TO MEMOmANi 
 
 HENRY U. BRANDENSTEIN 
 
Digitized by tine Internet Archive 
 
 in 2007 with funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/firstsatireofjuvOOusherich 
 
THE 
 
 FIRST SATIEE 
 
 JUVENAL, 
 
 TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH VERSE, 
 
 O »-5^0500 * o"" 
 
 •M 
 
 EDWARD P. USHER, A. M. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE 
 
 MARCH, 1876. 
 
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 • • • 
 
 • • • • 
 
 e e e • • 
 
SATIRE 
 
 Shall I forever play the list'ner's part; 
 And never have my say, though harassed oft 
 By Cordus mumbling out his dull Theseid? 
 Without e'er hearing me shall one recite 
 His elegies, another read his plays? 
 Must I hear " Telephus " the live-long day, 
 That tragic story, where you scarcely find 
 A fate to draw compassion more than mine. 
 If I am doomed to hear without revenge? 
 Must sit in patience, while some crack-brained fool 
 Reels off, in detail, all Orestes' woes — 
 A vapid, endless, many-volumed tale? 
 I know, e'en as I do my house and home. 
 The cave of Vulcan near Aeolian cliffs. 
 The grove of Mars and all that sort of thing; 
 For 'neath the shady plane-trees, where the bards 
 Collect in crowds to shout their stupid lines 
 And bawl so loud that e'en the statues shake. 
 The porticoes of Fronto echo back 
 Descriptions of the roaring, raging winds; 
 
The judgments passed by Aeacus in hell; 
 Whence crafty Jason stole the Golden Fleece; 
 And all about the mountain ash-trees hurled 
 By Monychus the Centaur 'gainst his foes. 
 Such are to-day the universal themes, 
 A few dry husks, the corn within all gone. 
 
 Time was I wrote because, forsooth, I must; 
 The task undone had brought the teacher's rod. 
 But now I fear no ferule, for I 've writ 
 On all the threadbare topics of the schools, 
 How Sylla should the sovereign power resign 
 And sleep till noon at ease in private life. 
 Since then the boy could write with all the rest. 
 Why should not now the man take up the pen? 
 'Tis foolish, since each quarter of the town 
 Is crowded with its host of scribbling bards. 
 To spare the paper they will surely spoil. 
 Why then I choose to follow in the steps 
 Of great Lucilius in the realms of verse. 
 Nor write to please but to provoke and sting, 
 If you have time and wish to hear, I '11 tell. 
 
 When eunuchs marry and the hunting spear 
 Is held by women, who with breasts exposed 
 Within the circus fight the Tuscan boar; 
 When he exceeds the nobles in his wealth. 
 
Whose barber-fingers clipped my youthful beard; 
 
 When he, a born and bred Egyptian slave, 
 
 A vagabond, the very scum of Nile, 
 
 So boldly flaunts his Tyrian purple robe 
 
 And waves his hand to show his summer rings 
 
 So dainty and so fine, and swears he keeps 
 
 His score of heavier gems for winter's wear — 
 
 Satiric verse becomes an easy thing. 
 
 For who can be indifterent, when he sees 
 
 The daily life of this licentious town? 
 
 When lawyer Matho's sedan chair goes by 
 
 Completely filled with his unwieldy paunch; 
 
 When everywhere you hear his praises ring 
 
 Who as a base informer gained his wealth. 
 
 His friends and patron plundered and betrayed. 
 
 Secure in royal favor, now he yearns 
 
 For what our pillaged nobles yet have left; 
 
 Him all the tribe of small informers fear 
 
 And crouch before and soothe with gifts, while one 
 
 Trembling presents his mistress as his bribe. 
 
