A scholar lively, remembered to me, that Catullus translated word for word, is an anachronism, and that a literal English rendering in the nineteenth century could be true to the poet's letter, but false to his spirit. I was compelled to admit that something of this is true; but it is not the whole truth. "Consulting modern taste" means really a mere imitation, a re-cast of the ancient past in modern material. It is presenting the toga'd citizen, rough, haughty, and careless of any approbation not his own, in the costume of to-day,—boiled shirt, dove-tailed coat, black-cloth clothes, white pocket-handkerchief, and diamond ring. Moreover, of these transmogrifications we have already enough and to spare. But we have not, as far as I know, any version of Catullus which can transport the English reader from the teachings of our century to that preceding the Christian Era. As discovery is mostly my mania, I have hit upon a bastard-urging to indulge it, by a presenting to the public of certain classics in the nude Roman poetry, like the Arab, and of the same date....
Trieste, 1890.
[The Foreword just given is an unfinished pencilling on the margin of Sir Richard's Latin text of Catullus. I reproduce below, a portion of his Foreword to a previous translation from the Latin on which we collaborated and which was issued in the summer of 1890.—L. C. S.]
A 'cute French publisher lately remarked to me that, as a rule, versions in verse are as enjoyable to the writer as they are unenjoyed by the reader, who vehemently doubts their truth and trustworthiness. These pages hold in view one object sole and simple, namely, to prove that a translation, metrical and literal, may be true and may be trustworthy.
As I told the public (Camoens: Life and Lusiads ii. 185-198), it has ever been my ambition to reverse the late Mr. Matthew Arnold's peremptory dictum:—"In a verse translation no original work is any longer recognisable." And here I may be allowed to borrow from my Supplemental Arabian Nights (Vol. vi., Appendix pp. 411-412, a book known to few and never to be reprinted) my vision of the ideal translation which should not be relegated to the Limbus of Intentions.
"My estimate of a translator's office has never been of the low level generally assigned to it even in the days when Englishmen were in the habit of translating every work, interesting or important, published out of England, and of thus giving a continental and cosmopolitan flavour to their literature. We cannot at this period expect much from a 'man of letters' who must produce a monthly volume for a pittance of £20: of him we need not speak. But the translator at his best, works, when reproducing the matter and the manner of his original, upon two distinct lines. His prime and primary object is to please his reader, edifying him and gratifying his taste; the second is to produce an honest and faithful copy, adding naught to the sense or abating aught of its especial cachet. He has, however, or should have, another aim wherein is displayed the acme of hermeneutic art. Every language can profitably lend something to and take somewhat from its neighbours—an epithet, a metaphor, a naïf idiom, a turn of phrase. And the translator of original mind who notes the innumerable shades of tone, manner and complexion will not neglect the frequent opportunities of enriching his mother-tongue with novel and alien ornaments which shall justly be accounted barbarisms until formally naturalized and adopted. Nor will any modern versionist relegate to a foot-note, as is the malpractice of his banal brotherhood, the striking and often startling phases of the foreign author's phraseology and dull the text with well-worn and commonplace English equivalents, thus doing the clean reverse of what he should do. It was this beau idéal of a translator's success which made Eustache Deschamps write of his contemporary and brother bard,
Grand Translateur, noble Geoffroy Chaucier.
Here
'The firste finder of our fair langage'
is styled 'a Socrates in philosophy, a Seneca in morals, an Angel in conduct and a great Translator,'—a seeming anti-climax which has scandalized not a little sundry inditers of 'Lives' and 'Memoirs.' The title is no bathos: it is given simply because Chaucer translated (using the term in its best and highest sense) into his pure, simple and strong English tongue with all its linguistic peculiarities, the thoughts and fancies of his foreign models, the very letter and spirit of Petrarch and Boccaccio."
For the humble literary status of translation in modern England and for the short-comings of the average English translator, public taste or rather caprice is mainly to be blamed. The "general reader," the man not in the street but the man who makes up the educated mass, greatly relishes a novelty in the way of "plot" or story or catastrophe while he has a natural dislike to novelties of style and diction, demanding a certain dilution of the unfamiliar with the familiar. Hence our translations in verse, especially when rhymed, become for the most part deflorations or excerpts, adaptations or periphrases more or less meritorious and the "translator" was justly enough dubbed "traitor" by critics of the severer sort. And he amply deserves the injurious name when ignorance of his original's language perforce makes him pander to popular prescription.
