered up in a nest of small
cushions, which forced a snicker from the less wary. A shaven poll
protruded from a scarlet mantle, and around his neck, already muffled
with heavy clothing, he had tucked a napkin having a broad purple stripe
and a fringe that hung down all around. On the little finger of his left
hand he wore a massive gilt ring, and on the first joint of the next
finger, a smaller one which seemed to me to be of pure gold, but as a
matter of fact it had iron stars soldered on all around it. And then,
for fear all of his finery would not be displayed, he bared his right
arm, adorned with a golden arm-band and an ivory circlet clasped with a
plate of shining metal.
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-THIRD.
Picking his teeth with a silver quill, “Friends,” said he, “it was not
convenient for me to come into the dining-room just yet, but for fear my
absence should cause you any inconvenience, I gave over my own pleasure:
permit me, however, to finish my game.” A slave followed with a
terebinth table and crystal dice, and I noted one piece of luxury that
was superlative; for instead of black and white pieces, he used gold and
silver coins. He kept up a continual flow of various coarse expressions.
We were still dallying with the relishes when a tray was brought in, on
which was a basket containing a wooden hen with her wings rounded and
spread out as if she were brooding. Two slaves instantly approached, and
to the accompaniment of music, commenced to feel around in the straw.
They pulled out some pea-hen’s eggs, which they distributed among the
diners. Turning his head, Trimalchio saw what was going on. “Friends,”
he remarked. “I ordered pea-hen’s eggs set under the hen, but I’m afraid
they’re addled, by Hercules I am let’s try them anyhow, and see if
they’re still fit to suck.” We picked up our spoons, each of which
weighed not less than half a pound, and punctured the shells, which were
made of flour and dough, and as a matter of fact, I very nearly threw
mine away for it seemed to me that a chick had formed already, but upon
hearing an old experienced guest vow, “There must be something good
here,” I broke open the shell with my hand and discovered a fine fat
fig-pecker, imbedded in a yolk seasoned with pepper.
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-FOURTH.
Having finished his game, Trimalchio was served with a helping of
everything and was announcing in a loud voice his willingness to join
anyone in a second cup of honied wine, when, to a flourish of music, the
relishes were suddenly whisked away by a singing chorus, but a small dish
happened to fall to the floor, in the scurry, and a slave picked it up.
Seeing this, Trimalchio ordered that the boy be punished by a box on the
ear, and made him throw it down again; a janitor followed with his broom
and swept the silver dish away among the litter. Next followed two
long-haired Ethiopians, carrying small leather bottles, such as are
commonly seen in the hands of those who sprinkle sand in the arena, and
poured wine upon our hands, for no one offered us water. When
complimented upon these elegant extras, the host cried out, “Mars loves
a fair fight: and so I ordered each one a separate table: that way these
stinking slaves won’t make us so hot with their crowding.” Some glass
bottles carefully sealed with gypsum were brought in at that instant; a
label bearing this inscription was fastened to the neck of each one:
OPIMIAN FALERNIAN
ONE HUNDRED YEARS OLD.
While we were studying the labels, Trimalchio clapped his hands and
cried, “Ah me! To think that wine lives longer than poor little man.
Let’s fill ‘em up! There’s life in wine and this is the real Opimian,
you can take my word for that. I offered no such vintage yesterday,
though my guests were far more respectable.” We were tippling away and
extolling all these elegant devices, when a slave brought in a silver
skeleton, so contrived that the joints and movable vertebra could be
turned in any direction. He threw it down upon the table a time or two,
and its mobile articulation caused it to assume grotesque attitudes,
whereupon Trimalchio chimed in:
“Poor man is nothing in the scheme of things
And Orcus grips us and to Hades flings
Our bones! This skeleton before us here
Is as important as we ever were!
Let’s live then while we may and life is dear.”
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-FIFTH.
The applause was followed by a course which, by its oddity, drew every
eye, but it did not come up to our expectations. There was a circular
tray around which were displayed the signs of the zodiac, and upon each
sign the caterer had placed the food best in keeping with it. Ram’s
vetches on Aries, a piece of beef on Taurus, kidneys and lamb’s fry on
Gemini, a crown on Cancer, the womb of an unfarrowed sow on Virgo, an
African fig on Leo, on Libra a balance, one pan of which held a tart and
the other a cake, a small seafish on Scorpio, a bull’s eye on
Sagittarius, a sea lobster on Capricornus, a goose on Aquarius and two
mullets on Pisces. In the middle lay a piece of cut sod upon which
rested a honeycomb with the grass arranged around it. An Egyptian slave
passed bread around from a silver oven and in a most discordant voice
twisted out a song in the manner of the mime in the musical farce called
Laserpitium. Seeing that we were rather depressed at the prospect of
busying ourselves with such vile fare, Trimalchio urged us to fall to:
“Let us fall to, gentlemen, I beg of you, this is only the sauce!”
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-SIXTH.
While he was speaking, four dancers ran in to the time of the music,
and removed the upper part of the tray. Beneath, on what seemed to be
another tray, we caught sight of stuffed capons and sows’ bellies, and in
the middle, a hare equipped with wings to resemble Pegasus. At the
corners of the tray we also noted four figures of Marsyas and from their
bladders spouted a highly spiced sauce upon fish which were swimming
about as if in a tide-race. All of us echoed the applause which was
started by the servants, and fell to upon these exquisite delicacies,
with a laugh. “Carver,” cried Trimalchio, no less delighted with the
artifice practised upon us, and the carver appeared immediately. Timing
his strokes to the beat of the music he cut up the meat in such a fashion
as to lead you to think that a gladiator was fighting from a chariot to
the accompaniment of a water-organ. Every now and then Trimalchio would
repeat “Carver, Carver,” in a low voice, until I finally came to the
conclusion that some joke was meant in repeating a word so frequently, so
I did not scruple to question him who reclined above me. As he had often
experienced byplay of this sort he explained, “You see that fellow who is
carving the meat, don’t you? Well, his name is Carver. Whenever
Trimalchio says Carver, carve her, by the same word, he both calls and
commands!”
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-SEVENTH.
I could eat no more, so I turned to my whilom informant to learn as much
as I could and sought to draw him out with far-fetched gossip. I
inquired who that woman could be who was scurrying about hither and yon
in such a fashion. “She’s called Fortunata,” he replied. “She’s the
wife of Trimalchio, and she measures her money by the peck. And only a
little while ago, what was she! May your genius pardon me, but you would
not have been willing to take a crust of bread from her hand. Now,
without rhyme or reason, she’s in the seventh heaven and is Trimalchio’s
factotum, so much so that he would believe her if she told him it was
dark when it was broad daylight! As for him, he don’t know how rich he
is, but this harlot keeps an eye on everything and where you least expect
to find her, you’re sure to run into her. She’s temperate, sober, full
of good advice, and has many good qualities, but she has a scolding
tongue, a very magpie on a sofa, those she likes, she likes, but those
she dislikes, she dislikes! Trimalchio himself has estates as broad as
the flight of a kite is long, and piles of money. There’s more silver
plate lying in his steward’s office than other men have in their whole
fortunes! And as for slaves, damn me if I believe a tenth of them knows
the master by sight. The truth is, that these stand-a-gapes are so much
in awe of him that any one of them would step into a fresh dunghill
without ever knowing it, at a mere nod from him!”
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-EIGHTH.
“And don’t you get the idea that he buys anything; everything is produced
at home, wool, pitch, pepper, if you asked for hen’s milk you would get
it. Because he wanted his wool to rival other things in quality, he
bought rams at Tarentum and sent ‘em into his flocks with a slap on the
arse. He had bees brought from Attica, so he could produce Attic honey
at home, and, as a side issue, so he could improve the native bees by
crossing with the Greek. He even wrote to India for mushroom seed one
day, and he hasn’t a single mule that wasn’t sired by a wild ass. Do you
see all those cushions? Not a single one but what is stuffed with either
purple or scarlet wool! He hasn’t anything to worry about! Look out how
you criticise those other fellow-freedmen-friends of his, they’re all
well heeled. See the fellow reclining at the bottom of the end couch?
He’s worth his 800,000 any day, and he rose from nothing. Only a short
while ago he had to carry faggots on his own back. I don’t know how true
it is, but they say that he snatched off an Incubo’s hat and found a
treasure! For my part, I don’t envy any man anything that was given him
by a god. He still carries the marks of his box on the ear, and he isn’t
wishing himself any bad luck! He posted this notice, only the other day:
CAIUS POMPONIUS DIOGENES HAS
PURCHASED A HOUSE
THIS GARRET FOR RENT AFTER
THE KALENDS OF JULY.
“What do you think of the fellow in the freedman’s place? He has a good
front, too, hasn’t he? And he has a right to. He saw his fortune
multiplied tenfold, but he lost heavily through speculation at the last.
I don’t think he can call his very hair his own, and it is no fault of
his either, by Hercules, it isn’t. There’s no better fellow anywhere; his
rascally freedmen cheated him out of everything. You know very well how
it is; everybody’s business is nobody’s business, and once let business
affairs start to go wrong, your friends will stand from under! Look at
the fix he’s in, and think what a fine trade he had! He used to be an
undertaker. He dined like a king, boars roasted whole in their shaggy
hides, bakers’ pastries, birds, cooks and bakers! More wine was spilled
under his table than another has in his wine cellar. His life was like a
pipe dream, not like an ordinary mortal’s. When his affairs commenced to
go wrong, and he was afraid his creditors would guess that he was
bankrupt, he advertised an auction and this was his placard:
JULIUS PROCULUS WILL SELL AT
AUCTION HIS SUPERFLUOUS
FURNITURE”
CHAPTER THE THIRTY-NINTH.
Trimalchio broke in upon this entertaining gossip, for the course had
been removed and the guests, happy with wine, had started a general
conversation: lying back upon his couch, “You ought to make this wine go
down pleasantly,” he said, “the fish must have something to swim in. But
I say, you didn’t think I’d be satisfied with any such dinner as you saw
on the top of that tray? ‘Is Ulysses no better known?’ Well, well, we
shouldn’t forget our culture, even at dinner. May the bones of my patron
rest in peace, he wanted me to become a man among men. No one can show
me anything new, and that little tray has proved it. This heaven where
the gods live, turns into as many different signs, and sometimes into the
Ram: therefore, whoever is born under that sign will own many flocks and
much wool, a hard head, a shameless brow, and a sharp horn. A great many
school-teachers and rambunctious butters-in are born under that sign.”
We applauded the wonderful penetration of our astrologer and he ran on,
“Then the whole heaven turns into a bull-calf and the kickers and
herdsmen and those who see to it that their own bellies are full, come
into the world. Teams of horses and oxen are born under the Twins, and
well-hung wenchers and those who bedung both sides of the wall. I was
born under the Crab and therefore stand on many legs and own much
property on land and sea, for the crab is as much at home on one as he is
in the other. For that reason, I put nothing on that sign for fear of
weighing down my own destiny. Bulldozers and gluttons are born under the
Lion, and women and fugitives and chain-gangs are born under the Virgin.
