BOOK I I.

SATIRE I.

HORACE.

OME people think, my satire hits

SOM

More home, and harder, than befits,
While others say, my lines lack nerve,
Nay, go so far as to observe,

That of a morning 'twere not much
To rattle off a thousand such.

Prescribe, Trebatius *-and I'll try it

The course I ought to take.

TREBATIUS.

Be quiet.

Write no more verse.

HORACE.

Oh, that's what you say?

TREBATIUS.

Precisely. That's just what I do say!

HORACE.

Hang me, if I don't think you're right!
But then I cannot sleep at night.

. Trebatius Testa was a lawyer of great eminence, who stood high esteem of both Julius Cæsar and Augustus.

TREBATIUS.

Wants any man sound sleep, let him
Three times across the Tiber swim
With limbs well oiled, and soak his skin
With wine, ere he to bed turn in.

Or, if needs must that you should write,
Why then essay a daring flight!

Great Cæsar sing, and his campaign,

Where praise and pudding wait your strain.

HORACE.

Most worthy sir, that's just the thing

I'd like especially to sing,

But at the task my spirits faint;
For 'tis not every one can paint
Battalions, with their bristling wall
Of pikes, or make you see the Gaul,
With shivered spear, in death-throe bleed,
Or Parthian stricken from his steed.

TREBATIUS.

But why not sing—this much you could—

His justice and his fortitude,

Like sage Lucilius, in his lays

To Scipio Africanus' praise?

HORACE.

When time and circumstance suggest,

I shall not fail to do my best;

But never words of mine shall touch
Great Cæsar's ear, but only such

As are to the occasion due,

And spring from my conviction, too.

For, stroke him with an awkward hand,
And he kicks out,-you understand?

TREBATIUS.

Far better this, friend, every way,
Than with sarcastic verse to flay
Pantolabus, that scurrile boor,
Or Nomentanus,—since, be sure,
That, though themselves untouched by you,
People will fear and hate you, too.

HORACE.

What shall I take to, tell me, then?
Milonius falls a capering, when
Wine throws his brain into a stew,

And he for every lamp sees two.
Castor delights in horses-Well!

While he, that with him chipped the shell,

In boxing his enjoyment finds.

So many men, so many minds!

And my delight is to enclose

Words in such measured lines, as those
Lucilius wrote, who in that kind
Left you and me and all behind.
As unto loyal friends and tried,
He to his notebook did confide
His secrets, thither turning still,
Went fortune well with him or ill;
Whence all the old man's life is known,
As if 'twere in a picture shown.

Him follow I, Lucania's son,
Perhaps Apulia's. 'Tis all one;
For the Venusian dalesman now

O'er either border drives the plough,

Sent thither, says tradition eld,

What time the Samnites were expelled,

To keep back foes from Roman ground,

Who through these wilds might else have found
An entrance, or, belike, to stand
Betwixt the Apulian people and
Lucania's headstrong sons, and mar
Their love of breaking into war.
But never shall this pen contrive
Assault on any man alive.

Like a good sword within its sheath,
'Twill prove that I can show my teeth,
But draw it why should I, so long
As thieves don't seek to do me wrong?
Grant, Jove, great sire and king, it may
Rust in its scabbard day by day,
Nor any one fall foul of me,

Who fain at peace with all would be!
But he, that shall my temper try—
'Twere best to touch me not, say I-
Shall rue it, and through all the town
My verse shall damn him with renown.*

Smite Cervius, and his indignation
Vows suits at law for defamation;
Canidia with her poisons strikes
The people down whom she dislikes.
And woe betide you, if your judge
Be Turius, and he bear you grudge!
Learn this with me, 'tis nature's law,
Through what we're strongest in to awe

*Happily translated by Pope :

"Whoe'er offends, at some unlucky time

Slides into verse, and hitches in a rhyme ;
Sacred to ridicule his whole life long,
And the sad burden of a merry song."