But the good time which has long been coming seems now to have come. The home reader will no longer put up with the careless caricatures of classical chefs d'œuvre which satisfied his old-fashioned predecessor. Our youngers, in most points our seniors, now expect the translation not only to interpret the sense of the original but also, when the text lends itself to such treatment, to render it verbatim et literatim, nothing being increased or diminished, curtailed or expanded. Moreover, in the choicer passages, they so far require an echo of the original music that its melody and harmony should be suggested to their mind. Welcomed also are the mannerisms of the translator's model as far as these aid in preserving, under the disguise of another dialect, the individuality of the foreigner and his peculiar costume.
That this high ideal of translation is at length becoming popular now appears in our literature. The "Villon Society," when advertizing the novels of Matteo Bandello, Bishop of Agen, justly remarks of the translator, Mr. John Payne, that his previous works have proved him to possess special qualifications for "the delicate and difficult task of transferring into his own language at once the savour and the substance, the matter and the manner of works of the highest individuality, conceived and executed in a foreign language."
In my version of hexameters and pentameters I have not shirked the metre although it is strangely out of favour in English literature while we read it and enjoy it in German. There is little valid reason for our aversion; the rhythm has been made familiar to our ears by long courses of Greek and Latin and the rarity of spondaic feet is assuredly to be supplied by art and artifice.
And now it is time for farewelling my friends:—we may no longer (alas!) address them, with the ingenuous Ancient in the imperative
Vos Plaudite.
July, 1890.
The present translation was jointly undertaken by the late Sir Richard Burton and myself in 1890, some months before his sudden and lamented death. We had previously put into English, and privately printed, a body of verse from the Latin, and our aim was to follow it with literal and unexpurgated renderings of Catullus, Juvenal, and Ausonius, from the same tongue. Sir Richard laid great stress on the necessity of thoroughly annotating each translation from an erotic (and especially a paederastic) point of view, but subsequent circumstances caused me to abandon that intention.
The Latin text of Catullus printed in this volume is that of Mueller (A.D. 1885), which Sir Richard Burton chose as the basis for our translation, and to that text I have mainly adhered. On some few occasions, however, I have slightly deviated from it, and, although I have consulted Owen and Postgate, in such cases I have usually followed Robinson Ellis.
Bearing in mind my duty to the reader as well as to the author, I have aimed at producing a readable translation, and yet as literal a version (castrating no passages) as the dissimilarity in idiom of the two languages, Latin and English, permit; and I claim for this volume that it is the first literal and complete English translation as yet issued of Catullus. The translations into English verse which I have consulted are The Adventures of Catullus, and the History of his Amours with Lesbia (done from the French, 1707), Nott, Lamb, Fleay, (privately printed, 1864), Hart-Davies, Shaw, Cranstoun, Martin, Grant Allen, and Ellis. Of these, none has been helpful to me save Professor Robinson Ellis's Poems and Fragments of Catullus translated in the metres of the original,—a most excellent and scholarly version, to which I owe great indebtedness for many a felicitous expression. I have also used Dr. Nott freely in my annotations. The only English prose translation of which I have any knowledge is the one in Bohn's edition of Catullus, and this, in addition to being bowdlerized, is in a host of passages more a paraphrase than a literal translation.
I have not thought it needful in any case to point out my deviations from Mueller's text, and I have cleared the volume of all the load of mythological and historical notes which are usually appended to a translation of a classic, contenting myself with referring the non-classical reader to Bohn's edition of the poet.
Of the boldness of Sir Richard Burton's experiment of a metrical and linear translation there can be no question; and on the whole he has succeeded in proving his contention as to its possibility, though it must be confessed that it is at times at the cost of obscurity, or of inversions of sentences which certainly are compelled to lay claim to a poet's license. It must, however, be borne in mind that in a letter to me just before his death, he expressed his intention of going entirely through the work afresh, on receiving my prose, adding that it needed "a power of polishing."
To me has fallen the task of editing Sir Richard's share in this volume from a type-written copy literally swarming with copyist's errors. With respect to the occasional lacunae which appear, I can merely state that Lady Burton has repeatedly assured me that she has furnished me with a faithful copy of her husband's translation, and that the words omitted (which are here indicated by full points, not asterisks) were not filled in by him, because he was first awaiting my translation with the view of our not using similar expressions. However, Lady Burton has without any reason consistently refused me even a glance at his MS.; and in our previous work from the Latin I did not find Sir Richard trouble himself in the least concerning our using like expressions.
