Quantum Grammaticus meruit labor? Et tamen ex hôc,' Quodcumque est, (minus est autem, quam rhetoris æra,) Discipuli custos præmordet Aconitus ipse; Et, qui dispensat, frangit sibi. Cede, Palæmon, Et patere inde aliquid decrescere; non alitèr, quàm 220 Rara tamen merces, quæ cognitione Tribuni 225 218. Discipuli custos] That sort of slave called Pædagogus, (from wais and ɑyw,) whose office was to attend on his young master, to bring him to school in the morning, and take him back in the afternoon. (Comp. Sat. x. 117.) He also brought the master's pay; but claimed or deducted a portion of it as his own fee. 219. Qui dispensat] Dispensator.-The steward also, before he delivers the pay to the Padagogus, deducts somewhat by way of perquisite. 220. Non alitèr, quàm Institor, &c.] Just as a hawker or pedlar suffers himself to be beat down in his price, rather than lose the sale of his goods altogether. 222. Dummodò non pereat] Ne vanus omninò sit tuus labor. P. -Media noctis ab horá] A poetical exaggeration. The Roman schools opened early in the morning, before daylight in the winter months. 224. Lanam deducere] To card wool, i. e. to prepare it for spinning, by drawing it out into fine filaments with an instrument called a comb; a flat piece of wood like a large clothes-brush, set with slanting teeth of iron; obliquo ferro. 225. Lucernas] Each boy holding his book in one hand, and a lamp in the other; by which the master was poisoned, and the books (Horaces and Virgils) spoiled. 228. Rara tamen, &c.] Though little is left of the pay to the grammarians, after all the deductions above mentioned, yet it is very rare that they get any thing at all, unless they go to law for it. M.-Cognitione Tribuni] Not a tribune of the people; but one of the tribuni ararii, to whom the cognizance of these smaller complaints belonged. O. 229. Sed vos, &c.] An ironical apostrophe to the parents: Ut præceptori verborum regula constet; 230 Ut legat historias, auctores noverit omnes, 235 240 "Although you pay the masters so ill, yet be sure you exact the very utmost from them." 230. Verborum regula] Regula quæque grammatices.-Constet] Probè nota sit, absolutissimè intelligatur. 232. Ut, fortè rogatus, &c.] Require the master to know everything, and to be ready at a moment, (at any time and place,) to answer the most out-of-the-way questions. 233. Phabi balnea] Some baths at Rome, so called. 234. Nutricem Anchisa, &c.] The nurse of Anchises is not even alluded to by Virgil. The step-mother of Anchemolus is just mentioned, but not named, En. x. 389. We read of avi maturus Acestes, the hospitable king of Sicily, who supplied the fleet of Eneas with wine, Æn. i. 195. v. 73. 237. Exigite ut mores, &c.] Require him also to watch over the morals of your children, as well as their learning; to form their young characters with all the nicety of an artist modelling a waxen bust;-and, although neither you nor your sons deign to consider him sancti parentis loco, yet require him, on his part, to be quite a father to his scholars, in affection and vigilant care. 240. Inquit] Says the father. 241. Victori] When a gladiator or charioteer had particularly distinguished himself in the Circus, the people demanded a reward for him.-The stated reward was five aurei; nec licebat amplius dare. This, if we value the aureus at sixteen shillings and a penny three farthings, made about four pounds. The poet's complaint, therefore, is, that the gladiator or charioteer got in an hour as much as the poor grammarian did by a whole year's toil and vexation. 0. SATIRA VIII. ARGUMENT. This Satire, which is addressed to a young nobleman named Ponticus, consists of three parts:-I. The first supports a very serious and important truth, that the nobility which is acquired by virtue, is lost by vice.-II. The second part laments the grievous oppression under which the provinces groaned, and gives the rules of a good administration; and the connexion is tolerably easy, as the office generally fell upon persons of rank. -III. The third part adduces particular examples both of good and bad characters, illustrative of the general subject.