Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams,.

BOOK ELEVEN
Next for dessert-you then may take
Compote of gourd and pumpkin cake,
Insipid it must be confessed,
Although the cook has done his best
With pumpkin puffs and dates like those
So popular in all the shows;
Then the mixed dishes, to one's view
Lentil or beans, are pumpkin too.
Mock mushrooms and mock tunny fin,
Mock rissoles, mock sardines-within
Are merely pumpkin pulp, and though
All flavourings the cook doth know,
Not rue nor any sauce can hide
The fact that they are gourd inside;
Each dish, the greatest like the least,
Is pumpkin! This he calls a feast,
Because he gives you courses many
Which altogether cost one penny.
XXXII
TO NESTOR
No coat or bed, however foul, you own,
No mat of reeds, although a cheap and hard one,
No slave or young or old, no child or crone,
No cup, no bolt, no door, no dog, to guard one.
Yet you pretend-an idle stratagemThat you are poor, ah, vain, self-flattering fancy!
Many are poor; you cannot rank with them,
Yours is not poverty but mendicancy.
XXXIII
THE GREEN CHARIOT
How oft the green hath won! ' Aye', envy saith,
'By Nero's favour were the rest undone '.
Doth Nero's favour then outlive his death?
For since he died more palms the green hath won!
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