Butchers and perfumers are born under the Balance, and all who think that
it is their business to straighten things out. Poisoners and assassins
are born under the Scorpion. Cross-eyed people who look at the
vegetables and sneak away with the bacon, are born under the Archer.
Horny-handed sons of toil are born under Capricorn. Bartenders and
pumpkin-heads are born under the Water-Carrier. Caterers and
rhetoricians are born under the Fishes: and so the world turns round,
just like a mill, and something bad always comes to the top, and men are
either being born or else they’re dying. As to the sod and the honeycomb
in the middle, for I never do anything without a reason, Mother Earth is
in the centre, round as an egg, and all that is good is found in her,
just like it is in a honeycomb.”
CHAPTER THE FORTIETH.
“Bravo!” we yelled, and, with hands uplifted to the ceiling, we swore
that such fellows as Hipparchus and Aratus were not to be compared with
him. At length some slaves came in who spread upon the couches some
coverlets upon which were embroidered nets and hunters stalking their
game with boar-spears, and all the paraphernalia of the chase. We knew
not what to look for next, until a hideous uproar commenced, just outside
the dining-room door, and some Spartan hounds commenced to run around the
table all of a sudden. A tray followed them, upon which was served a
wild boar of immense size, wearing a liberty cap upon its head, and from
its tusks hung two little baskets of woven palm fibre, one of which
contained Syrian dates, the other, Theban. Around it hung little
suckling pigs made from pastry, signifying that this was a brood-sow with
her pigs at suck. It turned out that these were souvenirs intended to be
taken home. When it came to carving the boar, our old friend Carver, who
had carved the capons, did not appear, but in his place a great bearded
giant, with bands around his legs, and wearing a short hunting cape in
which a design was woven. Drawing his hunting-knife, he plunged it
fiercely into the boar’s side, and some thrushes flew out of the gash.
fowlers, ready with their rods, caught them in a moment, as they
fluttered around the room and Trimalchio ordered one to each guest,
remarking, “Notice what fine acorns this forest-bred boar fed on,” and as
he spoke, some slaves removed the little baskets from the tusks and
divided the Syrian and Theban dates equally among the diners.
CHAPTER THE FORTY-FIRST.
Getting a moment to myself, in the meantime, I began to speculate as to
why the boar had come with a liberty cap upon his head. After exhausting
my invention with a thousand foolish guesses, I made bold to put the
riddle which teased me to my old informant. “Why, sure,” he replied,
“even your slave could explain that; there’s no riddle, everything’s as
plain as day! This boar made his first bow as the last course of
yesterday’s dinner and was dismissed by the guests, so today he comes
back as a freedman!” I damned my stupidity and refrained from asking any
more questions for fear I might leave the impression that I had never
dined among decent people before. While we were speaking, a handsome
boy, crowned with vine leaves and ivy, passed grapes around, in a little
basket, and impersonated Bacchus-happy, Bacchus-drunk, and
Bacchus-dreaming, reciting, in the meantime, his master’s verses, in a
shrill voice. Trimalchio turned to him and said, “Dionisus, be thou
Liber,” whereupon the boy immediately snatched the cap from the boar’s
head, and put it upon his own. At that Trimalchio added, “You can’t
deny that my father’s middle name was Liber!” We applauded Trimalchio’s
conceit heartily, and kissed the boy as he went around. Trimalchio
retired to the close-stool, after this course, and we, having freedom of
action with the tyrant away, began to draw the other guests out. After
calling for a bowl of wine, Dama spoke up, “A day’s nothing at all: it’s
night before you can turn around, so you can’t do better than to go
right to the dining-room from your bed. It’s been so cold that I can
hardly get warm in a bath, but a hot drink’s as good as an overcoat:
I’ve had some long pegs, and between you and me, I’m a bit groggy; the
booze has gone to my head.”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-SECOND.
Here Seleucus took up the tale. “I don’t bathe every day,” he confided,
“a bath uses you up like a fuller: water’s got teeth and your strength
wastes away a little every day; but when I’ve downed a pot of mead, I
tell the cold to suck my cock! I couldn’t bathe today anyway, because I
was at a funeral; dandy fellow, he was too, good old Chrysanthus slipped
his wind! Why, only the other day he said “Good morning’ to me, and I
almost think I’m talking to him now! Gawd’s truth, we’re only blown-up
bladders strutting around, we’re less than flies, for they have some good
in them, but we’re only bubbles. And supposing he had not kept to such a
low diet! Why, not a drop of water or a crumb of bread so much as passed
his lips for five days; and yet he joined the majority! Too many doctors
did away with him, or rather, his time had come, for a doctor’s not good
for anything except for a consolation to your mind! He was well carried
out, anyhow, in the very bed he slept in during his lifetime. And he was
covered with a splendid pall: the mourning was tastefully managed; he had
freed some slaves; even though his wife was sparing with her tears: and
what if he hadn’t treated her so well! But when you come to women, women
all belong to the kite species: no one ought to waste a good turn upon
one of them; it’s just like throwing it down a well! An old love’s like
a cancer!”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-THIRD.
He was becoming very tiresome, and Phileros cried out, “Let’s think about
the living! He has what was coming to him, he lived respectably, and
respectably he died. What’s he got to kick about’? He made his pile
from an as, and would pick a quadrans out of a dunghill with his teeth,
any old time. And he grew richer and richer, of course: just like a
honeycomb. I expect that he left all of a hundred thousand, by Hercules,
I do! All in cold cash, too; but I’ve eaten dog’s tongue and must speak
the truth: he was foul-mouthed, had a ready tongue, he was a trouble
maker and no man. Now his brother was a good fellow, a friend to his
friend, free-handed, and he kept a liberal table. He picked a loser at
the start, but his first vintage set him upon his legs, for he sold his
wine at the figure he demanded, and, what made him hold his head higher
still, he came into a legacy from which he stole more than had been left
to him. Then that fool friend of yours, in a fit of anger at his
brother, willed his property away to some son-of-a-bitch or other, who
he was, I don’t know, but when a man runs away from his own kin, he has
a long way to go! And what’s more, he had some slaves who were
ear-specialists at the keyhole, and they did him a lot of harm, for a man
won’t prosper when he believes, on the spot, every tale that he hears; a
man in business, especially. Still, he had a good time as long as he
lived: for happy’s the fellow who gets the gift, not the one it was meant
for. He sure was Fortune’s son! Lead turned to gold in his hands. It’s
easy enough when everything squares up and runs on schedule. How old
would you think he was? Seventy and over, but he was as tough as horn,
carried his age well, and was as black as a crow. I knew the fellow for
years and years, and he was a lecher to the very last. I don’t believe
that even the dog in his house escaped his attentions, by Hercules, I
don’t; and what a boy-lover he was! Saw a virgin in every one he met!
Not that I blame him though, for it’s all he could take with him.”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-FOURTH.
Phileros had his say and Ganymedes exclaimed, “You gabble away about
things that don’t concern heaven or earth: and none of you cares how the
price of grain pinches. I couldn’t even get a mouthful of bread today,
by Hercules, I couldn’t. How the drought does hang on! We’ve had famine
for a year. If the damned AEdiles would only get what’s coming to them.
They graft with the bakers, scratch-my-arse-and-I’ll-scratch-yours!
That’s the way it always is, the poor devils are out of luck, but the
jaws of the capitalists are always keeping the Saturnalia. If only we
had such lion-hearted sports as we had when I first came from Asia! That
was the life! If the flour was not the very best, they would beat up
those belly-robbing grafters till they looked like Jupiter had been at
them. How well I remember Safinius; he lived near the old arch, when I
was a boy. For a man, he was one hot proposition! Wherever he went, the
ground smoked! But he was square, dependable, a friend to a friend, you
could safely play mora with him, in the dark. But how he did peel them
in the town hall: he spoke no parables, not he! He did everything
straight from the shoulder and his voice roared like a trumpet in the
forum. He never sweat nor spat. I don’t know, but I think he had a
strain of the Asiatic in him. And how civil and friendly-like he was,
in returning everyone’s greeting; called us all by name, just like he was
one of us! And so provisions were cheap as dirt in those days. The loaf
you got for an as, you couldn’t eat, not even if someone helped you, but
you see them no bigger than a bull’s eye now, and the hell of it is that
things are getting worse every day; this colony grows backwards like a
calf’s tall! Why do we have to put up with an AEdile here, who’s not
worth three Caunian figs and who thinks more of an as than of our lives?
He has a good time at home, and his daily income’s more than another
man’s fortune. I happen to know where he got a thousand gold pieces.
If we had any nuts, he’d not be so damned well pleased with himself!
Nowadays, men are lions at home and foxes abroad. What gets me is, that
I’ve already eaten my old clothes, and if this high cost of living keeps
on, I’ll have to sell my cottages! What’s going to happen to this town,
if neither gods nor men take pity on it? May I never have any luck if I
don’t believe all this comes from the gods! For no one believes that
heaven is heaven, no one keeps a fast, no one cares a hang about Jupiter:
they all shut their eyes and count up their own profits. In the old
days, the married women, in their stolas, climbed the hill in their bare
feet, pure in heart, and with their hair unbound, and prayed to Jupiter
for rain! And it would pour down in bucketfuls then or never, and they’d
all come home, wet as drowned rats. But the gods all have the gout now,
because we are not religious; and so our fields are burning up!”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-FIFTH.
“Don’t be so down in the mouth,” chimed in Echion, the ragman; “if it
wasn’t that it’d be something else, as the farmer said, when he lost his
spotted pig. If a thing don’t happen today, it may tomorrow. That’s the
way life jogs along. You couldn’t name a better country, by Hercules,
you couldn’t, if only the men had any brains. She’s in hot water right
now, but she ain’t the only one. We oughtn’t to be so particular;
heaven’s as far away everywhere else. If you were somewhere else, you’d
swear that pigs walked around here already roasted. Think of what’s
coming! We’ll soon have a fine gladiator show to last for three days, no
training-school pupils; most of them will be freedmen. Our Titus has a
hot head and plenty of guts and it will go to a finish. I’m well
acquainted with him, and he’ll not stand for any frame-ups. It will be
cold steel in the best style, no running away, the shambles will be in
the middle of the amphitheatre where all the crowd can see. And what’s
more, he has the coin, for he came into thirty million when his father
had the bad luck to die. He could blow in four hundred thousand and his
fortune never feel it, but his name would live forever. He has some
dwarfs already, and a woman to fight from a chariot. Then, there’s
Glyco’s steward; he was caught screwing Glyco’s wife. You’ll see some
battle between jealous husbands and favored lovers. Anyhow, that cheap
screw of a Glyco condemned his steward to the beasts and only published
his own shame. How could the slave go wrong when he only obeyed orders?
