Juvenal, Satire 4
Translated by Lewis Evans (1889)
Formatted and with notes by C. Chinn (2007)

	ONCE more behold Crispinus,1 and often shall I have to call him 
	on the stage. A monster! without one virtue to redeem 
	his vices--of feeble powers, save only in his lust. 
	It is only a widow's charms this adulterer scorns. 
5	What matters it then in what large porticoes he wearies out 
	his steeds--through what vast shady groves his rides extend--
	how many acres close to the forum, or what palaces he has bought?2 
	No bad man is ever happy. Least of all he that has added incest 
	to his adultery, and lately seduced the filleted priestess,3 
10	that with her life-blood still warm must descend into the earth.
	But now we have to deal with more venial acts. Yet if any other man had 
	committed the same, he would have come under the sentence of our imperial 
	censor.4 For what would be infamous in men of worth, a Titius or Seius,5 
	was becoming to Crispinus. What can you do when no crime can be so foul 
15	and loathsome as the perpetrator himself? He gave six thousand sestertia 
	for a mullet. A thousand sesterces, forsooth! for every pound of weight, 
	as they allege, who exaggerate stories already beyond belief. 
	I should commend the act as a masterstroke of policy, if by so noble a present 
	he had got himself named chief heir in the will of some childless old man.6 
20	A better plea still would be that he had sent it to some mistress of rank, 
	that rides in her close chair with its wide glasses. 
	Nothing of the sort! He bought it for himself! We see many things which even 
	Apicius7 (mean and thrifty compared with him) never was guilty of. Did you do 
	this in days of yore, Crispinus, when girt about with your native papyrus?8 
25	What! pay this price for fish-scales? Perchance you might have bought 
	the fisherman cheaper than the fish! You might have bought a whole estate 
	for the money in some of our provinces. In Apulia, a still larger one.9 
	What kind of luxuries, then, may we suppose were gorged 
	by the emperor himself, when so many sestertia, that furnished forth 
30	but a small portion, a mere side-dish of a very ordinary dinner, 
	were devoured by this court buffoon,10 new clothed in purple. 
	Chief of the equestrian order11 now is he who was wont to hawk 
	about the streets shads from the same borough with himself. 
	Begin, Calliope!12 here may we take our seats! This is no poetic fiction; 
35	we are dealing with facts! Relate it, Pierian maids!13 
	and grant me grace for having called you maids. 
	
	When the last of the Flavii was mangling the world, 
	lying at its last gasp, and Rome was enslaved by a Nero, 
	ay, and a bald one too,14 an Adriatic turbot of wonderful size 
40	fell into the net, and filled its ample folds, off the temple of Venus 
	which Doric Ancona sustains.15 No less in bulk was it than those 
	which the ice of the Maeotis incloses, and when melted at length 
	by the sun's rays, discharges at the outlets of the sluggish Euxine, 
	unwieldly from their long sloth, and fattened by the long-protracted cold.16 
45	This prodigy of a fish the owner of the boat and nets designs 
	for the chief pontiff.17 For who would dare to put up such a fish 
	to sale, or to buy it? Since the shores too would be crowded 
	with informers; these inspectors of sea-weed, prowling in 
	every nook, would straightway contest the point with the naked 
50	fisherman, and would not scruple to allege that the fish was a "stray," 
	and that having made its escape from the emperor's ponds, where it had long 
	reveled in plenty, ought of course to revert to its ancient lord.18 
	If we place any faith in Palfurius or Armillatus,19 
	whatever is pre-eminently fine in the whole sea, 
55	is the property of the exchequer,20 wherever it swims. So, that it may not 
	be utterly lost, it will be made a present of, though now sickly autumn 
	was giving place to winter, and sick men were already expecting their fits 
	of ague, though the rude tempest whistled and kept the fish fresh, 
	yet the fisherman hurries on as though a mild south wind were blowing.21 
60	And when the lakes were near at hand, where, though in ruins, 
	Alba still preserves the Trojan fire,22 and her Lesser Vesta, the wondering 
	crowd for a short space impeded his entrance; as they made way 
	for him, the folding doors flew open on ready-turning hinge. 
	The senators, shut out themselves, watch the dainty23 admitted. 
65	He stands in the royal presence. Then he of Picenum begins,24 
	"Deign to accept what is too great for any private kitchen: let this day 
	be celebrated as the festival of your genius, haste to relieve your 
	stomach of its burden, and devour a turbot reserved to honor your reign. 
	It insisted on being caught."25 What could be more fulsome? and yet the great 
70	man's crest rose.26 What flattery is there that it is not 
	prepared to believe, when power is praised as equal to the gods. 
