The Satyricon — Complete by Petronius Arbiter (book series for 12 year olds TXT) 📖

surprised that the rabble chases you with rocks. I’m going to load my pockets with stones, too, and whenever you begin to go out of your head, I’m going to let blood out of it!” His expression changed. “My dear young man,” said he, “today is not the first time I have had such compliments showered upon me; the audience always applauds me in this fashion, when I go into the theatre to recite anything, but I’ll abstain from this sort of diet for the whole day, for fear of having trouble with you.” “Good,” I replied, “we’ll dine together if you’ll swear off crankiness for the day.” (So saying,) I gave the housekeeper the orders for our little supper (and we went straight off to the baths.)







CHAPTER THE NINETY-FIRST.

(There) I catch sight of Giton laden with towels and scrapers, leaning, downhearted and embarrassed, against the wall. You could see that he did not serve of his own free will. Then, that I might assure myself that I saw aright, “Take pity on me, brother,” he cried, turning towards me a face lighted up with joy, “there are no arms here, I can speak freely take me away from that bloody robber, and punish your penitent judge as severely as you like. To have perished, should you wish it, will be a consolation great enough in my misery!” Fearing some one might overhear our plans, I bade him hush his complaints and, leaving Eumolpus behind--for he was reciting a poem in the bath--I pull Giton down a dark and dirty passage, after me, and fly with all speed to my lodgings. Arriving there, I slam the door shut, embrace him convulsively, and press my face against his which is all wet with tears. For a long time, neither of us could find his voice, and as for the lad, his shapely bosom was heaving continuously with choking sobs. “Oh the disgraceful inconsistency of it all,” I cried, “for I love you still, although you abandoned me, and no scar from that gaping wound is left upon this breast! What can you say that will justify you in yielding your love to a stranger? Did I merit such an affront’?” He held his head higher when he found that he was loved.

For one to love, and at the same time, blame,
That were a labor Hercules to tame!
Conflicting passions yield in Cupid’s name.

(“And furthermore,” I went on), “I was not the one that laid the cause of our love before another judge, but I will complain no more, I will remember nothing, if you will prove your penitence by keeping faith.” He wiped his face upon his mantle, while I poured out these words, with groans and tears. “Encolpius,” said he, “I beseech you, I appeal to your honest recollection, did I leave you, or did you throw me over? For my part, I admit, and openly at that, that I sought, refuge with the stronger, when I beheld two armed men.” I kissed that, bosom, so full of prudence, threw my arms around his neck and pressed him tightly against my breast, that he might see unmistakably that he had gotten back into my good graces, and that our friendship lived again in perfect confidence.

CHAPTER THE NINETY-SECOND.

Night had fallen by this time, and the woman to whom I had given my order had prepared supper, when Eumolpus knocked at the door. “How many of you are there?” I called out, and as I spoke, I peeped cautiously through a chink in the door to see if Ascyltos had come with him; then, as I perceived that he was the only guest, I quickly admitted him. He threw himself upon the pallet and caught sight of Giton, waiting table, whereupon, he nodded his head, “I like your Ganymede,” he remarked, “this day promises a good ending!” I did not take kindly to such an inquisitive beginning, fearing that I had let another Ascyltos into my lodging. Eumolpus stuck to his purpose. “I like you better than the whole bathful,” he remarked, when the lad had served him with wine, then he thirstily drained the cup dry and swore that never before had he tasted a wine with such a satisfying tang to it. “While I was bathing,” he went on, “I was almost beaten up for trying to recite a poem to the people sitting around the basin, and when I had been thrown out of the baths, just like I was out of the theatre, I hunted through every nook and cranny of the building, calling ‘Encolpius, Encolpius,’ at the top of my voice. A naked youth at the other end, who had lost his clothes, was bawling just as loudly and no less angrily for Giton! As for myself, the slaves took me for a maniac, and mimicked me in the most insolent manner, but a large crowd gathered around him, clapping its hands in awe-struck admiration, for so heavy and massive were his private parts, that you would have thought that the man himself was but an appendage of his own member! Oh such a man! He could do his bit all right! I haven’t a doubt but that he could begin on the day before and never finish till the day after the next! And he soon found a friend, of course: some Roman knight or other, I don’t know his name, but he bears a bad reputation, so they say, threw his own mantle around the wanderer and took him off home with himself, hoping, I suppose, to have the sole enjoyment of so huge a prize. But I couldn’t get my own clothing back from the officious bath attendant till I found some one who could identify me, which only goes to show that it is more profitable to rub up the member than it is to polish the mind!” While Eumolpus was relating all this, I changed countenance continually, elated, naturally, at the mishaps of my enemy, and vexed at his good fortune; but I controlled my tongue nevertheless, as if I knew nothing about the episode, and read aloud the bill of fare. (Hardly had I finished, when our humble meal was served. The food was plain but succulent and nutritious, and the famished scholar Eumolpus, fell to ravenously.)

Kind Providence unto our needs has tempered its decrees
     And met our wants, our carping plaints to still
Green herbs, and berries hanging on their rough and brambly sprays
     Suffice our hunger’s gnawing pangs to kill.
What fool would thirst upon a river’s brink? Or stand and freeze
     In icy blasts, when near a cozy fire?
The law sits armed outside the door, adulterers to seize,
     The chaste bride, guiltless, gratifies desire.
All Nature lavishes her wealth to meet our just demands;
But, spurred by lust of pride, we stop at naught to gain our ends!

(Our philosopher began to moralize, when he had gorged himself, leveling many critical shafts at those who hold every-day things in contempt, esteeming nothing except what is rare.)

CHAPTER THE NINETY-THIRD.

(“To their perverted taste,” he went on,) everything one may have lawfully is held cheap and the appetite, tickled only by forbidden indulgences, delights in what is most difficult to obtain.

The pheasant from Colchis, the wild-fowl from African shores,
Because they