Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams,.

MARTIAL'S EPIGRAMS

* XL
THE POET'S CURSE
MAY those who frown as they peruse this book,
On all with envy, no one on them, look.
XLI
THE WIT
CAECILIUS, you think your taste is pretty;
Believe me, any kennel in the city
Could furnish rascals just as wise and witty.
Yours is the kind that every gutter hatches,
Across the Tiber it is bred in batches
And trades in broken glass and peddles matches.
If you would find your peers, the street supplies them,
The sellers of boiled peas, the lout that buys them,
The cheating quacks with snakes to advertize them.
The salt meat vendor's hireling is your fellow,
To yours the street-musician's tones are mellow,
The reeking sausage-seller thus does bellow.
Slave-dealing Spaniards, refuse of the nation,
The debauchee whose drivelling iteration
Is proof of babbling age and dissipation.
These are your equals. It does not beseem you
To count yourself what no one else will deem you,
No Tettius Caballus we esteem you.
Let not the meaning of his name misguide you.
The taste and wit that nature has denied you
No vulgar dullard's horse-play can provide you.
XLI I
THE LOX ING WIFE
WHEN Porcia heard how Brutus fell
And strove to join her lord,
'Twas vain, for they who loved her \ell
Withheld from her the sword.
I4