The frontispiece to this volume is reproduced from the statue which stands over the Palazzo di Consiglio, the Council House at Verona, which is the only representation of Catullus extant.
July 11th, 1894.
OF
LIBER.
I.
Quoi dono lepidum novom libellum
Arida modo pumice expolitum?
Corneli, tibi: namque tu solebas
Meas esse aliquid putare nugas,
Iam tum cum ausus es unus Italorum
Omne aevum tribus explicare chartis
Doctis, Iuppiter, et laboriosis.
Quare habe tibi quidquid hoc libelli,
Qualecumque, quod o patrona virgo,
Plus uno maneat perenne saeclo.
I.
Dedication to Cornelius Nepos.
Now smooth'd to polish due with pumice dry
Whereto this lively booklet new give I?
To thee (Cornelius!); for wast ever fain
To deem my trifles somewhat boon contain;
E'en when thou single 'mongst Italians found
Daredst all periods in three Scripts expound
Learned (by Jupiter!) elaborately.
Then take thee whatso in this booklet be,
Such as it is, whereto O Patron Maid
To live down Ages lend thou lasting aid!
To whom inscribe my dainty tome—just out and with ashen pumice polished? Cornelius, to thee! for thou wert wont to deem my triflings of account, and at a time when thou alone of Italians didst dare unfold the ages' abstract in three chronicles—learned, by Jupiter!—and most laboriously writ. Wherefore take thou this booklet, such as 'tis, and O Virgin Patroness, may it outlive generations more than one.
II.
Passer, deliciae meae puellae,
Quicum ludere, quem in sinu tenere,
Quoi primum digitum dare adpetenti
Et acris solet incitare morsus,
Cum desiderio meo nitenti
Carum nescioquid libet iocari
Vt solaciolum sui doloris,
Credo ut iam gravis acquiescat ardor:
Tecum ludere sicut ipsa possem
Et tristis animi levare curas!
* * * *
Tam gratumst mihi quam ferunt puellae
Pernici aureolum fuisse malum,
Quod zonam soluit diu ligatam.
II.
Lesbia's Sparrow.
Sparrow! my pet's delicious joy,
Wherewith in bosom nurst to toy
She loves, and gives her finger-tip
For sharp-nib'd greeding neb to nip,
Were she who my desire withstood
To seek some pet of merry mood,
As crumb o' comfort for her grief,
Methinks her burning lowe's relief:
Could I, as plays she, play with thee,
That mind might win from misery free!
* * * *
To me t'were grateful (as they say),
Gold codling was to fleet-foot May,
Whose long-bound zone it loosed for aye.
Sparrow, petling of my girl, with which she wantons, which she presses to her bosom, and whose eager peckings is accustomed to incite by stretching forth her forefinger, when my bright-hued beautiful one is pleased to jest in manner light as (perchance) a solace for her heart ache, thus methinks she allays love's pressing heats! Would that in manner like, I were able with thee to sport and sad cares of mind to lighten!
* * * *
This were gracious to me as in story old to the maiden fleet of foot was the apple golden-fashioned which unloosed her girdle long-time girt.
III.
Lugete, o Veneres Cupidinesque,
Et quantumst hominum venustiorum.
Passer mortuus est meae puellae,
Passer, deliciae meae puellae,
Quem plus illa oculis suis amabat:
Nam mellitus erat suamque norat
Ipsa tam bene quam puella matrem
Nec sese a gremio illius movebat,
Sed circumsiliens modo huc modo illuc
Ad solam dominam usque pipiabat.
Qui nunc it per iter tenebricosum
Illuc, unde negant redire quemquam.
At vobis male sit, malae tenebrae
Orci, quae omnia bella devoratis:
Tam bellum mihi passerem abstulistis.
O factum male! io miselle passer!
Tua nunc opera meae puellae
Flendo turgiduli rubent ocelli.
III.
On the Death of Lesbia's Sparrow.
Weep every Venus, and all Cupids wail,
And men whose gentler spirits still prevail.
Dead is the Sparrow of my girl, the joy,
Sparrow, my sweeting's most delicious toy,
Whom loved she dearer than her very eyes;
For he was honeyed-pet and anywise
Knew her, as even she her mother knew;
Ne'er from her bosom's harbourage he flew
But 'round her hopping here, there, everywhere,
Piped he to none but her his lady fair.
