In summis, minimisque; etiam cum piscis emetur: : Argenti gravis, et pecorum agrorumque capacem? 40 45 50 36. A fish, &c.] When he goes to the fish market, if his purse will only afford him a gudgeon, he should not think of buying so dear a fish as a mullet; i. e. a man should always proportion his expenses to his pocket. 38. What end, &c.] What must increasing expense and gluttony, and a decreasing and failing purse, end in? 40. In your belly.] Your patrimony, both in goods and land, all spent to gratify your luxury and gluttony, all swallowed up by your voracious appetite. Capable of containing, &c.] Not only the interest and principal of what the father left in personal estate, but also all his land, and stock thereon into the bargain. By argenti gravis (joined with foenoris, which signifies interest upon money lent) the principal money itself may be understood. Or the epithet gravis may here signify the best silver money, in contradistinction to the tenue argentum, venæque secundæ, sat. ix. 31. Many interpret argenti gravis to denote silver in the rude heavy mass. 42. Such masters.] i. e. Owners, possessors. -After all, &c.] When all else is spent and gone. 43. The ring.] The mark of honour and distinction worn by Roman knights. They must be driven very hard to part with this ;but having, by their extravagance, reduced themselves below the fortune and rank of the equestrian order, they have no right to claim it, or to wear the badge of it. Pollio.] He was brought to that pass by his gluttony, that he was forced to sell his ring, and then beg for a livelihood. Naked finger.] His finger bare, bereft of the ring which he used to wear upon it. 44. Ashes, &c.] Death never comes too soon; the funeral pile, And in the least affairs; even when a fish shall be bought : To luxury, but old age more to be feared than death. 40 45 These are ofttimes the steps: money is borrowed at Rome, 50 year. for one which reduces them to ashes, is never bitter to such as these, whose maxim is--" a short life and a merry one," or, "let us eat and "drink, for to-morrow we die." 45. To luxury.] To gluttons and spendthrifts. More to be feared, &c.] Because it can be attended with nothing but poverty and disease. 46. Oftlimes the steps.] Plerumque--for the most part, most commonly the degrees by which they proceed. t Borrowed at Rome.] They first take up money at Rome. 47. Before the owners.] Spent before the face of the late owners --i. e. of the people who lent it. When a little, &c.] Before it is all gone, and they have just enough to carry them off, whatever the sum may be I don't know48. The usurer.] Lit. the increaser of interest-the money-lender -who, perhaps, may have taken such an advantage of their necessi ties, as to make them pay interest upon interest Is pale.] With the fear of losing all his money. 49. Changed the soil.] Vertere solum, signifies to run one's country. Cic. pro domo. Those who have made off. Baix, and to Ostia.] See sat. iii. 1. 4; and sat. viii. 171, n. 2. from whence they might take shipping, and make their escape into some other country. 50. For, to depart, &c.] To run away from Rome for debt is so common, that there is no more discredit in it, than changing the hot street of the Suburra (see sat. iii. v.) for the cool air of the Esquilian hill. See sat. v. 1. 77, 8. Foro is here put, by synec. for Rome itself. Or to depart from the forum, may imply their running away from justice. 53. Circensian games, &c.] These people have no other sorrow, Sanguinis in facie non hæret gutta; morantur Exp hodie nunquid pulcherrima dictu, Fercula nunc audi nullis ornata macellis : De Tiburtino veniet pinguissimus agro 55 60 65 or regret, at flying their country, than arises from their not being able to partake of the public diversions during their absence. sat. iii. 1. 223, note. See 54. Drop of blood, &c.] They have lost all shame-they cannot blush. 54-5. Detain modesty, &c.] The virtue of modesty is laughed at and ridiculed: she is, as it were, taking her flight from the city, and few are for stopping her, or delaying her retreat. 56. This day, &c.] When you are to dine with me. very Experience, &c.] i. e. You shall be convinced, by your own experience, whether I am an hypocrite, saying one thing and doing another; and while I have been laying down such fair and becoming rules of economy, in what I have been saying, I practice them not, in fact, neither with respect to my way of life, nor my moral conduct. -Re-in reality. TER. And. act v. sc. i. 1. 5. 58. Pulse.] Siliquas denotes bean or pea-pods, or the like; also the pulse contained therein-it stands for frugal and homely diet in general. Water-gruel.] Pultes.