 When rightful heirs are robbed of their estate 
 
 By those whose legacies were earned through lust, 
 
 Who find that wealth and high preferment lie 
 
 For those whose hands are stained with crime and 
 
 wrong; 
 When grandames dying all their wealth bestow 
 According to the part that each one bore 
 
In gratifying their insatiate lust, 
 Whose aged blood by ill-timed passion fired 
 Becomes the prey of each ambitious knave; 
 All steeped in vile excesses they bequeath 
 To those of kin the legacy of shame, 
 While fawning lovers take the vast estate: 
 And these, so blinded by the greed of gold. 
 Sell their life-blood and rich at last, bewail 
 The frame exhausted, broken with excess, 
 The features thin and deathly pale, as his 
 Who on a snake has trod with naked feet. 
 Or who prepares to seek the Lyon's prize 
 When failure is disgrace and risk of life. 
 
 My angry blood with indignation boils 
 To see the guardian, who his trust betrayed. 
 Attended by a servile throng, who fill 
 The whole broad street around him as he walks; 
 This too though 'tis the common talk of town 
 That he has made an orphan ward his prey. 
 Robbed her of all, obliging her to sell 
 For livelihood her virtue and good fame: 
 Or when again I see the courts condemn 
 The plunderer of provinces, who still 
 An exile lives in luxury, while they 
 Who urged the suit now fail to get their costs. 
 He laughs to scorn their impotent revenge. 
 
Their judgments vain, for what disgrace to-day 
 To be convicted while one's wealth is spared! 
 
 Worthy are these of strong Horatian verse. 
 Shall I not lash them? Shall I rather write 
 Of Diomedes or Alcmene's son, 
 Of Daedalus and Cretan labyrinth, 
 And Icarus who flew too near the sun? 
 Of these stale themes rather than daily life? 
 Nay, nay, the times demand far diflferent verse 
 When vile men pander to their wives and take 
 In their own name the legacies thus earned 
 To which the law will not allow her claim; 
 Skilled such become in knowing when to gaze 
 Up at the frescoed ceiling, when to nod. 
 And o'er their glasses feign to be asleep: 
 When he can hope to reach a Colonel's place 
 Who squandered money in a wild career. 
 Nor kept his wealth ancestral while he drove 
 The finest team seen on Flaminian way. 
 With no mean company indeed he rode; 
 He held the reins when Nero and his boy 
 Disgraced our streets by lust past nature's bounds, 
 While Romans blushed and mourned the glories past. 
 
 How can I keep my waxen tablets smooth? 
 How can forbear to take my hurried notes. 
 
8 
 
 Though jostled at each elbow by the crowd, 
 When here and there on every street is seen, 
 Borne by six lusty slaves in sedan chair 
 A la Maecenas carelessly outstretched. 
 The forger now so famous, rich and proud; 
 Become thus by a few brief parchment deeds. 
 And wax well moistened e'er the seal was pressed? 
 Or when she sweeps so gaily, proudly by 
 Who mingled with the mild Calenian wine 
 The subtle poison e'er her husband drank? 
 She, skilled in myst'ries of the dreadful art. 
 By her well known example would instruct 
 Her less accomplished neighbors how to shift 
 The burden from their shoulders and endure 
 The scandal of a husband's spotted corpse. 
 While Honesty is praised, the honest man 
 Stands shivering in the cold outside and starves, 
 ould'st thou then be of consequence, thou must 
 ommit some crime that should entitle thee 
 o exile or to prison, then compound 
 J3y using part of thy ill-gotten gains ! 
 To crimes are due these gardens, country-seats. 
 These sumptuous dinners, antique silver ware, 
 These drinking cups embossed with grapes and goats. 
 Oh! who can sleep, these scandals in his ears. 
 Daughters-in-law corrupted, wives as vile, 
 i The thoughts of children turned to lust and sin. 
 