Now must he wander o'er the darkling way
Thither, whence life-return the Fates denay.
But ah! beshrew you, evil Shadows low'ring
In Orcus ever loveliest things devouring:
Who bore so pretty a Sparrow fro' her ta'en.
(Oh hapless birdie and Oh deed of bane!)
Now by your wanton work my girl appears
With turgid eyelids tinted rose by tears.
Mourn ye, O ye Loves and Cupids and all men of gracious mind. Dead is the sparrow of my girl, sparrow, sweetling of my girl. Which more than her eyes she loved; for sweet as honey was it and its mistress knew, as well as damsel knoweth her own mother nor from her bosom did it rove, but hopping round first one side then the other, to its mistress alone it evermore did chirp. Now does it fare along that path of shadows whence naught may e'er return. Ill be to ye, savage glooms of Orcus, which swallow up all things of fairness: which have snatched away from me the comely sparrow. O deed of bale! O sparrow sad of plight! Now on thy account my girl's sweet eyes, swollen, do redden with tear-drops.
IIII.
Phaselus ille, quem videtis, hospites,
Ait fuisse navium celerrimus,
Neque ullius natantis impetum trabis
Nequisse praeter ire, sive palmulis
Opus foret volare sive linteo.
Et hoc negat minacis Adriatici
Negare litus insulasve Cycladas
Rhodumque nobilem horridamque Thraciam
Propontida trucemve Ponticum sinum,
Vbi iste post phaselus antea fuit
Comata silva: nam Cytorio in iugo
Loquente saepe sibilum edidit coma.
Amastri Pontica et Cytore buxifer,
Tibi haec fuisse et esse cognitissima
Ait phaselus: ultima ex origine
Tuo stetisse dicit in cacumine,
Tuo imbuisse palmulas in aequore,
Et inde tot per inpotentia freta
Erum tulisse, laeva sive dextera
Vocaret aura, sive utrumque Iuppiter
Simul secundus incidisset in pedem;
Neque ulla vota litoralibus deis
Sibi esse facta, cum veniret a marei
Novissime hunc ad usque limpidum lacum.
Sed haec prius fuere: nunc recondita
Senet quiete seque dedicat tibi,
Gemelle Castor et gemelle Castoris.
IIII.
On his Pinnace.
Yonder Pinnace ye (my guests!) behold
Saith she was erstwhile fleetest-fleet of crafts,
Nor could by swiftness of aught plank that swims,
Be she outstripped, whether paddle plied,
Or fared she scudding under canvas-sail.
Eke she defieth threat'ning Adrian shore,
Dare not denay her, insular Cyclades,
And noble Rhodos and ferocious Thrace,
Propontis too and blustering Pontic bight.
Where she (my Pinnace now) in times before,
Was leafy woodling on Cytórean Chine
For ever loquent lisping with her leaves.
Pontic Amastris! Box-tree-clad Cytórus!
Cognisant were ye, and you weet full well
(So saith my Pinnace) how from earliest age
Upon your highmost-spiring peak she stood,
How in your waters first her sculls were dipt,
And thence thro' many and many an important strait
She bore her owner whether left or right,
Where breezes bade her fare, or Jupiter deigned
At once propitious strike the sail full square;
Nor to the sea-shore gods was aught of vow
By her deemed needful, when from Ocean's bourne
Extreme she voyaged for this limpid lake.
Yet were such things whilome: now she retired
In quiet age devotes herself to thee
(O twin-born Castor) twain with Castor's twin.
That pinnace which ye see, my friends, says that it was the speediest of boats, nor any craft the surface skimming but it could gain the lead, whether the course were gone o'er with plashing oars or bended sail. And this the menacing Adriatic shores may not deny, nor may the Island Cyclades, nor noble Rhodes and bristling Thrace, Propontis nor the gusty Pontic gulf, where itself (afterwards a pinnace to become) erstwhile was a foliaged clump; and oft on Cytorus' ridge hath this foliage announced itself in vocal rustling. And to thee, Pontic Amastris, and to box-screened Cytorus, the pinnace vows that this was alway and yet is of common knowledge most notorious; states that from its primal being it stood upon thy topmost peak, dipped its oars in thy waters, and bore its master thence through surly seas of number frequent, whether the wind whistled 'gainst the starboard quarter or the lee or whether Jove propitious fell on both the sheets at once; nor any vows [from stress of storm] to shore-gods were ever made by it when coming from the uttermost seas unto this glassy lake. But these things were of time gone by: now laid away, it rusts in peace and dedicates its age to thee, twin Castor, and to Castor's twin.
