The Poems and Fragments of Catullus | Page 8

mule in a glutinous
sludge her rondel of iron.
XXI.
Sire and prince-patriarch of hungry starvelings,
Lean Aurelius, all
that are, that have been,
That shall ever in after years be famish'd;
Wouldst thou lewdly my dainty love to folly
Tempt, and visibly?
thou be near, be joking 5 Cling and fondle, a hundred arts redouble?
O presume not: a wily wit defeated
Pays in scandalous incapacitation.
Yet didst folly to fulness add, 'twere all one;
Now shall beauty to
thirst be train'd or hunger's 10 Grim necessity; this is all my sorrow.

Then hold, wanton, upon the verge; to-morrow
Comes preposterous
incapacitation.
XXII.
Suffenus, he, dear Varus, whom, methinks, you know,
Has sense, a
ready tongue to talk, a wit urbane,
And writes a world of verses, on
my life no less.
Ten times a thousand he, believe me, ten or more,
Keeps fairly
written; not on any palimpsest, 5 As often, enter'd, paper extra-fine,
sheets new,
New every roller, red the strings, the parchment-case
Lead-rul'd, with even pumice all alike complete.
You read them: our choice spirit, our refin'd rare wit, Suffenus, O no
ditcher e'er appeared more rude, 10 No looby coarser; such a shock, a
change is there.
How then resolve this puzzle? He the birthday-wit,
For so we thought
him--keener yet, if aught is so--
Becomes a dunce more boorish e'en
than hedge-born boor, If e'er he faults on verses; yet in heart is then 15
Most happy, writing verses, happy past compare,
So sweet his own
self, such a world at home finds he.
Friend, 'tis the common error; all alike are wrong,
Not one, but in
some trifle you shall eye him true
Suffenus; each man bears from
heaven the fault they send, 20 None sees within the wallet hung behind,
our own.
XXIII.
Needy Furius, house nor hoard possessing,
Bug or spider, or any fire
to thaw you,
Yet most blest in a father and a step-dame,
Each for
penury fit to tooth a flint-stone:
Is not happiness yours? a home
united? 5 Son, sire, mother, a lathy dame to match him.

Who can wonder? in all is health, digestion,
Pure and vigorous, hours
without a trouble.
Fires ye fear not, or house's heavy downfal,

Deeds unnatural, art in act to poison, 10 Dangers myriad accidents
befalling.
Then your bodies? in every limb a shrivell'd
Horn, all dryness in all
the world whatever,
Tann'd or frozen or icy-lean with ages.
Sure
superlative happiness surrounds thee. 15 Thee sweat frets not, an
o'er-saliva frets not,
Frets not snivel or oozy rheumy nostril.
Yet such purity lacks not e'en a purer.
White those haunches as any
cleanly-silver'd
Salt, it takes you a month to barely dirt them. 20 Then
like beans, or inert as e'er a pebble,
Those impeccable heavy loins, a
finger's
Breadth from apathy ne'er seduced to riot.
Such prosperity, such superb profusion,
Slight not, Furius, idly nor
reject not. 25 As for sesterces, all the would-be fortune,
Cease to wish
it; enough, methinks, the present.
XXIV.
O thou blossom of all the race Juventian
Not now only, but all as yet
arisen,
All to flower in after-years arising;
Midas' treasury better you presented
Him that owns not a slave nor
any coffer, 5 Ere you suffer his alien arm's presuming.
What? you fancy him all refin'd perfection?
Perfect! truly, without a
slave, a coffer.
Slight, reject it, away with it; for all that
He, he owns not a slave nor
any coffer. 10
XXV.
Smooth Thallus, inly softer you than any furry rabbit,
Or glossy

goose's oily plumes, or velvet earlap yielding, Or feeble age's heavy
thighs, or flimsy filthy cobweb;
And Thallus, hungry rascal you, as hurricane rapacious, When winks
occasion on the stroke, the gulls agape declaring: 5
Return the mantle home to me, you watch'd your hour to pilfer, The
fleecy napkin and the rings from Thynia quaintly graven, Whatever you
parade as yours, vain fool, a sham reversion:
Unglue the nails adroit to steal, unclench the spoil, deliver, Lest yet that
haunch voluptuous, those tender hands caressant, 10 Should take an
ugly print severe, the scourge's heavy branding;
And strange to bruises you should heave, as heaves in open Ocean,
Some little hoy surprised adrift, when wails the windy water.
XXVI.
Draughts, dear Furius, if my villa faces,
'Tis not showery south, nor
airy wester,
North's grim fury, nor east; 'tis only fifteen
Thousand
sesterces, add two hundred over.
Draft unspeakable, icy, pestilential!
5
XXVII.
Boy, young caterer of Falernian olden,
Brim me cups of a fiercer
harsher essence;
So Postumia, queen of healths presiding,
Bids, less
thirsty the thirsty grape, the toper.
But dull water, avaunt. Away the
wine-cup's 5 Sullen enemy; seek the sour, the solemn!
Here Thyonius
hails his own elixir.
XXVIII.
Starving company, troop of hungry Piso,
Light of luggage, of outfit
expeditious,
You, Veranius, you, my own Fabullus,

Say, what fortune? enough of empty masters,
Frost and famine, a
lingering probation? 5
Stands your diary fair? is any profit
Enter'd _given_? as I to serve a
praetor
Count each beggarly gift a timely profit.
Trust me, Memmius, you