Though nature had refused the gift divine, 
 Yet indignation forces one to write 
 Such verse as I or Cluvienus may. ^ 
 
 E'er since Deucalion, tossed on angry waves, 
 Sought on the mountains crest the voice of fate. 
 Asking of Themis to disclose the means 
 That should to earth restore the race of men. 
 Renewing what the deluge had destroyed — 
 He then, obedient to divine commands. 
 Found rocks behind him hurled changed into men, 
 While Pyrrha brought the blushing, virgin brides — 
 From that time forth, whatever men have done. 
 What feelings have inspired, what motives urged. 
 Their vows, their fits of anger and of fear. 
 The pleasures and the giddy whirl of life; 
 All this the motley burden of my verse. 
 And when has Vice a richer harvest known? 
 When did the gulf of av'rice wider yawn? 
 When was the die with wilder gesture tossed? 
 For now small stakes no more content, but all 
 The gathered wealth of years goes on one throw. 
 What feverish, fierce encounters with the dice! 
 How vexed the anxious steward, standing near 
 With bags of coin, the weapons of the fight! 
 Is it not madness, absolute, complete. 
 
lO 
 
 That leads a man to risk his whole estate 
 E'en to the vesture of the shiv'ring slave? 
 
 In earlier days, v^hen simpler tastes prevailed, 
 Who called so many country seats his own, 
 Or vainly loaded thus the board, and saw 
 Seven sumptuous courses for himself alone? 
 Ah I then the clients found a generous host, 
 A welcome and good cheer for all who came; 
 While now the fragment basket hangs outside. 
 The eager plunder of the hungry crew, 
 Too poor to scorn, however small the dole. 
 But, first, the wary steward eyes each one 
 Lest any undeserving get a share; 
 If known, you may partake; in turn they call 
 Such as, now poor, still boast their noble blood, 
 The shabby remnants of a genteel past. 
 Who hang in noble rags and royal dirt 
 About the threshold with the common herd. 
 "Call first the Praetor; then next after him 
 The Tribune : " but a noisy freedman cries 
 " The rule here followed is first come, first served. 
 " I may demand the place before you all; 
 " Why shall I fear to claim what is my right, 
 " Though born upon Euphrates' bank, a fact 
 " My pierced ears would prove did I deny. 
 " My crowded shops are quite enough to show 
 
II 
 
 ^^ My right and title to a Knight's estate; 
 
 " What more have I to wish? Corvinus guards, 
 
 " Although of noble kin, a stranger's flocks, 
 
 "As poor in money as he's rich in blood. 
 
 " To me must Pallas and Licinus yield 
 
 "In land and goods; then let the Tribune wait." 
 
 Let wealth become supreme, nor let him yield, 
 Who to this city lately came a slave, 
 Before the empty honor of high birth. 
 We worship and in holy rev'rence keep 
 The majesty of wealth, although we build 
 No temples unto thee, accursed gold, 
 Nor raise thee altars as to other gods — 
 These are but hypocrite's retreats and shams — 
 Thou rulest all; they but a worship feign 
 P^or Peace and Faith, for Valor and High Worth, 
 And all that cloistered Culture can bring forth. 
 When men of rank, e'en Consuls, closely count 
 How much each year the dole has brought them in, 
 How fare the poor, who on this paltry sum 
 Depend for all they have of food and clothes! 
 Dense the array before the rich man's door 
 When husbands bring their bed-rid, pregnant wives 
 In chairs and litters, every size and kind. 
 While each one strives to prove his case the worst, 
 And noisy impudence asserts its sway. 
 
f 
 
 12 
 
 Some sly one brings his sedan chair all closed, 
 
 And, while 'tis really vacant, asks a share 
 
 As if there were a living form within, — 
 
 " My Galla here," says he, ^^ Do n't make us wait." 
 
 "Wo n't Madam Galla please put forth hor head?" 
 
 " Do n't wake her, Mr. Steward, she 's asleep." 
 