It would have been better if that she-piss-pot, for that’s all she’s fit
for, had been tossed by the bull, but a fellow has to beat the saddle
when he can’t beat the jackass. How could Glyco ever imagine that a
sprig of Hermogenes’ planting could turn out well? Why, Hermogenes could
trim the claws of a flying hawk, and no snake ever hatched out a rope
yet! And look at Glyco! He’s smoked himself out in fine shape, and as
long as he lives, he’ll carry that stain! No one but the devil himself
can wipe that out, but chickens always come home to roost. My nose tells
me that Mammaea will set out a spread: two bits apiece for me and mine!
And he’ll nick Norbanus out of his political pull if he does; you all
know that it’s to his interest to hump himself to get the best of him.
And honestly, what did that fellow ever do for us? He exhibited some two
cent gladiators that were so near dead they’d have fallen flat if you
blew your breath at them. I’ve seen better thugs sent against wild
beasts! And the cavalry he killed looked about as much like the real
thing as the horsemen on the lamps; you would have taken them for
dunghill cocks! One plug had about as much action as a jackass with a
pack-saddle; another was club-footed; and a third who had to take the
place of one that was killed, was as good as dead, and hamstrung into the
bargain. There was only one that had any pep, and he was a Thracian, but
he only fought when we egged him on. The whole crowd was flogged
afterwards. How the mob did yell ‘Lay it on!’ They were nothing but
runaways. And at that he had the nerve to say, ‘I’ve given you a show.’
‘And I’ve applauded,’ I answered; ‘count it up and you’ll find that I
gave more than I got! One hand washes the other.’”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-SIXTH
“Agamemnon, your looks seem to say, What’s this boresome nut trying to
hand us?’ Well, I’m talking because you, who can talk book-foolishness,
won’t. You don’t belong to our bunch, so you laugh in your sleeve at the
way us poor people talk, but we know that you’re only a fool with a lot
of learning. Well, what of it? Some day I’ll get you to come to my
country place and take a look at my little estate. We’ll have fresh eggs
and spring chicken to chew on when we get there; it will be all right
even if the weather has kept things back this year. We’ll find enough to
satisfy us, and my kid will soon grow up to be a pupil of yours; he can
divide up to four, now, and you’ll have a little servant at your side, if
he lives. When he has a minute to himself, he never takes his eyes from
his tablets; he’s smart too, and has the right kind of stuff in him, even
if he is crazy about birds. I’ve had to kill three of his linnets
already. I told him that a weasel had gotten them, but he’s found
another hobby, now he paints all the time. He’s left the marks of his
heels on his Greek already, and is doing pretty well with his Latin,
although his master’s too easy with him; won’t make him stick to one
thing. He comes to me to get me to give him something to write when his
master don’t want to work. Then there’s another tutor, too, no scholar,
but very painstaking, though; he can teach you more than he knows
himself. He comes to the house on holidays and is always satisfied with
whatever you pay him. Some little time ago, I bought the kid some law
books; I want him to have a smattering of the law for home use. There’s
bread in that! As for literature, he’s got enough of that in him
already; if he begins to kick, I’ve concluded that I’ll make him learn
some trade; the barber’s, say, or the auctioneer’s, or even the lawyer’s.
That’s one thing no one but the devil can do him out of! ‘Believe what
your daddy says, Primigenius,’ I din into his ears every day, ‘whenever
you learn a thing, it’s yours. Look at Phileros the attorney; he’d not
be keeping the wolf from the door now if he hadn’t studied. It’s not
long since he had to carry his wares on his back and peddle them, but he
can put up a front with Norbanus himself now! Learning’s a fine thing,
and a trade won’t starve.’”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-SEVENTH.
Twaddle of this sort was being bandied about when Trimalchio came in;
mopping his forehead and washing his hands in perfume, he said, after a
short pause, “Pardon me, gentlemen, but my stomach’s been on strike for
the past few days and the doctors disagreed about the cause. But
pomegranate rind and pitch steeped in vinegar have helped me, and I hope
that my belly will get on its good behavior, for sometimes there’s such a
rumbling in my guts that you’d think a bellowing bull was in there. So
if anyone wants to do his business, there’s no call to be bashful about
it. None of us was born solid! I don’t know of any worse torment than
having to hold it in, it’s the one thing Jupiter himself can’t hold in.
So you’re laughing, are you, Fortunata? Why, you’re always keeping me
awake at night yourself. I never objected yet to anyone in my
dining-room relieving himself when he wanted to, and the doctors forbid
our holding it in. Everything’s ready outside, if the call’s more
serious, water, close-stool, and anything else you’ll need. Believe me,
when this rising vapor gets to the brain, it puts the whole body on the
burn. Many a one I’ve known to kick in just because he wouldn’t own up
to the truth.” We thanked him for his kindness and consideration, and
hid our laughter by drinking more and oftener. We had not realized that,
as yet, we were only in the middle of the entertainment, with a hill
still ahead, as the saying goes. The tables were cleared off to the beat
of music, and three white hogs, muzzled, and wearing bells, were brought
into the dining-room. The announcer informed us that one was a
two-year-old, another three, and the third just turned six. I had an
idea that some rope-dancers had come in and that the hogs would perform
tricks, just as they do for the crowd on the streets, but Trimalchio
dispelled this illusion by asking, “Which one will you have served up
immediately, for dinner? Any country cook can manage a dunghill cock, a
pentheus hash, or little things like that, but my cooks are well used to
serving up calves boiled whole, in their cauldrons!” Then he ordered a
cook to be called in at once, and without awaiting our pleasure, he
directed that the oldest be butchered, and demanded in a loud voice,
“What division do you belong to?” When the fellow made answer that he
was from the fortieth, “Were you bought, or born upon my estates?”
Trimalchio continued. “Neither,” replied the cook, “I was left to you by
Pansa’s will.” “See to it that this is properly done,” Trimalchio
warned, “or I’ll have you transferred to the division of messengers!”
and the cook, bearing his master’s warning in mind, departed for the
kitchen with the next course in tow.
CHAPTER THE FORTY-EIGHTH.
Trimalchio’s threatening face relaxed and he turned to us, “If the wine
don’t please you,” he said, “I’ll change it; you ought to do justice to
it by drinking it. I don’t have to buy it, thanks to the gods.
Everything here that makes your mouths water, was produced on one of my
country places which I’ve never yet seen, but they tell me it’s down
Terracina and Tarentum way. I’ve got a notion to add Sicily to my other
little holdings, so in case I want to go to Africa, I’ll be able to sail
along my own coasts. But tell me the subject of your speech today,
Agamemnon, for, though I don’t plead cases myself, I studied literature
for home use, and for fear you should think I don’t care about learning,
let me inform you that I have three libraries, one Greek and the others
Latin. Give me the outline of your speech if you like me.”
“A poor man and a rich man were enemies,” Agamemmon began, when: “What’s
a poor man?” Trimalchio broke in. “Well put,” Agamemnon conceded and
went into details upon some problem or other, what it was I do not know.
Trimalchio instantly rendered the following verdict, “If that’s the case,
there’s nothing to dispute about; if it’s not the case, it don’t amount
to anything anyhow.” These flashes of wit, and others equally
scintillating, we loudly applauded, and he went on: “Tell me, my dearest
Agamemnon, do you remember the twelve labors of Hercules or the story of
Ulysses, how the Cyclops threw his thumb out of joint with a pig-headed
crowbar? When I was a boy, I used to read those stories in Homer. And
then, there’s the Sibyl: with my own eyes I saw her, at Cumae, hanging up
in a jar; and whenever the boys would say to her ‘Sibyl, Sibyl, what
would you?’ she would answer, ‘I would die.’”
CHAPTER THE FORTY-NINTH.
Before he had run out of wind, a tray upon which was an enormous hog was
placed upon the table, almost filling it up. We began to wonder at the
dispatch with which it had been prepared and swore that no cock could
have been served up in so short a time; moreover, this hog seemed to us
far bigger than the boar had been. Trimalchio scrutinized it closely and
“What the hell,” he suddenly bawled out, “this hog hain’t been gutted,
has it? No, it hain’t, by Hercules, it hain’t! Call that cook! Call
that cook in here immediately!” When the crestfallen cook stood at the
table and owned up that he had forgotten to bowel him, “So you forgot,
did you?” Trimalchio shouted, “You’d think he’d only left out a bit of
pepper and cummin, wouldn’t you? Off with his clothes!” The cook was
stripped without delay, and stood with hanging head, between two
torturers. We all began to make excuses for him at this, saying, “Little
things like that are bound to happen once in a while, let us prevail upon
you to let him off; if he ever does such a thing again, not a one of us
will have a word to say in his behalf.” But for my part, I was
mercilessly angry and could not help leaning over towards Agamemnon and
whispering in his ear, “It is easily seen that this fellow is criminally
careless, is it not? How could anyone forget to draw a hog? If he had
served me a fish in that fashion I wouldn’t overlook it, by Hercules, I
wouldn’t.” But that was not Trimalchio’s way: his face relaxed into good
humor and he said, “Since your memory’s so short, you can gut him right
here before our eyes!” The cook put on his tunic, snatched up a carving
knife, with a trembling hand, and slashed the hog’s belly in several
places. Sausages and meat-puddings, widening the apertures, by their
own weight, immediately tumbled out.
CHAPTER THE FIFTIETH.
The whole household burst into unanimous applause at this; “Hurrah for
Gaius,” they shouted. As for the cook, he was given a drink and a silver
crown and a cup on a salver of Corinthian bronze. Seeing that Agamemnon
was eyeing the platter closely, Trimalchio remarked, “I’m the only one
that can show the real Corinthian!” I thought that, in his usual
purse-proud manner, he was going to boast that his bronzes were all
imported from Corinth, but he did even better by saying, “Wouldn’t you
like to know how it is that I’m the only one that can show the real
Corinthian? Well, it’s because the bronze worker I patronize is named
Corinthus, and what’s Corinthian unless it’s what a Corinthus makes?
And, so you won’t think I’m a blockhead, I’m going to show you that I’m
well acquainted with how Corinthian first came into the world. When Troy
was taken, Hannibal, who was a very foxy fellow and a great rascal into
the bargain, piled all the gold and silver and bronze statues in one pile
and set ‘em afire, melting these different metals into one: then the
metal workers took their pick and made bowls and dessert dishes and
statuettes as well. That’s how Corinthian was born; neither one nor the
other, but an amalgam of all. But I prefer glass, if you don’t mind my
saying so; it don’t stink, and if it didn’t break, I’d rather have it
than gold, but it’s cheap and common now.”
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-FIRST.