-Puls signifies a kind of diet which the ancients used, made of meal and water sodden together. This also stands here for any thing of that homely kind. 59. Cakes.] These were dainties made with honey and other sweetHOR. Ep. lib. i. x. l. 11, 12, says: meats. Liba recuso, Pane egeo jam mellitis potiore placentis. FRANCIS. I nauseate honied cakes, and long for bread, You shall see, says the poet, whether I am a glutton in secret, though professedly abstemious; whether I recommend a meal of herbs, yet secretly gormandize on dainties; and when before company I order my servant to bring some homely fare, I secretly whisper him to bring some very luscious and delicate food. 60. Promised guest.] Since you have promised to be my guest at dinner. You shall have.] i. e. You shall find in me Not a drop of blood sticks in the face, few detain Modesty, ridiculous and flying out of the city. You shall this day experience, whether things most fair 55 In word, Persicus, I cannot practise, neither in my life, nor in my morals, and in deed; But, a secret glutton, I can praise pulse, order water-gruel To the servant before others, but, in his ear, cakes. For, since you are a promised guest to me, you shall have 60 Than he, and yet he akin to heaven in blood, 65 61. Evander.] A king of Arcadia, who, having accidentally slain his father, sailed into Italy, and possessed himself of the place where afterwards Rome was built. He entertained Hercules, and hospitably received Æneas when he landed in Italy. See VIRG. Æn. viii. 154, et seq. Tirynthius.] A name of Hercules, the son of Jupiter and Alcmena she being born at Tiryns, a city of Peloponnesus, he was therefore called Tirynthius. A guest less, &c.] Meaning Eneas-inferior in birth. 62. Yet he akin, &c.] Æneas was the son of Anchises and the goddess Venus, 63. By water] Æneas was drowned in the Numicus, a river in Italy, which on that account was fabulously consecrated. The other by flames.] Hercules burnt himself to death on Mount Eta, in Thessaly. The poet seems to mean, that Persicus, his friend, should, on his coming to dine with him, find him another Evander with respect to the homeliness and simplicity of his entertainment; and that Persicus might consider himself as Hercules, or Æneas, or indeed both, with regard to the welcome he would find, and the hospitable reception he would meet with. 64. Now hear, &c.] Now hear your bill of fare, not a single ar ticle of which is furnished from the butcher's or poulterer's. Macelium signifies a market for all manner of provisions. 65. Tiburtine farm.] Tibur, a pleasant city of Italy, situate on the river Anio, about sixteen miles from Rome-in the neighbourhood of this, Juvenal had a farm. See HoR. Od. lib. i. ode vii. et al. 66. Ignorant of grass.] Never suffered to graze, but, like our house-lamb, fatted by suckling. 67. Nor yet daring.] Or attempting to browse on the twigs of the willow, which kids are very fond of, but they are apt to make the flesh bitter. Qui plus lactis habet quam sanguinis; et montani 70 75 80 68-9. Mountain asparaguses.] Some wild sorts that grew on the mountains, inferior in flavour to the asparagus altilis, or that which was carefully cultivated in garden-beds. Asparagi, plur. may mean the young shoots of herbs that are to be eaten. See sat. v. 81, note. 69. Bailiff's wife, &c.] The feminine of villicus, a steward or bailiff, signifies the wife of such a one, a farmer's wife, and the like. The asparagus gotten for the dinner was not of the sort which is raised at a great expense, and gathered by people kept for such purposes, but the wild sort, and gathered by a woman, who at other times was employed in spinning. 70. Eggs-warm, &c.] Large new-laid eggs, brought in the nest, which was made of hay twisted together. 71. Are added.] i. e. To the bill of fare. With the mothers, &c.] The same hens that laid them. 72. Grapes, &c.] Preserved for some time after their being gathered, so as to look quite fresh, as much so as when they were upon the vines. 73. The Signian.] Signia was a town in Italy, famous for pears and for rough wines→→→ Spumans immiti Signia musto. SIL. viii. 380. The Syrian pear.] These came from Tarentum, a city of Calabria, but were originally brought from Syria. 74. Apples, rivals to the Picene.] Horace says, that the apples from Tibur were not so good as the Picene. Picenis cedunt pomis Tiburtia succo. Lib. ii. sat. iv. 70. Therefore it was a high commendation of his apples, to say they ri. valled those of Picenum. Recent odour.] Smelling as fresh as if just gathered. 75. To be feared, &c.] You need not fear to eat them, since the cruder juices which they have in autumn are dried away, and now they are mellowed by the cold of winter, so that you are in no |