V.
Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus,
Rumoresque senum severiorum
Omnes unius aestimemus assis.
Soles occidere et redire possunt:
Nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
Nox est perpetua una dormienda.
Da mi basia mille, deinde centum,
Dein mille altera, dein secunda centum,
Deinde usque altera mille, deinde centum.
Dein, cum milia multa fecerimus,
Conturbabimus illa, ne sciamus,
Aut nequis malus invidere possit,
Cum tantum sciet esse basiorum.
V.
To Lesbia, (of Lesbos—Clodia?)
Love we (my Lesbia!) and live we our day,
While all stern sayings crabbed sages say,
At one doit's value let us price and prize!
The Suns can westward sink again to rise
But we, extinguished once our tiny light,
Perforce shall slumber through one lasting night!
Kiss me a thousand times, then hundred more,
Then thousand others, then a new five-score,
Still other thousand other hundred store.
Last when the sums to many thousands grow,
The tale let's trouble till no more we know,
Nor envious wight despiteful shall misween us
Knowing how many kisses have been kissed between us.
Let us live, my Lesbia, and let us love, and count all the mumblings of sour age at a penny's fee. Suns set can rise again: we when once our brief light has set must sleep through a perpetual night. Give me of kisses a thousand, and then a hundred, then another thousand, then a second hundred, then another thousand without resting, then a hundred. Then, when we have made many thousands, we will confuse the count lest we know the numbering, so that no wretch may be able to envy us through knowledge of our kisses' number.
VI.
Flavi, delicias tuas Catullo,
Nei sint inlepidae atque inelegantes,
Velles dicere, nec tacere posses.
Verum nescioquid febriculosi
Scorti diligis: hoc pudet fateri.
Nam te non viduas iacere noctes
Nequiquam tacitum cubile clamat
Sertis ac Syrio fragrans olivo,
Pulvinusque peraeque et hic et ille
Attritus, tremulique quassa lecti
Argutatio inambulatioque.
Nam nil stupra valet, nihil, tacere.
Cur? non tam latera ecfututa pandas,
Nei tu quid facias ineptiarum.
Quare quidquid habes boni malique,
Dic nobis. volo te ac tuos amores
Ad caelum lepido vocare versu.
VI.
To Flavius: Mis-speaking his Mistress.
Thy Charmer (Flavius!) to Catullus' ear
Were she not manner'd mean and worst in wit
Perforce thou hadst praised nor couldst silence keep.
But some enfevered jade, I wot-not-what,
Some piece thou lovest, blushing this to own.
For, nowise 'customed widower nights to lie
Thou 'rt ever summoned by no silent bed
With flow'r-wreaths fragrant and with Syrian oil,
By mattress, bolsters, here, there, everywhere
Deep-dinted, and by quaking, shaking couch
All crepitation and mobility.
Explain! none whoredoms (no!) shall close my lips.
Why? such outfuttered flank thou ne'er wouldst show
Had not some fulsome work by thee been wrought.
Then what thou holdest, boon or bane be pleased
Disclose! For thee and thy beloved fain would I
Upraise to Heaven with my liveliest lay.
O Flavius, of thy sweetheart to Catullus thou would'st speak, nor could'st thou keep silent, were she not both ill-mannered and ungraceful. In truth thou affectest I know not what hot-blooded whore: this thou art ashamed to own. For that thou dost not lie alone a-nights thy couch, fragrant with garlands and Syrian unguent, in no way mute cries out, and eke the pillow and bolsters indented here and there, and the creakings and joggings of the quivering bed: unless thou canst silence these, nothing and again nothing avails thee to hide thy whoredoms. And why? Thou wouldst not display such drainèd flanks unless occupied in some tomfoolery. Wherefore, whatsoever thou hast, be it good or ill, tell us! I wish to laud thee and thy loves to the sky in joyous verse.
VII.
Quaeris, quot mihi basiationes
Tuae, Lesbia, sint satis superque.