“But there was an artisan, once upon a time, who made a glass vial that
couldn’t be broken. On that account he was admitted to Caesar with his
gift; then he dashed it upon the floor, when Caesar handed it back to
him. The Emperor was greatly startled, but the artisan picked the vial
up off the pavement, and it was dented, just like a brass bowl would have
been! He took a little hammer out of his tunic and beat out the dent
without any trouble. When he had done that, he thought he would soon be
in Jupiter’s heaven, and more especially when Caesar said to him, ‘Is
there anyone else who knows how to make this malleable glass? Think
now!’ And when he denied that anyone else knew the secret, Caesar
ordered his head chopped off, because if this should get out, we would
think no more of gold than we would of dirt.”
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-SECOND.
“And when it comes to silver, I’m a connoisseur; I have goblets as big as
wine-jars, a hundred of ‘em more or less, with engraving that shows how
Cassandra killed her sons, and the dead boys are lying so naturally that
you’d think ‘em alive. I own a thousand bowls which Mummius left to my
patron, where Daedalus is shown shutting Niobe up in the Trojan horse,
and I also have cups engraved with the gladiatorial contests of Hermeros
and Petraites: they’re all heavy, too. I wouldn’t sell my taste in these
matters for any money!” A slave dropped a cup while he was running on in
this fashion. Glaring at him, Trimalchio said, “Go hang yourself, since
you’re so careless.” The boy’s lip quivered and he immediately commenced
to beg for mercy. “Why do you pray to me?” Trimalchio demanded, at
this: “I don’t intend to be harsh with you, I’m only warning you against
being so awkward.” Finally, however, we got him to give the boy a pardon
and no sooner had this been done than the slave started running around
the room crying, “Out with the water and in with the wine!” We all paid
tribute to this joke, but Agamemnon in particular, for he well knew what
strings to pull in order to secure another invitation to dinner. Tickled
by our flattery, and mellowed by the wine, Trimalchio was just about
drunk. “Why hasn’t one of you asked my Fortunata to dance?” he
demanded, “There’s no one can do a better cancan, believe me,” and he
himself raised his arms above his head and favored us with an
impersonation of Syrus the actor; the whole household chanting:
Oh bravo
Oh bravissimo
in chorus, and he would have danced out into the middle of the room
before us all, had not Fortunata whispered in his ear, telling him,
I suppose, that such low buffoonery was not in keeping with his dignity.
But nothing could be so changeable as his humor, for one minute he stood
in awe of Fortunata, but his natural propensities would break out the
next.
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-THIRD.
But his passion for dancing was interrupted at this stage by a
stenographer who read aloud, as if he were reading the public records,
“On the seventh of the Kalends of July, on Trimalchio’s estates near
Cumae, were born thirty boys and forty girls: five hundred pecks of wheat
were taken from the threshing floors and stored in the granaries: five
hundred oxen were put to yoke: the slave Mithridates was crucified on the
same date for cursing the genius of our master, Gaius: on said date ten
million sesterces were returned to the vaults as no sound investment
could be found: on said date, a fire broke out in the gardens at Pompeii,
said fire originating in the house of Nasta, the bailiff.” “What’s
that?” demanded Trimalchio. “When were the gardens at Pompeii bought for
me?” “Why, last year,” answered the stenographer, “for that reason the
item has not appeared in the accounts.” Trimalchio flew into a rage at
this. “If I’m not told within six months of any real estate that’s
bought for me,” he shouted, “I forbid it’s being carried to my account at
all!” Next, the edicts of his aediles were read aloud, and the wills of
some of his foresters in which Trimalchio was disinherited by a codicil,
then the names of his bailiffs, and that of a freedwoman who had been
repudiated by a night watchman, after she had been caught in bed with a
bath attendant, that of a porter banished to Baioe, a steward who was
standing trial, and lastly the report of a decision rendered in the
matter of a lawsuit, between some valets. When this was over with, some
rope dancers came in and a very boresome fool stood holding a ladder,
ordering his boy to dance from rung to rung, and finally at the top, all
this to the music of popular airs; then the boy was compelled to jump
through blazing hoops while grasping a huge wine jar with his teeth.
Trimalchio was the only one who was much impressed by these tricks,
remarking that it was a thankless calling and adding that in all the
world there were just two things which could give him acute pleasure,
rope-dancers and horn blowers; all other entertainments were nothing
but nonsense. “I bought a company of comedians,” he went on, “but I
preferred for them to put on Atellane farces, and I ordered my
flute-player to play Latin airs only.”
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-FOURTH.
While our noble Gaius was still talking away, the boy slipped and fell,
alighting upon Trimalchio’s arm. The whole household cried out, as did
also the guests, not that they bore such a coarse fellow any good will,
as they would gladly have seen his neck broken, but because such an
unlucky ending to the dinner might make it necessary for them to go into
mourning over a total stranger. As for Trimalchio, he groaned heavily
and bent over his arm as though it had been injured: doctors flocked
around him, and Fortunata was among the very first, her hair was
streaming and she held a cup in her hand and screamed out her grief and
unhappiness. As for the boy who had fallen, he was crawling at our feet,
imploring pardon. I was uneasy for fear his prayers would lead up to
some ridiculous theatrical climax, for I had not yet been able to forget
that cook who had forgotten to bowel that hog, and so, for this reason, I
began to scan the whole dining-room very closely, to see if an automaton
would come out through the wall; and all the more so as a slave was
beaten for having bound up his master’s bruised arm in white wool instead
of purple. Nor was my suspicion unjustified, for in place of punishment,
Trimalchio ordered that the boy be freed, so that no one could say that
so exalted a personage had been injured by a slave.
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-FIFTH.
We applauded his action and engaged in a discussion upon the instability
of human affairs, which many took sides. “A good reason,” declared
Trimalchio, “why such an occasion shouldn’t slip by without an epigram.”
He called for his tablets at once, and after racking his brains for a
little while, he got off the following:
The unexpected will turn up;
Our whole lives Fortune bungles up.
Falernian, boy, hand round the cup.
This epigram led up to a discussion of the poets, and for a long time,
the greatest praise was bestowed upon Mopsus the Thracian, until
Trimalchio broke in with: “Professor, I wish you’d tell me how you’d
compare Cicero and Publilius. I’m of the opinion that the first was the
more eloquent, but that the last moralizes more beautifully, for what can
excel these lines?
Insatiable luxury crumbles the walls of war;
To satiate gluttony, peacocks in coops are brought
Arrayed in gold plumage like Babylon tapestry rich.
Numidian guinea-fowls, capons, all perish for thee:
And even the wandering stork, welcome guest that he is,
The emblem of sacred maternity, slender of leg
And gloctoring exile from winter, herald of spring,
Still, finds his last nest in the--cauldron of gluttony base.
India surrenders her pearls; and what mean they to thee?
That thy wife decked with sea-spoils adorning her breast
and her head
On the couch of a stranger lies lifting adulterous legs?
The emerald green, the glass bauble, what mean they to thee?
Or the fire of the ruby? Except that pure chastity shine
From the depth of the jewels: in garments of woven wind clad
Our brides might as well take their stand, their game
naked to stalk,
As seek it in gossamer tissue transparent as air.”
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-SIXTH.
“What should we say was the hardest calling, after literature?” he asked.
“That of the doctor or that of the money-changer, I would say: the
doctor, because he has to know what poor devils have got in their
insides, and when the fever’s due: but I hate them like the devil, for my
part, because they’re always ordering me on a diet of duck soup: and the
money-changer’s, because he’s got to be able to see the silver through
the copper plating. When we come to the dumb beasts, the oxen and sheep
are the hardest worked, the oxen, thanks to whose labor we have bread to
chew on, the sheep, because their wool tricks us out so fine. It’s the
greatest outrage under the sun for people to eat mutton and then wear a
tunic. Then there’s the bee: in my opinion, they’re divine insects
because they puke honey, though there are folks that claim that they
bring it from Jupiter, and that’s the reason they sting, too, for
wherever you find a sweet, you’ll find a bitter too.” He was just putting
the philosophers out of business when lottery tickets were passed around
in a cup. A slave boy assigned to that duty read aloud the names of the
souvenirs: “Silver s--ham,” a ham was brought in with some silver vinegar
cruets on top of it; “cervical”--something soft for the neck--a piece of
the cervix--neck--of a sheep was brought in; “serisapia”--after wit--“and
contumelia”--insult--we were given must wafers and an apple-melon--and a
phallus--contus--; “porri”--leeks--“and persica,” he picked up a whip and
a knife; “passeres”--sparrows” and a fly--trap,” the answer was
raisins--uva passa--and Attic honey; “cenatoria”--a dinner toga--“and
forensia”--business dress--he handed out a piece of meat--suggestive of
dinner--and a note-book--suggestive of business--; “canale”--chased by a
dog--“and pedale”--pertaining to the foot--, a hare and a slipper were
brought out; “lamphrey”--murena--“and a letter,” he held up a
mouse--mus--and a frog--rana--tied together, and a bundle of
beet--beta--the Greek letter beta--. We laughed long and loud, there
were a thousand of these jokes, more or less, which have now escaped my
memory.
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-SEVENTH.
But Ascyltos threw off all restraint and ridiculed everything; throwing
up his hands, he laughed until the tears ran down his cheeks. At last,
one of Trimalchio’s fellow-freedmen, the one who had the place next to
me, flew into a rage, “What’s the joke, sheep’s-head,” he bawled, “Don’t
our host’s swell entertainment suit you? You’re richer than he is, I
suppose, and used to dining better! As I hope the guardian spirit of
this house will be on my side, I’d have stopped his bleating long ago if
I’d been sitting next to him. He’s a peach, he is, laughing at others;
some vagabond or other from who-knows-where, some night-pad who’s not
worth his own piss: just let me piss a ring around him and he wouldn’t
know where to run to! I ain’t easy riled, no, by Hercules, I ain’t, but
worms breed in tender flesh. Look at him laugh! What the hell’s he got
to laugh at? Is his family so damned fine-haired? So you’re a Roman
knight! Well, I’m a king’s son! How’s it come that you’ve been a slave,
you’ll ask because I put myself into service because I’d rather be a
Roman citizen than a tax-paying provincial. And now I hope that my life
will be such that no one can jeer at me. I’m a man among men! I take my
stroll bareheaded and owe no man a copper cent. I never had a summons in
my life and no one ever said to me, in the forum, pay me what you owe me.