-Owen. AD PONTICUM. I. STEMMATA quid faciunt? Quid prodest, Pontice, 2. Censeri] Recenseri, judicari, numerari. Hinc Censores dicuntur. L. 3. Stantes in curribus Emilianos] Triumphal statues; see Sat. vii. 125. and the note.-The Emiliani, (meaning the son of P. Æmilius adopted into the Scipio family,) with the Curii and other illustrious names, are here used generally for any noble ancestors. 4. Dimidios, humeroque minorem, &c.] Their statues mutilated by age. 6. Generis tabulá] Tabulâ genealogicâ.-The line which usually follows this, is rejected as spurious, on the authority of Ruperti and Achaintre: viz. Corvinum; posthac multâ deducere virgå 7. Fumosos] Thus Cicero in Pisonem, 1. "Obrepsisti ad honores errore hominum, commendatione fumosarum imaginum; quarum simile habes nihil, præter colorem."-Equitum Magistros] The Magister Equitum, or master of the horse, was the officer next in command to the Dictator. Juv. Sat. H Si coram Lepidis malè vivitur? Effigies quò 10 15 8. Coram Lepidis] Ut mox ante Numantinos, h. e. coram imaginibus nobilium majorum. R. 10. Si dormire incipis] If you, after a night's debauch, are going to bed at day-break, the very time when those great generals used to be setting forth on their march. M. 12. Quò mihi te?] Jactas, understood.-Tabellas] Wills, which were usually signed in temples, by way of greater solemnity.The four lines in brackets are inserted here from the middle of the satire, on Owen's authority. "They destroy the connexion (he remarks) where they usually stand, but serve in this place to carry on the climax of vices with very good effect; gaming, alea pernox ; forgery, falsas signare tabellas; adulterous intrigues, nocturnus adulter; murder, emptorque veneni.” 15. Santonico cucullo] Hoods were adopted by the Romans from the Gauls, of whom the Santones were a tribe, inhabiting that part afterwards called Saintonge, on the north of the Gironde. 16. Allobrogicis] The Fabian family had this title, because the Allobroges were conquered by one of that family. They had the right of perpetual priesthood at the altar of Hercules, called properly Maxima, though Juvenal here calls it Magna only: Hanc aram luco statuit, quæ Maxima semper Dicetur nobis. Virg. Æn. viii. 272. O. 18. Euganeá] The Euganei were an ancient tribe of the Venetian territory, where stood Altinum famous for its wool, as Martial has recorded: Velleribus primis Appulia, Parma secundis Nobilis, Altinum tertia laudat ovis. 19. Catinensi pumice] Pumice-stone is thrown up from volcanoes, and was used by the effeminate for the purpose of rubbing Squalentes traducit avos; emptorque veneni 20 25 30 off superfluous hair and smoothing their skin. Catina (now Catania) was a city of Sicily, at the foot of Mount Etna. 20. Squalentes] Cultum corporis negligentes, horridos, adeoque pumice non lævigatos.- Traducit] Dedecorat, probro exponit. P. 21. Frangendá] Frangi dignâ. When any man of rank was convicted of heinous crimes, his statues were demolished. Compare Sat. x. 58-64.-Funestat] Polluit quasi cadavere. 22. Cera] Cereæ imagines. 25. Hos ante, &c.] Hos mores bonos pone quasi et constitue ante imagines in atrio: i. e. illustrium avorum mores considera magis quam statuas. R. P.-Sic Tacitus, Agric. 46. Id filiæ quoque uxorique præceperim, sic patris, sic mariti memoriam venerari, ut omnia facta dictaque ejus secum revolvant; famamque ac figuram animi magis quam corporis complectantur: non quia intercedendum putem imaginibus, quæ marmore aut are finguntur; sed, ut vultus hominum, ita simulacra vultus imbecilla ac mortalia sunt; forma mentis æterna: quam tenere et exprimere, non per alienam materiam et artem, sed tuis ipse moribus possis. 26. llli] Mores.-When you are Consul, let the fame of your virtues precede you wherever you go, and this will strike more awe into the crowd, than your lictors and fasces, or all the pomp of office. 27. Prima mihi debes animi bona] A te requiro primarias animi dotes et virtutes. 29. Gatulice] This was the surname of the Cossus above-mentioned, who subdued the Gætulians in the reign of Augustus.Seu tu Silanus] Sis or voceris, understood. Silanus was another noble name. 30. Quocumque alio de sanguine] Etiam infimo. 31. Contingis] Datus es. L-Ovanti] Rejoicing that such a man has fallen to its lot. M. |