Quam magnus numerus Libyssae arenae
Lasarpiciferis iacet Cyrenis,
Oraclum Iovis inter aestuosi
Et Batti veteris sacrum sepulcrum,
Aut quam sidera multa, cum tacet nox,
Furtivos hominum vident amores,
Tam te basia multa basiare
Vesano satis et super Catullost,
Quae nec pernumerare curiosi
Possint nec mala fascinare lingua.
VII.
To Lesbia still Beloved.
Thou ask'st How many kissing bouts I bore
From thee (my Lesbia!) or be enough or more?
I say what mighty sum of Lybian-sands
Confine Cyrene's Laserpitium-lands
'Twixt Oracle of Jove the Swelterer
And olden Battus' holy Sepulchre,
Or stars innumerate through night-stillness ken
The stolen Love-delights of mortal men,
For that to kiss thee with unending kisses
For mad Catullus enough and more be this,
Kisses nor curious wight shall count their tale,
Nor to bewitch us evil tongue avail.
Thou askest, how many kisses of thine, Lesbia, may be enough and to spare for me. As the countless Libyan sands which strew the spicy strand of Cyrene 'twixt the oracle of swelt'ring Jove and the sacred sepulchre of ancient Battus, or as the thronging stars which in the hush of darkness witness the furtive loves of mortals, to kiss thee with kisses of so great a number is enough and to spare for passion-driven Catullus: so many that prying eyes may not avail to number, nor ill tongues to ensorcel.
VIII.
Miser Catulle, desinas ineptire,
Et quod vides perisse perditum ducas.
Fulsere quondam candidi tibi soles,
Cum ventitabas quo puella ducebat
Amata nobis quantum amabitur nulla.
Ibi illa multa tum iocosa fiebant,
Quae tu volebas nec puella nolebat.
Fulsere vere candidi tibi soles.
Nunc iam illa non vult: tu quoque, inpotens, noli
Nec quae fugit sectare, nec miser vive,
Sed obstinata mente perfer, obdura.
Vale, puella. iam Catullus obdurat,
Nec te requiret nec rogabit invitam:
At tu dolebis, cum rogaberis nulla.
Scelesta, vae te! quae tibi manet vita!
Quis nunc te adibit? cui videberis bella?
Quem nunc amabis? cuius esse diceris?
Quem basiabis? cui labella mordebis?
At tu, Catulle, destinatus obdura.
VIII.
To Himself recounting Lesbia's Inconstancy.
Woe-full Catullus! cease to play the fool
And what thou seest dead as dead regard!
Whilòme the sheeniest suns for thee did shine
When oft-a-tripping whither led the girl
By us belovèd, as shall none be loved.
There all so merry doings then were done
After thy liking, nor the girl was loath.
Then certès sheeniest suns for thee did shine.
Now she's unwilling: thou too (hapless!) will
Her flight to follow, and sad life to live:
Endure with stubborn soul and still obdure.
Damsel, adieu! Catullus obdurate grown
Nor seeks thee, neither asks of thine unwill;
Yet shalt thou sorrow when none woos thee more;
Reprobate! Woe to thee! What life remains?
Who now shall love thee? Who'll think thee fair?
Whom now shalt ever love? Whose wilt be called?
To whom shalt kisses give? whose liplets nip?
But thou (Catullus!) destiny-doomed obdure.
Unhappy Catullus, cease thy trifling and what thou seest lost know to be lost. Once bright days used to shine on thee when thou wert wont to haste whither thy girl didst lead thee, loved by us as never girl will e'er be loved. There those many joys were joyed which thou didst wish, nor was the girl unwilling. In truth bright days used once to shine on thee. Now she no longer wishes: thou too, powerless to avail, must be unwilling, nor pursue the retreating one, nor live unhappy, but with firm-set mind endure, steel thyself. Farewell, girl, now Catullus steels himself, seeks thee not, nor entreats thy acquiescence. But thou wilt pine, when thou hast no entreaty proffered. Faithless, go thy way! what manner of life remaineth to thee? who now will visit thee? who find thee beautiful? whom wilt thou love now? whose girl wilt thou be called? whom wilt thou kiss? whose lips wilt thou bite? But thou, Catullus, remain hardened as steel.
VIIII.
Verani, omnibus e meis amicis
Antistans mihi milibus trecentis,
Venistine domum ad tuos Penates
Fratresque unanimos anumque matrem?
Venisti. o mihi nuntii beati!