I’ve bought a few acres and saved up a few dollars and I feed twenty
bellies and a dog. I ransomed my bedfellow so no one could wipe his
hands on her bosom; a thousand dinars it cost me, too. I was chosen
priest of Augustus without paying the fee, and I hope that I won’t need
to blush in my grave after I’m dead. But you’re so busy that you can’t
look behind you; you can spot a louse on someone else, all right, but you
can’t see the tick on yourself. You’re the only one that thinks we’re so
funny; look at your professor, he’s older than you are, and we’re good
enough for him, but you’re only a brat with the milk still in your nose
and all you can prattle is ‘ma’ or ‘mu,’ you’re only a clay pot, a piece
of leather soaked in water, softer and slipperier, but none the better
for that. You’ve got more coin than we have, have you? Then eat two
breakfasts and two dinners a day. I’d rather have my reputation than
riches, for my part, and before I make an end of this--who ever dunned me
twice? In all the forty years I was in service, no one could tell
whether I was free or a slave. I was only a long-haired boy when I came
to this colony and the town house was not built then. I did my best to
please my master and he was a digniferous and majestical gentleman whose
nail-parings were worth more than your whole carcass. I had enemies in
his house, too, who would have been glad to trip me up, but I swam the
flood, thanks to his kindness. Those are the things that try your
mettle, for it’s as easy to be born a gentleman as to say, ‘Come here.’
Well, what are you gaping at now, like a billy-goat in a vetch-field?”
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-EIGHTH.
Giton, who had been standing at my feet, and who had for some time been
holding in his laughter, burst into an uproarious guffaw, at this last
figure of speech, and when Ascyltos’ adversary heard it, he turned his
abuse upon the boy. “What’s so funny, you curly-headed onion,” he
bellowed, “are the Saturnalia here, I’d like to know? Is it December
now?
“When did you pay your twentieth? What’s this to you, you gallows-bird,
you crow’s meat? I’ll call the anger of Jupiter down on you and that
master of yours, who don’t keep you in better order. If I didn’t respect
my fellow-freedmen, I’d give you what is coming to you right here on the
spot, as I hope to get my belly full of bread, I would. We’ll get along
well enough, but those that can’t control you are fools; like master like
man’s a true saying. I can hardly hold myself in and I’m not hot-headed
by nature, but once let me get a start and I don’t care two cents for my
own mother. All right, I’ll catch you in the street, you rat, you
toadstool. May I never grow an inch up or down if I don’t push your
master into a dunghill, and I’ll give you the same medicine, I will, by
Hercules, I will, no matter if you call down Olympian Jupiter himself!
I’ll take care of your eight inch ringlets and your two cent master into
the bargain. I’ll have my teeth into you, either you’ll cut out the
laughing, or I don’t know myself. Yes, even if you had a golden beard.
I’ll bring the wrath of Minerva down on you and on the fellow that first
made a come-here out of you. No, I never learned geometry or criticism
or other foolishness like that, but I know my capital letters and I can
divide any figure by a hundred, be it in asses, pounds or sesterces.
Let’s have a show-down, you and I will make a little bet, here’s my coin;
you’ll soon find out that your father’s money was wasted on your
education, even if you do know a little rhetoric. How’s this--what part
of us am I? I come far, I come wide, now guess me! I’ll give you
another. What part of us runs but never moves from its place? What part
of us grows but always grows less? But you scurry around and are as
flustered and fidgeted as a mouse in a piss-pot. Shut up and don’t annoy
your betters, who don’t even know that you’ve been born. Don’t think
that I’m impressed by those boxwood armlets that you did your mistress
out of. Occupo will back me! Let’s go into the forum and borrow money,
then you’ll see whether this iron ring means credit! Bah! A draggled
fox is a fine sight, ain’t it’? I hope I never get rich and die decently
so that the people will swear by my death, if I don’t hound you
everywhere with my toga turned inside out. And the fellow that taught
you such manners did a good job too, a chattering ape, all right, no
schoolmaster. We were better taught. ‘Is everything in its place?’ the
master would ask; go straight home and don’t stop and stare at everything
and don’t be impudent to your elders. Don’t loiter along looking in at
the shops. No second raters came out of that school. I’m what you see
me and I thank the gods it’s all due to my own cleverness.”
CHAPTER THE FIFTY-NINTH.
Ascyltos was just starting in to answer this indictment when Trimalchio,
who was delighted with his fellow-freedman’s tirade, broke in, “Cut out
the bickering and let’s have things pleasant here. Let up on the young
fellow, Hermeros, he’s hot-blooded, so you ought to be more reasonable.
The loser’s always the winner in arguments of this kind. And as for you,
even when you were a young punk you used to go ‘Co-co co-co,’ like a hen
after a rooster, but you had no pep. Let’s get to better business and
start the fun all over again and watch the Homerists.” A troupe filed
in, immediately, and clashed spears against shields. Trimalchio sat
himself up on his cushion and intoned in Latin, from a book, while the
actors, in accordance with their conceited custom, recited their parts in
the Greek language. There came a pause, presently, and “You don’t any of
you know the plot of the skit they’re putting on, do you?” he asked,
“Diomedes and Ganymede were two brothers, and Helen was their sister;
Agamemnon ran away with her and palmed off a doe on Diana, in her place,
so Homer tells how the Trojans and Parentines fought among themselves.
Of course Agamemnon was victorious, and gave his daughter Iphigenia, to
Achilles, for a wife: This caused Ajax to go mad, and he’ll soon make the
whole thing plain to you.” The Homerists raised a shout, as soon as
Trimalchio had done speaking, and, as the whole familia stepped back, a
boiled calf with a helmet on its head was brought in on an enormous
platter. Ajax followed and rushed upon it with drawn sword, as if he
were insane, he made passes with the flat, and again with the edge, and
then, collecting the slices, he skewered them, and, much to our
astonishment, presented them to us on the point of his sword.
CHAPTER THE SIXTIETH.
But we were not given long in which to admire the elegance of such
service, for all of a sudden the ceiling commenced to creak and then the
whole dining-room shook. I leaped to my feet in consternation, for fear
some rope-walker would fall down, and the rest of the company raised
their faces, wondering as much as I what new prodigy was to be announced
from on high. Then lo and behold! the ceiling panels parted and an
enormous hoop, which appeared to have been knocked off a huge cask, was
lowered from the dome above; its perimeter was hung with golden chaplets
and jars of alabaster filled with perfume. We were asked to accept these
articles as souvenirs. When my glance returned to the table, I noticed
that a dish containing cakes had been placed upon it, and in the middle
an image of Priapus, made by the baker, and he held apples of all
varieties and bunches of grapes against his breast, in the conventional
manner. We applied ourselves wholeheartedly to this dessert and our
joviality was suddenly revived by a fresh diversion, for, at the
slightest pressure, all the cakes and fruits would squirt a saffron sauce
upon us, and even spurted unpleasantly into our faces. Being convinced
that these perfumed dainties had some religious significance, we arose in
a body and shouted, “Hurrah for the Emperor, the father of his country!”
However, as we perceived that even after this act of veneration, the
others continued helping themselves, we filled our napkins with the
apples. I was especially keen on this, for I thought I could never put
enough good things into Giton’s lap. Three slaves entered, in the
meantime, dressed in white tunics well tucked up, and two of them placed
Lares with amulets hanging from their necks, upon the table, while the
third carried round a bowl of wine and cried, “May the gods be
propitious!” One was called Cerdo--business--, Trimalchio informed us,
the other Lucrio--luck--and the third Felicio--profit--and, when all the
rest had kissed a true likeness of Trimalchio, we were ashamed to pass it
by.
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-FIRST.
After they had all wished each other sound minds and good health,
Trimalchio turned to Niceros. “You used to be better company at
dinner,” he remarked, “and I don’t know why you should be dumb today,
with never a word to say. If you wish to make me happy, tell about that
experience you had, I beg of you.” Delighted at the affability of his
friend, “I hope I lose all my luck if I’m not tickled to death at the
humor I see you in,” Niceros replied. “All right, let’s go the limit for
a good time, though I’m afraid these scholars’ll laugh at me, but I’ll
tell my tale and they can go as far as they like. What t’hell do I care
who laughs? It’s better to be laughed at than laughed down.” These
words spake the hero, and began the following tale: “We lived in a narrow
street in the house Gavilla now owns, when I was a slave. There, by the
will of the gods, I fell in love with the wife of Terentius, the
innkeeper; you knew Melissa of Tarentum, that pretty round-checked little
wench. It was no carnal passion, so hear me, Hercules, it wasn’t; I was
not in love with her physical charms. No, it was because she was such a
good sport. I never asked her for a thing and had her deny me; if she
had an as, I had half. I trusted her with everything I had and never was
done out of anything. Her husband up and died on the place, one day, so
I tried every way I could to get to her, for you know friends ought to
show up when anyone’s in a pinch.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-SECOND.
“It so happened that our master had gone to Capua to attend to some odds
and ends of business and I seized the opportunity, and persuaded a guest
of the house to accompany me as far as the fifth mile-stone. He was a
soldier, and as brave as the very devil. We set out about cock-crow, the
moon was shining as bright as midday, and came to where the tombstones
are. My man stepped aside amongst them, but I sat down, singing, and
commenced to count them up. When I looked around for my companion, he
had stripped himself and piled his clothes by the side of the road. My
heart was in my mouth, and I sat there while he pissed a ring around them
and was suddenly turned into a wolf! Now don’t think I’m joking, I
wouldn’t lie for any amount of money, but as I was saying, he commenced
to howl after he was turned into a wolf, and ran away into the forest.
I didn’t know where I was for a minute or two, then I went to his
clothes, to pick them up, and damned if they hadn’t turned to stone! Was
ever anyone nearer dead from fright than me? Then I whipped out my sword
and cut every shadow along the road to bits, till I came to the house of
my mistress. I looked like a ghost when I went in, and I nearly slipped
my wind. The sweat was pouring down my crotch, my eyes were staring, and
I could hardly be brought around. My Melissa wondered why I was out so
late. “Oh, if you’d only come sooner,” she said, “you could have helped
us: a wolf broke into the folds and attacked the sheep, bleeding them
like a butcher. But he didn’t get the laugh on me, even if he did get
away, for one of the slaves ran his neck through with a spear!” I
couldn’t keep my eyes shut any longer when I heard that, and as soon as
it grew light, I rushed back to our Gaius’ house like an innkeeper beaten
out of his bill, and when I came to the place where the clothes had been
turned into stone, there was nothing but a pool of blood! And moreover,
when I got home, my soldier was lying in bed, like an ox, and a doctor
was dressing his neck! I knew then that he was a werewolf, and after
that, I couldn’t have eaten a crumb of bread with him, no, not if you had
killed me. Others can think what they please about this, but as for me,
I hope your geniuses will all get after me if I lie.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-THIRD.