	But there was no dish of sufficient size for the fish. Therefore 
	the senators are summoned to a council--men whom he hated!27 
	men on whose faces sat the paleness engendered by the wretched friendship 
75	with the great! At the loud summons of the Liburnian slave,28 
	"Run! the emperor is already seated!" the first to snatch up his cloak 
	and hurry to the place was Pegasus,29 lately set as bailiff over the amazed city;30 
	for what else were the prefects of Rome in those days? of whom he was 
	the best and most conscientious dispenser of the laws, though 
80	in those days of terror he thought all things ought to be administered 
	by justice unarmed, Crispus31 came too, that facetious old man, 
	with high character equal to his eloquence and mild disposition. 
	Who could have been a more serviceable minister to one that ruled seas, 
	and lands, and peoples, if, under that bane and pest of mankind, 
85	he had been allowed to reprobate his savage nature and give honest 
	advice? But what is more ticklish than a tyrant's ear, 
	with whom the life even of a favorite was at stake, 
	though he might be talking of showers or heat, or a rainy spring? 
	He, therefore, never attempted to swim against the stream, 
90	nor was he a citizen who dared give vent to the free sentiments 
	of his soul, and devote his life to the cause of truth: 
	and so it was that he saw many winters and eighty summers; 
	safe, by such weapons, even in a court like that. 
	Next to him hurried Acilius,32 a man of the same time of life; 
95	with a youth33 that ill deserved so cruel a death as that which 
	awaited him, so prematurely inflicted by the tyrant's swords; 
	but nobility coupled with old age, has long since been a miracle. 
	Consequently, for myself, I should prefer being a younger brother of the giants. 
	It was of no avail therefore to the wretched man, that as a naked 
100	huntsman in the amphitheatre of Alba, he fought hand to hand with 
	Numidian bears.34 For who, in our days, is not up to the artifices of 
	the patricians? Who would now admire that primitive cunning 
	of thine, Brutus?35 It is an easy thing to impose on a king that wears a beard! 
	Then came Rubrius36 not a whit less pale, though he was 
105	no noble, one accused of an ancient and nameless crime, 
	and yet more lost to shame than the pathic satirist. 
	There too is to be seen Montanus'37 paunch, unwieldy from its size, 
	and Crispinus38 reeking with unguent though so early in the day, 
	more than enough to furnish forth two funerals; and Pompeius,39 still more 
110	ruthless even than he at cutting men's throats by his insinuating whisper; 
	and he that kept his entrails only to fatten the Dacian vultures, 
	Fuscus,40 that studied the art of war in his marble palace; 
	and the shrewd Veiento with the deadly Catullus,41 
	who raged with lust for a girl he could not see, 
115	a monster and prodigy of guilt even in our days, the blind flatterer, 
	a common bridge-beggar invested with this hateful power, whose worthiest fate 
	would be to run begging by the carriages on the road to Aricia,42 
	and blow his fawning kisses to the chariot as it descends the hill. 
	No one showed more astonishment at the turbot, for he43 was profuse 
120	in his wonder, turning toward the left, but unfortunately the fish lay 
	on the other side. This was just the way he used to praise the combat and fencing 
	of the Cilician gladiator,44 and the stage machinery, and the boys caught up by it 
	to the awning.45 Veiento is not to be outdone by him; but, like one inspired 
	by the maddening influence of Bellona,46 begins to divine. "A mighty 
125	omen this you have received of some great and noble triumph. 
	Some captive king you'll take, or Arviragus47 will be hurled from 
	his British car.48 For the monster is a foreign one. Do you see the sharp fins 
	bristling on his back like spears?" In one point only Fabricius 
	was at fault, he could not tell the turbot's country or age. 
130	"What then is your opinion? Is it to be cut up?" "Heaven forefend 
	so great dishonor to the noble fish!" says Montanus. "Let a deep dish 
	be provided, whose thin sides may inclose its huge circumference. 
	Some cunning Prometheus49 to act on this sudden emergency is required. 
	Quick with the clay and potter's wheel! But henceforth, 
135	Caesar, let potters always attend your armies!" 
	This opinion, worthy of the author, carried the day. He was well versed 
	in the old luxury of the imperial court, and Nero's nights,50 
	and a second appetite when the stomach was fired with the 
	Falernian.51 No one in my day was a greater connoisseur in good 
140	eating; he could detect at the first bite whether the oysters were 
	natives from Circeii, or the Lucrine rocks, or whether 
	they came from the Rutupian beds, and told the shore 
	an Echinus came from at the first glance.52 They rise; 
	and the cabinet being dismissed, the great chief bids the nobles 
145	depart whom he had dragged to the Alban height, 
	amazed and forced to hurry, as though he were about 
	to announce some tidings of the Catti and fierce Sicambri;53 
	as though from diverse parts of the world some 
	alarming express had arrived on hurried wing. 
150	And would that he had devoted to such trifles as these those days 
	of horror and cruelty, in which he removed from the city those glorious 
	and illustrious spirits,54 with none to punish or avenge the deed! 
	But he perished as soon as he began to be an object of alarm to cobblers. 
	This was what proved fatal to one that was reeking with the blood of the Lamiae!55