 A fine routine the client's day employs! 
 First on his lord he makes his morning call. 
 Then swells the crowd around him, as he walks 
 Down through the public squares to courts of law; 
 And there, indifferent to the busy scene. 
 Drags through long hours, all in his master's cause; 
 The rows of statues with disgust he views; 
 They do no honor to the names they bear. 
 When money and not worth secures a place, 
 When not infrequent you shall see the forms 
 Of vile Egyptians or of filthy Jews, 
 Whose infamy was covered up by wealth, 
 Whose statues, fit at best to be defiled, 
 He must, forsooth, hold sacred and keep clean. 
 At length, the weary day's attendance o'er, 
 The client, ling'ring long, goes to his home; 
 And he, who hoped to share his patron's feast, 
 Balked of expected bounty, now must boil 
 His paltry cabbage o'er his scanty fire. 
 Or else go supperless and cold to bed. 
 
13 
 
 Meanwhile the patron, of his clients rid, 
 Lolls on his couch in solitary state. 
 Revels in choicest fish, rare game and fruits, 
 Selects from many tables, broad and fair, 
 Of antique patterns and of costly woods. 
 Some one that suits perchance his present whim, 
 And there devours a whole estate at once. 
 No guest intrudes; the name is dying out. 
 The kind and generous host of earlier days 
 Has given way to men who worship self. 
 Whose splendid living is for self alone. 
 The shameless glutton a whole boar desires. 
 Though that might well suffice to feast a crowd; 
 Yet shall his folly meet its just reward 
 When, stuflfed with food, he lays aside his robe. 
 Flies to the bath and vainly seeks relief 
 From woes the undigested peacock brings. 
 Hence unexpected death without a will. 
 The news soon flies the circle of his friends. 
 Makes talk at every table in the town. 
 Where 't is regarded as a theme for jest. 
 They waste, forsooth, no idle tears, but vent 
 Their spleen and disappointed hopes, and mock 
 As his funereal pageant passes by. 
 
 They who succeed us shall but need to learn; 
 They can devise no form of vice or crime 
 
H 
 
 But what the records of this age will show. 
 
 We've reached the climax now of every vice; 
 
 Spread, Satire, then thy wings to boldest flights. 
 
 But where the mind to grasp so vast a theme. 
 
 The early freedom, now almost forgot. 
 
 To utter what indignant Virtue thinks? 
 
 In other times men wrote without regard 
 
 To smiles or frowns, court favor or disgrace; 
 
 But now glance at some wretch in public life, 
 
 Direct one shaft at some subservient tool 
 
 Who by his intrigues helps the royal power. 
 
 And forthwith you shall wear the shirt of pitch. 
 
 Be fastened to the public stake, and serve 
 
 To drive the darkness of the night away; 
 
 Or else, with breasts transfixed, you squirm and draw 
 
 In shapes fantastic the arena sand. 
 
 " Shall he, who for three uncles mixed the draught 
 
 " Of deadly poison, ride in triumph by 
 
 "And cast disdainful glances down on me?" 
 
 Yes; 'tis the time when arrant knaves succeed. 
 
 So when you meet him, 'spite the wrath you feel, 
 
 Restrain your tongue, for some informer vile 
 
 Who follows in his wake, will get your name 
 
 And bring you 'neath the mighty power he wields. 
 
 Aeneas and the fierce Rutulian prince. 
 
 Or Hylas and his pitcher sought in vain. 
 
 You may describe at length : none take offence. 
 
IS 
 
 You may declare Achilles slain: none weep. 
 
 But when, with virtuous indignation filled, 
 
 You brandish, as it were, your naked sword. 
 
 The list'ner's cheeks grow red with conscious guilt, 
 
 His blood runs cold, his trembling limbs betray 
 
 His terror and his shame at crime revealed. 
 
 Hence angry tears and fierce revenge ensue. 
 
 These consequences of your deed revolve 
 
 E'er with your lips you blow the trumpet's blast; 
 
 Too late the soldier, in the fight, repents. 
 
 Despite the danger, I shall do m}^ best 
 To hold the mirror up to crime and wrong; 
 And as I may not lash the living vile, 
 I '11 take the names of those long dead, but write 
 So that to all the meaning shall be plain. 
 
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
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