Visam te incolumem audiamque Hiberum
Narrantem loca, facta, nationes,
Vt mos est tuus, adplicansque collum
Iocundum os oculosque suaviabor.
O quantumst hominum beatiorum,
Quid me laetius est beatiusve?
VIIII.
To Veranius returned from Travel.
Veranius! over every friend of me
Forestanding, owned I hundred thousands three,
Home to Penates and to single-soul'd
Brethren, returned art thou and mother old?
Yes, thou art come. Oh, winsome news come well!
Now shall I see thee, safely hear thee tell
Of sites Iberian, deeds and nations 'spied,
(As be thy wont) and neck-a-neck applied
I'll greet with kisses thy glad lips and eyne.
Oh! Of all mortal men beatified
Whose joy and gladness greater be than mine?
Veranius, of all my friends standing in the front, owned I three hundred thousands of them, hast thou come home to thy Penates, thy longing brothers and thine aged mother? Thou hast come back. O joyful news to me! I may see thee safe and sound, and may hear thee speak of regions, deeds, and peoples Iberian, as is thy manner; and reclining o'er thy neck shall kiss thy jocund mouth and eyes. O all ye blissfullest of men, who more gladsome or more blissful is than I am?
X.
Varus me meus ad suos amores
Visum duxerat e foro otiosum,
Scortillum, ut mihi tum repente visumst,
Non sane inlepidum neque invenustum.
Huc ut venimus, incidere nobis
Sermones varii, in quibus, quid esset
Iam Bithynia, quo modo se haberet,
Ecquonam mihi profuisset aere.
Respondi id quod erat, nihil neque ipsis
Nec praetoribus esse nec cohorti,
Cur quisquam caput unctius referret,
Praesertim quibus esset inrumator
Praetor, non faciens pili cohortem.
'At certe tamen, inquiunt, quod illic
Natum dicitur esse, conparasti
Ad lecticam homines.' ego, ut puellae
Vnum me facerem beatiorem,
'Non' inquam 'mihi tam fuit maligne,
Vt, provincia quod mala incidisset,
Non possem octo homines parare rectos.'
At mi nullus erat nec hic neque illic,
Fractum qui veteris pedem grabati
In collo sibi collocare posset.
Hic illa, ut decuit cinaediorem,
'Quaeso' inquit 'mihi, mi Catulle, paulum
Istos. commode enim volo ad Sarapim
Deferri.' 'minime' inquii puellae;
* * * *
'Istud quod modo dixeram me habere,
Fugit me ratio: meus sodalis
Cinnast Gaius, is sibi paravit.
Verum, utrum illius an mei, quid ad me?
Vtor tam bene quam mihi pararim.
Sed tu insulsa male ac molesta vivis,
Per quam non licet esse negligentem.'
X.
He meets Varus and Mistress.
Led me my Varus to his flame,
As I from Forum idling came.
Forthright some whorelet judged I it
Nor lacking looks nor wanting wit,
When hied we thither, mid us three
Fell various talk, as how might be
Bithynia now, and how it fared,
And if some coin I made or spared.
"There was no cause" (I soothly said)
"The Prætors or the Cohort made
Thence to return with oilier head;
The more when ruled by ——
Prætor, as pile the Cohort rating."
Quoth they, "But certès as 'twas there
The custom rose, some men to bear
Litter thou boughtest?" I to her
To seem but richer, wealthier,
Cry, "Nay, with me 'twas not so ill
That, given the Province suffered, still
Eight stiff-backed loons I could not buy.'
(Withal none here nor there owned I
Who broken leg of Couch outworn
On nape of neck had ever borne!)
Then she, as pathic piece became,
"Prithee Catullus mine, those same
Lend me, Serapis-wards I'd hie."
* * * *
"Easy, on no-wise, no," quoth I,
"Whate'er was mine, I lately said
Is some mistake, my camarade
One Cinna—Gaius—bought the lot,
But his or mine, it matters what?
I use it freely as though bought,
Yet thou, pert troubler, most absurd,
None suffer'st speak an idle word."
