Apocolocyntosis | Page 6

this he you want now to make a god? Look at his body, born under the wrath of heaven! In fine, let him say the three words [Footnote: Some formula such as _ais esse meum_.] quickly, and he may have me for a slave. God! who will worship this god, who will believe in him? While you make gods of such as he, no one will believe you to be gods To be brief, my lords: if I have lived honourably among you, if I have never given plain speech to any, avenge my wrongs. This is my motion": then he read out his amendment, which he had committed to writing: "Inasmuch as the blessed Claudius murdered his father-in-law Appius Silanus, his two sons-in-law, Pompeius Magnus and L. Silanus, Crassus Frugi his daughter's father-in-law, as like him as two eggs in a basket, Scribonia his daughter's mother-in-law, his wife Messalina, and others too numerous to mention; I propose that strong measures be taken against him, that he be allowed no delay of process, that immediate sentence of banishment be passed on him, that he be deported from heaven within thirty days, and from Olympus within thirty hours."
This motion was passed without further debate. Not a moment was lost: Mercury screwed his neck and haled him to the lower regions, to that bourne "from which they say no traveller returns." [Footnote: Catullus iii, 12.] As they passed downwards along the Sacred Way, Mercury asked what was that great concourse of men? could it be Claudius' funeral? It was certainly a most gorgeous spectacle, got up regardless of expense, clear it was that a god was being borne to the grave: tootling of flutes, roaring of horns, an immense brass band of all sorts, such a din that even Claudius could hear it. Joy and rejoicing on every side, the Roman people walking about like free men. Agatho and a few pettifoggers were weeping for grief, and for once in a way they meant it. The Barristers were crawling out of their dark corners, pale and thin, with hardly a breath in their bodies, as though just coming to life again. One of them when he saw the pettifoggers putting their heads together, and lamenting their sad lot, up comes he and says: "Did not I tell you the Saturnalia could not last for ever?"
When Claudius saw his own funeral train, he understood that he was dead. For they were chanting his dirge in anapaests, with much mopping and mouthing:
"Pour forth your laments, your sorrow declare,?Let the sounds of grief rise high in the air:?For he that is dead had a wit most keen,?Was bravest of all that on earth have been.?Racehorses are nothing to his swift feet:?Rebellious Parthians he did defeat;?Swift after the Persians his light shafts go:?For he well knew how to fit arrow to bow,?Swiftly the striped barbarians fled:?With one little wound he shot them dead.?And the Britons beyond in their unknown seas,?Blue-shielded Brigantians too, all these?He chained by the neck as the Romans' slaves.?He spake, and the Ocean with trembling waves?Accepted the axe of the Roman law.?O weep for the man! This world never saw?One quicker a troublesome suit to decide,?When only one part of the case had been tried,?(He could do it indeed and not hear either side).?Who'll now sit in judgment the whole year round??Now he that is judge of the shades underground?Once ruler of fivescore cities in Crete,?Must yield to his better and take a back seat.?Mourn, mourn, pettifoggers, ye venal crew,?And you, minor poets, woe, woe is to you!?And you above all, who get rich quick?By the rattle of dice and the three card trick."
Claudius was charmed to hear his own praises sung, 13 and would have stayed longer to see the show. But the Talthybius [Footnote: Talthybius was a herald, and _nuntius_ is obviously a gloss on this. He means Mercury.] of the gods laid a hand on him, and led him across the Campus Martius, first wrapping his head up close that no one might know him, until betwixt Tiber and the Subway he went down to the lower regions. [Footnote: By the Cloaca?] His freedman Narcissus had gone down before him by a short cut, ready to welcome his master. Out he comes to meet him, smooth and shining (he had just left the bath), and says he: "What make the gods among mortals?" "Look alive," says Mercury, "go and tell them we are coming." Away he flew, quicker than tongue can tell. It is easy going by that road, all down hill. So although be had a touch of the gout, in a trice they were come to Dis's door. There lay Cerberus, or, as Horace puts it, the hundred-headed monster. [Sidenote: Odes ii, 13, 35] Claudius was a trifle