We were all dumb with astonishment, when “I take your story for granted,”
said Trimalchio, “and if you’ll believe me, my hair stood on end, and
all the more, because I know that Niceros never talks nonsense: he’s
always level-headed, not a bit gossipy. And now I’ll tell you a
hair-raiser myself, though I’m like a jackass on a slippery pavement
compared to him. When I was a long-haired boy, for I lived a Chian life
from my youth up, my master’s minion died. He was a jewel, so hear me
Hercules, he was, perfect in every facet. While his sorrow-stricken
mother was bewailing his loss, and the rest of us were lamenting with
her, the witches suddenly commenced to screech so loud that you would
have thought a hare was being run down by the hounds! At that time, we
had a Cappadocian slave, tall, very bold, and he had muscle too; he
could hold a mad bull in the air! He wrapped a mantle around his left
arm, boldly rushed out of doors with drawn sword, and ran a woman
through the middle about here, no harm to what I touch. We heard a
scream, but as a matter of fact, for I won’t lie to you, we didn’t catch
sight of the witches themselves. Our simpleton came back presently, and
threw himself upon the bed. His whole body was black and blue, as if he
had been flogged with whips, and of course the reason of that was she
had touched him with her evil hand! We shut the door and returned to
our business, but when the mother put her arms around the body of her
son, it turned out that it was only a straw bolster, no heart, no guts,
nothing! Of course the witches had swooped down upon the lad and put
the straw changeling in his place! Believe me or not, suit yourselves,
but I say that there are women that know too much, and night-hags, too,
and they turn everything upside down! And as for the long-haired booby,
he never got back his own natural color and he died, raving mad, a few
days later.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-FOURTH.
Though we wondered greatly, we believed none the less implicitly and,
kissing the table, we besought the night-hags to attend to their own
affairs while we were returning home from dinner. As far as I was
concerned, the lamps already seemed to burn double and the whole
dining-room was going round, when “See here, Plocamus,” Trimalchio spoke
up, “haven’t you anything to tell us? You haven’t entertained us at all,
have you? And you used to be fine company, always ready to oblige with a
recitation or a song. The gods bless us, how the green figs have
fallen!” “True for you,” the fellow answered, “since I’ve got the gout
my sporting days are over; but in the good old times when I was a young
spark, I nearly sang myself into a consumption. How I used to dance!
And take my part in a farce, or hold up my end in the barber shops! Who
could hold a candle to me except, of course, the one and only Apelles?”
He then put his hand to his mouth and hissed out some foul gibberish or
other, and said afterwards that it was Greek. Trimalchio himself then
favored us with an impersonation of a man blowing a trumpet, and when he
had finished, he looked around for his minion, whom he called Croesus, a
blear-eyed slave whose teeth were very disagreeably discolored. He was
playing with a little black bitch, disgustingly fat, wrapping her up in a
leek-green scarf and teasing her with a half-loaf of bread which he had
put on the couch; and when from sheer nausea, she refused it, he crammed
it down her throat. This sight put Trimalchio in mind of his own dog and
he ordered Scylax, “the guardian of his house and home,” to be brought
in. An enormous dog was immediately led in upon a chain and, obeying a
kick from the porter, it lay down beside the table. Thereupon Trimalchio
remarked, as he threw it a piece of white bread, “No one in all my house
loves me better than Scylax.” Enraged at Trimalchio’s praising Scylax so
warmly, the slave put the bitch down upon the floor and sicked her on to
fight. Scylax, as might have been expected from such a dog, made the
whole room ring with his hideous barking and nearly shook the life out of
the little bitch which the slave called Pearl. Nor did the uproar end in
a dog fight, a candelabrum was upset upon the table, breaking the glasses
and spattering some of the guests with hot oil. As Trimalchio did not
wish to seem concerned at the loss, he kissed the boy and ordered him to
climb upon his own back. The slave did not hesitate but, mounting his
rocking-horse, he beat Trimalchio’s shoulders with his open palms,
yelling with laughter, “Buck! Buck! How many fingers do I hold up!”
When Trimalchio had, in a measure, regained his composure, which took but
a little while, he ordered that a huge vessel be filled with mixed wine,
and that drinks be served to all the slaves sitting around our feet,
adding as an afterthought, “If anyone refuses to drink, pour it on his
head: business is business, but now’s the time for fun.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-FIFTH.
The dainties that followed this display of affability were of such a
nature that, if any reliance is to be placed in my word, the very mention
of them makes me sick at the stomach. Instead of thrushes, fattened
chickens were served, one to each of us, and goose eggs with pastry caps
on them, which same Trimalchio earnestly entreated us to eat, informing
us that the chickens had all been boned. Just at that instant, however,
a lictor knocked at the dining-room door, and a reveler, clad in white
vestments, entered, followed by a large retinue. Startled at such pomp,
I thought that the Praetor had arrived, so I put my bare feet upon the
floor and started to get up, but Agamemnon laughed at my anxiety and
said, “Keep your seat, you idiot, it’s only Habinnas the sevir; he’s a
stone mason, and if report speaks true, he makes the finest tombstones
imaginable.” Reassured by this information, I lay back upon my couch and
watched Habinnas’ entrance with great curiosity. Already drunk and
wearing several wreaths, his forehead smeared with perfume which ran down
into his eyes, he advanced with his hands upon his wife’s shoulders, and,
seating himself in the Praetor’s place, he called for wine and hot water.
Delighted with his good humor, Trimalchio called for a larger goblet for
himself, and asked him, at the same time, how he had been entertained.
“We had everything except yourself, for my heart and soul were here, but
it was fine, it was, by Hercules. Scissa was giving a Novendial feast
for her slave, whom she freed on his death-bed, and it’s my opinion
she’ll have a large sum to split with the tax gatherers, for the dead man
was rated at 50,000, but everything went off well, even if we did have to
pour half our wine on the bones of the late lamented.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-SIXTH.
“But,” demanded Trimalchio, “what did you have for dinner’?” “I’ll tell
you if I can,” answered he, “for my memory’s so good that I often forget
my own name. Let’s see, for the first course, we had a hog, crowned with
a wine cup and garnished with cheese cakes and chicken livers cooked well
done, beets, of course, and whole-wheat bread, which I’d rather have
than white, because it puts strength into you, and when I take a crap
afterwards, I don’t have to yell. Following this, came a course of
tarts, served cold, with excellent Spanish wine poured over warm honey;
I ate several of the tarts and got the honey all over myself. Then there
were chick-peas and lupines, all the smooth-shelled nuts you wanted, and
an apple apiece, but I got away with two, and here they are, tied up in
my napkin; for I’ll have a row on my hands if I don’t bring some kind of
a present home to my favorite slave. Oh yes, my wife has just reminded
me, there was a haunch of bear-meat as a side dish, Scintilla ate some of
it without knowing what it was, and she nearly puked up her guts when she
found out. But as for me, I ate more than a pound of it, for it tasted
exactly like wild boar and, says I, if a bear eats a man, shouldn’t that
be all the more reason for a man to eat a bear? The last course was soft
cheese, new wine boiled thick, a snail apiece, a helping of tripe, liver
pate, capped eggs, turnips and mustard. But that’s enough. Pickled
olives were handed around in a wooden bowl, and some of the party
greedily snatched three handfuls, we had ham, too, but we sent it back.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-SEVENTH.
“But why isn’t Fortunata at the table, Gaius? Tell me.” “What’s that,”
Trimalchio replied; “don’t you know her better than that? She wouldn’t
touch even a drop of water till after the silver was put away and the
leftovers divided among the slaves.” “I’m going to beat it if she don’t
take her place,” Habinnas threatened, and started to get up; and then,
at a signal, the slaves all called out together “Fortunata,” four times
or more.
She appeared, girded round with a sash of greenish yellow, below which a
cherry-colored tunic could be seen, and she had on twisted anklets and
sandals worked in gold. Then, wiping her hands upon a handkerchief which
she wore around her neck, she seated herself upon the couch, beside
Scintilla, Habinnas’ wife, and clapping her hands and kissing her, “My
dear,” she gushed, “is it really you?” Fortunata then removed the
bracelets from her pudgy arms and held them out to the admiring
Scintilla, and by and by she took off her anklets and even her yellow
hair-net, which was twenty-four carats fine, she would have us know!
Trimalchio, who was on the watch, ordered every trinket to be brought to
him. “You see these things, don’t you?” he demanded; “they’re what
women fetter us with. That’s the way us poor suckers are done! These
ought to weigh six pounds and a half. I have an arm-band myself, that
don’t weigh a grain under ten pounds; I bought it out of Mercury’s
thousandths, too.” Finally, for fear he would seem to be lying, he
ordered the scales to be brought in and carried around to prove the
weights. And Scintilla was no better. She took off a small golden
vanity case which she wore around her neck, and which she called her
Lucky Box, and took from it two eardrops, which, in her turn, she handed
to Fortunata to be inspected. “Thanks to the generosity of my husband,”
she smirked, “no woman has better.” “What’s that?” Habinnas demanded.
“You kept on my trail to buy that glass bean for you; if I had a
daughter, I’ll be damned if I wouldn’t cut off her little ears. We’d
have everything as cheap as dirt if there were no women, but we have to
piss hot and drink cold, the way things are now.” The women, angry
though they were, were laughing together, in the meantime, and exchanging
drunken kisses, the one running on about her diligence as a housekeeper,
and the other about the infidelities and neglect of her husband.
Habinnas got up stealthily, while they were clinging together in this
fashion and, seizing Fortunata by the feet, he tipped her over backwards
upon the couch. “Let go!” she screeched, as her tunic slipped above her
knees; then, after pulling down her clothing, she threw herself into
Scintilla’s lap, and hid, with her handkerchief, a face which was none
the more beautiful for its blushes.
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-EIGHTH.
After a short interval, Trimalchio gave orders for the dessert to be
served, whereupon the slaves took away all the tables and brought in
others, and sprinkled the floor with sawdust mixed with saffron and
vermilion, and also with powdered mica, a thing I had never seen done
before. When all this was done Trimalchio remarked, “I could rest
content with this course, for you have your second tables, but, if you’ve
something especially nice, why bring it on.” Meanwhile an Alexandrian
slave boy, who had been serving hot water, commenced to imitate a
nightingale, and when Trimalchio presently called out, “Change your
tune,” we had another surprise, for a slave, sitting at Habinnas’ feet,
egged on, I have no doubt, by his own master, bawled suddenly in a
singsong voice, “Meanwhile AEneas and all of his fleet held his course on
the billowy deep”; never before had my ears been assailed by a sound so
discordant, for in addition to his barbarous pronunciation, and the
raising and lowering of his voice, he interpolated Atellane verses, and,
for the first time in my life, Virgil grated on my nerves. When he had
to quit, finally, from sheer want of breath, “Did he ever have any
training,” Habinnas exclaimed, “no, not he! I educated him by sending
him among the grafters at the fair, so when it comes to taking off a
barker or a mule driver, there’s not his equal, and the rogue’s clever,
too, he’s a shoemaker, or a cook, or a baker a regular jack of all
trades. But he has two faults, and if he didn’t have them, he’d be
beyond all price: he snores and he’s been circumcised. And that’s the
reason he never can keep his mouth shut and always has an eye open. I
paid three hundred dinars for him.”