Varus drew me off to see his mistress as I was strolling from the Forum: a little whore, as it seemed to me at the first glance, neither inelegant nor lacking good looks. When we came in, we fell to discussing various subjects, amongst which, how was Bithynia now, how things had gone there, and whether I had made any money there. I replied, what was true, that neither ourselves nor the praetors nor their suite had brought away anything whereby to flaunt a better-scented poll, especially as our praetor, the irrumating beast, cared not a single hair for his suite. "But surely," she said, "you got some men to bear your litter, for they are said to grow there?" I, to make myself appear to the girl as one of the fortunate, "Nay," I say, "it did not go that badly with me, ill as the province turned out, that I could not procure eight strapping knaves to bear me." (But not a single one was mine either here or there who the fractured foot of my old bedstead could hoist on his neck.) And she, like a pathic girl, "I pray thee," says she, "lend me, my Catullus, those bearers for a short time, for I wish to be borne to the shrine of Serapis." "Stay," quoth I to the girl, "when I said I had this, my tongue slipped; my friend, Cinna Gaius, he provided himself with these. In truth, whether his or mine—what do I trouble? I use them as though I had paid for them. But thou, in ill manner with foolish teasing dost not allow me to be heedless."
XI.
Furi et Aureli, comites Catulli,
Sive in extremos penetrabit Indos,
Litus ut longe resonante Eoa
Tunditur unda,
Sive in Hyrcanos Arabesve molles,
Seu Sacas sagittiferosve Parthos,
Sive qua septemgeminus colorat
Aequora Nilus,
Sive trans altas gradietur Alpes,
Caesaris visens monimenta magni,
Gallicum Rhenum, horribile aequor ulti-
mosque Britannos,
Omnia haec, quaecumque feret voluntas
Caelitum, temptare simul parati,
Pauca nuntiate meae puellae
Non bona dicta.
Cum suis vivat valeatque moechis,
Quos simul conplexa tenet trecentos,
Nullum amans vere, sed identidem omnium
Ilia rumpens:
Nec meum respectet, ut ante, amorem,
Qui illius culpa cecidit velut prati
Vltimi flos, praeter eunte postquam
Tactus aratrost.
XI.
A Parting Insult to Lesbia.
Furius and Aurelius, Catullus' friends,
Whether extremest Indian shore he brave,
Strands where far-resounding billow rends
The shattered wave,
Or 'mid Hyrcanians dwell he, Arabs soft and wild,
Sacæ and Parthians of the arrow fain,
Or where the Seven-mouth'd Nilus mud-defiled
Tinges the Main,
Or climb he lofty Alpine Crest and note
Works monumental, Cæsar's grandeur telling,
Rhine Gallic, horrid Ocean and remote
Britons low-dwelling;
All these (whatever shall the will design
Of Heaven-homed Gods) Oh ye prepared to tempt;
Announce your briefest to that damsel mine
In words unkempt:—
Live she and love she wenchers several,
Embrace three hundred wi' the like requitals,
None truly loving and withal of all
Bursting the vitals:
My love regard she not, my love of yore,
Which fell through fault of her, as falls the fair
Last meadow-floret whenas passed it o'er
Touch of the share.
Furius and Aurelius, comrades of Catullus, whether he penetrate to furthest Ind where the strand is lashed by the far-echoing Eoan surge, or whether 'midst the Hyrcans or soft Arabs, or whether the Sacians or quiver-bearing Parthians, or where the seven-mouthed Nile encolours the sea, or whether he traverse the lofty Alps, gazing at the monuments of mighty Caesar, the gallic Rhine, the dismal and remotest Britons, all these, whatever the Heavens' Will may bear, prepared at once to attempt,—bear ye to my girl this brief message of no fair speech. May she live and flourish with her swivers, of whom may she hold at once embraced the full three hundred, loving not one in real truth, but bursting again and again the flanks of all: nor may she look upon my love as before, she whose own guile slew it, e'en as a flower on the greensward's verge, after the touch of the passing plough.
XII.
Marrucine Asini, manu sinistra
Non belle uteris in ioco atque vino:
Tollis lintea neglegentiorum.
Hoc salsum esse putas? fugit te, inepte:
Quamvis sordida res et invenustast.
Non credis mihi? crede Polioni
Fratri, qui tua furta vel talento
Mutari velit: est enim leporum
Disertus puer ac facetiarum.
Quare aut hendecasyllabos trecentos
Expecta aut mihi linteum remitte,
Quod me non movet aestimatione,
Verumst mnemosynum mei sodalis.
Nam sudaria Saetaba ex Hibereis
Miserunt mihi muneri Fabullus
Et Veranius: haec amem necessest
Vt Veraniolum meum et Fabullum.
XII.
To M. Asinius who Stole Napery.