CHAPTER THE SIXTY-NINTH.
“Yes,” Scintilla broke in, “and you’ve not mentioned all of his
accomplishments either; he’s a pimp too, and I’m going to see that he’s
branded,” she snapped. Trimalchio laughed. “There’s where the
Cappadocian comes out,” he said; “never cheats himself out of anything
and I admire him for it, so help me Hercules, I do. No one can show a
dead man a good time. Don’t be jealous, Scintilla; we’re next to you
women, too, believe me. As sure as you see me here safe and sound, I
used to play at thrust and parry with Mamma, my mistress, and finally
even my master got suspicious and sent me back to a stewardship; but keep
quiet, tongue, and I’ll give you a cake.” Taking all this as praise, the
wretched slave pulled a small earthen lamp from a fold in his garment,
and impersonated a trumpeter for half an hour or more, while Habinnas
hummed with him, holding his finger pressed to his lips. Finally, the
slave stepped out into the middle of the floor and waved his pipes in
imitation of a flute-player; then, with a whip and a smock, he enacted
the part of a mule-driver. At last Habinnas called him over and kissed
him and said, as he poured a drink for him, “You get better all the time,
Massa. I’m going to give you a pair of shoes.” Had not the dessert been
brought in, we would never have gotten to the end of these stupidities.
Thrushes made of pastry and stuffed with nuts and raisins, quinces with
spines sticking out so that they looked like sea-urchins. All this would
have been endurable enough had it not been for the last dish that was
served; so revolting was this, that we would rather have died of
starvation than to have even touched it. We thought that a fat goose,
flanked with fish and all kinds of birds, had been served, until
Trimalchio spoke up. “Everything you see here, my friends,” said he,
“was made from the same stuff.” With my usual keen insight, I jumped to
the conclusion that I knew what that stuff was and, turning to Agamemnon,
I said, “I shall be greatly surprised, if all those things are not made
out of excrement, or out of mud, at the very least: I saw a like artifice
practiced at Rome during the Saturnalia.”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTIETH.
I had not done speaking, when Trimalchio chimed in, “As I hope to grow
fatter in fortune but not in figure, my cook has made all this out of a
hog! It would be simply impossible to meet up with a more valuable
fellow: he’d make you a fish out of a sow’s coynte, if that’s what you
wanted, a pigeon out of her lard, a turtle-dove out of her ham, and a hen
out of a knuckle of pork: that’s why I named him Daedalus, in a happy
moment. I brought him a present of knives, from Rome, because he’s so
smart; they’re made of Noric steel, too.” He ordered them brought in
immediately, and looked them over, with admiration, even giving us the
chance to try their edges upon our cheeks. Then all of a sudden two
slaves came in, carrying on as if they had been fighting at the fountain,
at least; each one had a water-jar hanging from a yoke around his neck.
Trimalchio arbitrated their difference, but neither would abide by his
decision, and each one smashed the other’s jar with a club. Perturbed at
the insolence of these drunken ruffians, we watched both of them
narrowly, while they were fighting, and then, what should come pouring
out of the broken jars but oysters and scallops, which a slave picked up
and passed around in a dish. The resourceful cook would not permit
himself to be outdone by such refinements, but served us with snails on a
silver gridiron, and sang continually in a tremulous and very discordant
voice. I am ashamed to have to relate what followed, for, contrary to
all convention, some long-haired boys brought in unguents in a silver
basin and anointed the feet of the reclining guests; but before doing
this, however, they bound our thighs and ankles with garlands of flowers.
They then perfumed the wine-mixing vessel with the same unguent and
poured some of the melted liquid into the lamps. Fortunata had, by this
time, taken a notion that she wanted to dance, and Scintilla was doing
more hand-clapping than talking, when Trimalchio called out,
“Philargyrus, and you too, Carrio, you can both come to the table;
even if you are green faction fans, and tell your bedfellow, Menophila,
to come too.” What would you think happened then? We were nearly
crowded off the couches by the mob of slaves that crowded into the
dining-room and almost filled it full. As a matter of fact, I noticed
that our friend the cook, who had made a goose out of a hog, was placed
next to me, and he stunk from sauces and pickle. Not satisfied with a
place at the table, he immediately staged an impersonation of Ephesus the
tragedian, and then he suddenly offered to bet his master that the greens
would take first place in the next circus games.
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-FIRST.
Trimalchio was hugely tickled at this challenge. “Slaves are men, my
friends,” he observed, “but that’s not all, they sucked the same milk
that we did, even if hard luck has kept them down; and they’ll drink the
water of freedom if I live: to make a long story short, I’m freeing all
of them in my will. To Philargyrus, I’m leaving a farm, and his
bedfellow, too. Carrio will get a tenement house and his twentieth,
and a bed and bedclothes to boot. I’m making Fortunata my heir and I
commend her to all my friends. I announce all this in public so that my
household will love me as well now as they will when I’m dead.” They all
commenced to pay tribute to the generosity of their master, when he,
putting aside his trifling, ordered a copy of his will brought in, which
same he read aloud from beginning to end, to the groaning accompaniment
of the whole household. Then, looking at Habinnas, “What say you, my
dearest friend,” he entreated; “you’ll construct my monument in keeping
with the plans I’ve given you, won’t you? I earnestly beg that you carve
a little bitch at the feet of my statue, some wreaths and some jars of
perfume, and all of the fights of Petraites. Then I’ll be able to live
even after I’m dead, thanks to your kindness. See to it that it has a
frontage of one hundred feet and a depth of two hundred. I want fruit
trees of every kind planted around my ashes; and plenty of vines, too,
for it’s all wrong for a man to deck out his house when he’s alive, and
then have no pains taken with the one he must stay in for a longer time,
and that’s the reason I particularly desire that this notice be added:
--THIS MONUMENT DOES NOT--
--DESCEND TO AN HEIR--
“In any case, I’ll see to it through a clause in my will, that I’m not
insulted when I’m dead. And for fear the rabble comes running up into my
monument, to crap, I’ll appoint one of my freedmen custodian of my tomb.
I want you to carve ships under full sail on my monument, and me, in my
robes of office, sitting on my tribunal, five gold rings on my fingers,
pouring out coin from a sack for the people, for I gave a dinner and two
dinars for each guest, as you know. Show a banquet-hall, too, if you
can, and the people in it having a good time. On my right, you can place
a statue of Fortunata holding a dove and leading a little bitch on a
leash, and my favorite boy, and large jars sealed with gypsum, so the
wine won’t run out; show one broken and a boy crying over it. Put a
sun-dial in the middle, so that whoever looks to see what time it is must
read my name whether he wants to or not. As for the inscription, think
this over carefully, and see if you think it’s appropriate:
HERE RESTS G POMPEIUS TRIMALCHIO
FREEDMAN OF MAECENAS DECREED
AUGUSTAL, SEVIR IN HIS ABSENCE
HE COULD HAVE BEEN A MEMBER OF
EVERY DECURIA OF ROME BUT WOULD
NOT CONSCIENTIOUS BRAVE LOYAL
HE GREW RICH FROM LITTLE AND LEFT
THIRTY MILLION SESTERCES BEHIND
HE NEVER HEARD A PHILOSOPHER
FAREWELL TRIMALCHIO
FAREWELL PASSERBY”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-SECOND.
When he had repeated these words, Trimalchio began to weep copiously,
Fortunata was crying already, and so was Habinnas, and at last, the whole
household filled the dining-room with their lamentations, just as if they
were taking part in a funeral. Even I was beginning to sniffle, when
Trimalchio said, “Let’s live while we can, since we know we’ve all got to
die. I’d rather see you all happy, anyhow, so let’s take a plunge in the
bath. You’ll never regret it. I’ll bet my life on that, it’s as hot as
a furnace!” “Fine business,” seconded Habinnas, “there’s nothing suits
me better than making two days out of one,” and he got up in his bare
feet to follow Trimalchio, who was clapping his hands. I looked at
Ascyltos. “What do you think about this?” I asked. “The very sight of a
bath will be the death of me.” “Let’s fall in with his suggestion,” he
replied, “and while they are hunting for the bath we will escape in the
crowd.” Giton led us out through the porch, when we had reached this
understanding, and we came to a door, where a dog on a chain startled us
so with his barking that Ascyltos immediately fell into the fish-pond.
As for myself, I was tipsy and had been badly frightened by a dog that
was only a painting, and when I tried to haul the swimmer out, I was
dragged into the pool myself. The porter finally came to our rescue,
quieted the dog by his appearance, and pulled us, shivering, to dry land.
Giton had ransomed himself by a very cunning scheme, for what we had
saved for him, from dinner, he threw to the barking brute, which then
calmed its fury and became engrossed with the food. But when, with
chattering teeth, we besought the porter to let us out at the door, “If
you think you can leave by the same door you came in at,” he replied,
“you’re mistaken: no guest is ever allowed to go out through the same
door he came in at; some are for entrance, others for exit.”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-THIRD.
What were we miserable wretches to do, shut up in this newfangled
labyrinth. The idea of taking a hot bath had commenced to grow in favor,
so we finally asked the porter to lead us to the place and, throwing off
our clothing, which Giton spread out in the hall to dry, we went in.
It was very small, like a cold water cistern; Trimalchio was standing
upright in it, and one could not escape his disgusting bragging even
here. He declared that there was nothing nicer than bathing without a
mob around, and that a bakery had formerly occupied this very spot.
Tired out at last, he sat down, but when the echoes of the place tempted
him, he lifted his drunken mouth to the ceiling, and commenced murdering
the songs of Menacrates, at least that is what we were told by those who
understood his language. Some of the guests joined hands and ran around
the edge of the pool, making the place ring with their boisterous peals
of laughter; others tried to pick rings up from the floor, with their
hands tied behind them, or else, going down upon their knees, tried to
touch the ends of their toes by bending backwards. We went down into the
pool while the rest were taking part in such amusements. It was being
heated for Trimalchio. When the fumes of the wine had been dissipated,
we were conducted into another dining-room where Fortunata had laid out
her own treasures; I noticed, for instance, that there were little bronze
fishermen upon the lamps, the tables were of solid silver, the cups were
porcelain inlaid with gold; before our eyes wine was being strained
through a straining cloth. “One of my slaves shaves his first beard
today,” Trimalchio remarked, at length, “a promising, honest, thrifty
lad; may he have no bad luck, so let’s get our skins full and stick
around till morning.”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-FOURTH.
He had not ceased speaking when a cock crowed! Alarmed at this omen,
Trimalchio ordered wine thrown under the table and told them to sprinkle
the lamps with it; and he even went so far as to change his ring from his
left hand to his right. “That trumpeter did not sound off without a
reason,” he remarked; “there’s either a fire in the neighborhood, or else
someone’s going to give up the ghost. I hope it’s none of us! Whoever
brings that Jonah in shall have a present.” He had no sooner made this
promise, than a cock was brought in from somewhere in the neighborhood
and Trimalchio ordered the cook to prepare it for the pot. That same
versatile genius who had but a short time before made birds and fish out
of a hog, cut it up; it was then consigned to the kettle, and while
Daedalus was taking a long hot drink, Fortunata ground pepper in a
boxwood mill. When these delicacies had been consumed, Trimalchio looked
the slaves over. “You haven’t had anything to eat yet, have you?” he
asked. “Get out and let another relay come on duty.” Thereupon a second
relay came in. “Farewell, Gaius,” cried those going off duty, and “Hail,
Gaius,” cried those coming on. Our hilarity was somewhat dampened soon
after, for a boy, who was by no means bad looking, came in among the
fresh slaves. Trimalchio seized him and kissed him lingeringly,
whereupon Fortunata, asserting her rights in the house, began to rail at
Trimalchio, styling him an abomination who set no limits to his lechery,
finally ending by calling him a dog. Trimalchio flew into a rage at her
abuse and threw a wine cup at her head, whereupon she screeched, as if
she had had an eye knocked out and covered her face with her trembling
hands. Scintilla was frightened, too, and shielded the shuddering woman
with her garment. An officious slave presently held a cold water pitcher
to her cheek and Fortunata bent over it, sobbing and moaning. But as for
Trimalchio, “What the hell’s next?” he gritted out, “this Syrian
dancing-whore don’t remember anything! I took her off the auction block
and made her a woman among her equals, didn’t I? And here she puffs
herself up like a frog and pukes in her own nest; she’s a blockhead, all
right, not a woman. But that’s the way it is, if you’re born in an attic
you can’t sleep in a palace I’ll see that this booted Cassandra’s tamed,
so help me my Genius, I will! And I could have married ten million, even
if I did only have two cents: you know I’m not lying! ‘Let me give you a
tip,’ said Agatho, the perfumer to the lady next door, when he pulled me
aside: ‘don’t let your line die out!’ And here I’ve stuck the ax into my
own leg because I was a damned fool and didn’t want to seem fickle. I’ll
see to it that you’re more careful how you claw me up, sure as you’re
born, I will! That you may realize how seriously I take what you’ve done
to me--Habinnas, I don’t want you to put her statue on my tomb for fear
I’ll be nagged even after I’m dead! And furthermore, that she may know I
can repay a bad turn, I won’t have her kissing me when I’m laid out!”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-FIFTH.
When Trimalchio had launched this thunderbolt, Habinnas commenced to
beg him to control his anger. “There’s not one of us but goes wrong
sometimes,” argued he; “we’re not gods, we’re men.” Scintilla also cried
out through her tears, calling him “Gaius,” and entreating him by his
guardian angel to be mollified. Trimalchio could restrain the tears no
longer. “Habinnas,” he blubbered, “as you hope to enjoy your money, spit
in my face if I’ve done anything wrong. I kissed him because he’s very
thrifty, not because he’s a pretty boy. He can recite his division table
and read a book at sight: he bought himself a Thracian uniform from his
savings from his rations, and a stool and two dippers, with his own
money, too. He’s worth my attention, ain’t he? But Fortunata won’t see
it! Ain’t that the truth, you high-stepping hussy’? Let me beg you to
make the best of what you’ve got, you shekite, and don’t make me show my
teeth, my little darling, or you’ll find out what my temper’s like!
Believe me, when once I’ve made up my mind, I’m as fixed as a spike in a
beam! But let’s think of the living. I hope you’ll all make yourselves
at home, gentlemen: I was in your fix myself once; but rose to what I am
now by my own merit. It’s the brains that makes the man, all the rest’s
bunk. I buy well, I sell well, someone else will tell you a different
story, but as for myself, I’m fairly busting with prosperity. What,
grunting-sow, still bawling? I’ll see to it that you’ve something to
bawl for, but as I started to say, it was my thrift that brought me to
my fortune. I was just as tall as that candlestick when I came over from
Asia; every day I used to measure myself by it, and I would smear my lips
with oil so my beard would sprout all the sooner. I was my master’s
‘mistress’ for fourteen years, for there’s nothing wrong in doing what
your master orders, and I satisfied my mistress, too, during that time,
you know what I mean, but I’ll say no more, for I’m not one of your
braggarts!”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-SIXTH.
“At last it came about by the will of the gods that I was master in the
house, and I had the real master under my thumb then. What is there
left to tell? I was made co-heir with Caesar and came into a Senator’s
fortune. But nobody’s ever satisfied with what he’s got, so I embarked
in business. I won’t keep you long in suspense; I built five ships and
loaded them with wine--worth its weight in gold, it was then--and sent
them to Rome. You’d think I’d ordered it so, for every last one of them
foundered; it’s a fact, no fairy tale about it, and Neptune swallowed
thirty million sesterces in one day! You don’t think I lost my pep, do
you? By Hercules, no! That was only an appetizer for me, just as if
nothing at all had happened. I built other and bigger ships, better
found, too, so no one could say I wasn’t game. A big ship’s a big
venture, you know. I loaded them up with wine again, bacon, beans,
Capuan perfumes, and slaves: Fortunata did the right thing in this
affair, too, for she sold every piece of jewelry and all her clothes into
the bargain, and put a hundred gold pieces in my hand. They were the
nest-egg of my fortune. A thing’s soon done when the gods will it;
I cleared ten million sesterces by that voyage, all velvet, and bought
in all the estates that had belonged to my patron, right away. I built
myself a house and bought cattle to resell, and whatever I touched grew
just like a honeycomb. I chucked the game when I got to have an income
greater than all the revenues of my own country, retired from business,
and commenced to back freedmen. I never liked business anyhow, as far as
that goes, and was just about ready to quit when an astrologer, a Greek
fellow he was, and his name was Serapa, happened to light in our colony,
and he slipped me some information and advised me to quit. He was hep to
all the secrets of the gods: told me things about myself that I’d
forgotten, and explained everything to me from needle and thread up; knew
me inside out, he did, and only stopped short of telling me what I’d had
for dinner the day before. You’d have thought he’d lived with me
always!”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-SEVENTH.
“Habinnas, you were there, I think, I’ll leave it to you; didn’t he say
--‘You took your wife out of a whore-house’? you’re as lucky in your
friends, too, no one ever repays your favor with another, you own broad
estates, you nourish a viper under your wing, and--why shouldn’t I tell
it--I still have thirty years, four months, and two days to live! I’ll
also come into another bequest shortly. That’s what my horoscope tells
me. If I can extend my boundaries so as to join Apulia, I’ll think I’ve
amounted to something in this life! I built this house with Mercury on
the job, anyhow; it was a hovel, as you know, it’s a palace now! Four
dining-rooms, twenty bed-rooms, two marble colonnades, a store-room
upstairs, a bed-room where I sleep myself, a sitting-room for this viper,
a very good room for the porter, a guest-chamber for visitors. As a
matter of fact, Scaurus, when he was here, would stay nowhere else,
although he has a family place on the seashore. I’ll show you many other
things, too, in a jiffy; believe me, if you have an as, you’ll be rated
at what you have. So your humble servant, who was a frog, is now a king.
Stychus, bring out my funereal vestments while we wait, the ones I’ll be
carried out in, some perfume, too, and a draught of the wine in that jar,
I mean the kind I intend to have my bones washed in.”
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-EIGHTH.
It was not long before Stychus brought a white shroud and a
purple-bordered toga into the dining-room, and Trimalchio requested us
to feel them and see if they were pure wool. Then, with a smile, “Take
care, Stychus, that the mice don’t get at these things and gnaw them, or
the moths either. I’ll burn you alive if they do. I want to be carried
out in all my glory so all the people will wish me well.” Then, opening
a jar of nard, he had us all anointed. “I hope I’ll enjoy this as well
when I’m dead,” he remarked, “as I do while I’m alive.” He then ordered
wine to be poured into the punch-bowl. “Pretend,” said he, “that you’re
invited to my funeral feast.” The thing had grown positively
nauseating, when Trimalchio, beastly drunk by now, bethought himself of
a new and singular diversion and ordered some horn-blowers brought into
the dining-room. Then, propped up by many cushions, he stretched
himself out upon the couch. “Let on that I’m dead,” said he, “and say
something nice about me.” The horn-blowers sounded off a loud funeral
march together, and one in particular, a slave belonging to an
undertaker, made such a fanfare that he roused the whole neighborhood,
and the watch, which was patrolling the vicinity, thinking Trimalchio’s
house was afire, suddenly smashed in the door and rushed in with their
water and axes, as is their right, raising a rumpus all their own. We
availed ourselves of this happy circumstance and, leaving Agamemnon in
the lurch, we took to our heels, as though we were running away from a
real conflagration.
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Affairs start to go wrong, your friends will stand from under
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Everybody’s business is nobody’s business
He can teach you more than he knows himself
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Men are lions at home and foxes abroad
No one can show a dead man a good time
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Too many doctors did away with him
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Whenever you learn a thing, it’s yours
Believes, on the spot, every tale
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VOLUME 3.--FURTHER ADVENTURES OF ENCOLPIUS AND HIS COMPANIONS
CHAPTER THE SEVENTY-NINTH.
There was no torch to light the way for us, as we wandered around, nor
did the silence of midnight give promise of our meeting any wayfarer with
a light; in addition to this, we were drunk and unfamiliar with the
district, which would confuse one, even in daylight, so for the best part
of a mortal hour we dragged our bleeding feet over all the flints and
pieces of broken tile, till we were extricated, at last, by Giton’s
cleverness. This prudent youngster had been afraid of going astray on
the day before, so he had taken care to mark all the pillars and columns
with chalk. These marks stood out distinctly, even through the pitchy
night, and by their brilliant whiteness pointed out the way for us as we
wandered about. Nevertheless, we had no less cause for being in a sweat
even when we came to our lodging, for the old woman herself had been
sitting and swilling so long with her guests that even if one had set her
afire, she would not have known it. We would have spent the night on the
door-sill had not Trimalchio’s courier come up in state, with ten wagons;
he hammered on the door for a short time, and then smashed it in, giving
us an entrance through the same breach. (Hastening to the
sleeping-chamber, I went to bed with my “brother” and, burning with
passion as I was, after such a magnificent dinner, I surrendered myself
wholly to sexual gratification.)
Oh Goddesses and Gods, that purple night
How soft the couch! And we, embracing tight;
With every wandering kiss our souls would meet!
Farewell all mortal woes, to die were sweet
But my self-congratulation was premature, for I was overcome with wine,
and when my unsteady hands relaxed their hold, Ascyltos, that
never-failing well-spring of iniquity, stole the boy away from me in the
night and carried him to his own bed, where he wallowed around without
restraint with a “
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