The Satires of Juvenal, Persius, Sulpicia, and Lucilius
virtuous principles, or other than she cherishes herself? It is right
profitable too for a depraved old hag to train her daughter to the same
depravity.
There is scarcely a single cause in which a woman is not engaged
in some way in fomenting the suit. If Manilia is not defendant,
she will be plaintiff. They draw up and frame bills of indictment
unassisted,[252] quite prepared to dictate even to Celsus[253] the
exordium and topics he should use.
The Tyrian Endromides[254] and the Ceroma for women who is ignorant
of? Or who has not seen the wounds of the Plastron,[255] which she
dints with unwearied foil, and attacks with her shield, and goes with
precision through her exercise? A matron most pre-eminently worthy
of the trumpet of the Floralia. Unless indeed in that breast of hers
she is plotting something deeper, and training in real earnest for
the amphitheatre.[256] What modesty can a woman show that wears a
helmet, and eschews her sex, and delights in feats of strength? And
yet, in spite of all, this virago would not wish to become a man. For
how small is our pleasure compared to theirs! Yet what a goodly array
would there be, if there were an auction of your wife's goods: belt
and gauntlets[257] and crest, and the half-armor for the left leg! Or
if she shall engage in a different way of fighting,[258] you will be
lucky indeed when your young wife sells her greaves. Yet these very
same women perspire even in their muslin; whose delicate frames even
a slip of sarcenet oppresses. See! with what a noise she makes the
home-thrusts taught her by the trainer, and what a weight of helmet
bows her down, how firmly she plants herself on her haunches, in what
a thick mass is the roll of clothes. Then smile when, laying aside
her arms, she takes her oblong vessel. Tell me, ye granddaughters of
Lepidus or blind Metellus, or Fabius Gurges, what actress ever wore a
dress like this? When would Asylus' wife cry Hah! at the Plastron?
The bed in which a wife lies is the constant scene of quarrels and
mutual recriminations. There is little chance of sleep there. Then
is she indeed bitter toward her husband, fiercer than tigress robbed
of her whelps; when, conscious of her secret guilt, she counterfeits
groans, or hates the servants, or upbraids you with some rival of her
own creation, with tears ever fruitful, ever ready at their post, and
only waiting her command in what way to flow. You believe it genuine
love. You, poor hedge-sparrow, plume yourself, and kiss off the tears!
Ah! what amorous lays, what letters would you read, if you were but to
examine the writing-case of that adulteress that counterfeits jealousy
so well!
But suppose her actually caught in the arms of a slave or knight. "Pray
suggest in this case some colorable excuse, Quintilian!" "We are at
fault! Let the lady herself speak!" "It was formerly agreed," she says,
"that you should do what you pleased, and that I also might have full
power to gratify myself. In spite of your outcry and confounding heaven
and sea, I am mortal." Nothing is more audacious than these women when
detected. They affect resentment, and borrow courage from their very
guilt itself.
Yet should you ask whence are these unnatural prodigies, or from what
source they spring; it was their humble fortune that made the Latin
women chaste in days of yore, nor did hard toil and short nights' rest,
and hands galled and hardened[259] with the Tuscan fleece, and Hannibal
close to the city, and their husbands mounting guard at the Colline
tower, suffer their lowly roofs to be contaminated by vice. Now we are
suffering all the evils of long-continued peace. Luxury, more ruthless
than war, broods over Rome, and exacts vengeance for a conquered
world. No guilt or deed of lust is wanting, since Roman poverty has
disappeared. This was the source whence Sybaris flowed to these seven
hills, and Rhodes too, and Miletus, and Tarentum crowned with garlands,
insolent and flushed with wine!
Money, the nurse of debauchery, was the first that introduced foreign
manners, and enervating riches sapped the sinews of the age with foul
luxury. For what cares Venus in her cups? All difference of head
or tail is alike to her who at very midnight devours huge oysters,
when unguents mixed with neat Falernian foam, when she drains the
conch,[260] when from her dizziness the roof seems to reel, and the
table to rise up with the lights doubled in number.[261] Go then, and
knowing all this, doubt, if you can, with what a snort of scorn Tullia
snuffs up the air when she passes the ancient altar of Chastity; or
what Collatia says to her accomplice Maura. Here they set down their
litters at night, and bedew the very image of the goddess with copious
irrigations, while the chaste moon witnesses their abominations,[262]
over which, when morn returns, you pass on your way to visit your great
friends.
The secrets of Bona Dea are well known. When the pipe excites them, and
inflamed alike with the horn and wine, these Mænads of Priapus rush
wildly round, and whirl their locks and howl! Then, as their passions
rise, how burning is their lust, how frantic their words, when all
power of restraining their desires is lost! A prize is proposed, and
Saufeia[263] challenges the vilest of her sex, and bears off the prize.
In these games nothing is counterfeit, all is acted to the life; so
that even the aged Priam, effete from years, or Nestor himself, might
be inflamed at the sight. Then their lust admits of no delay. Then the
woman appears in all her native depravity; and by all alike is the
shout re-echoed from the whole den--"Now is the proper time. Let in
the men!" But the adulterer still sleeps; so she bids the youth put on
a female hood, and speed to the spot. If none can be found, they have
recourse to slaves. If there is no hope of slaves, they will hire some
water-carrier to come. If this fails too, and no men can be found, she
would not hesitate to descend still lower in the scale of creation.
Oh, would that our ancient rites and public worship could at least be
celebrated, uncontaminated by such pollutions as these! But even the
Moors and Indians know what singing wench produced his wares equal
in bulk to Cæsar's two Anticatos, in a place whence even a mouse,
conscious of his sex, would flee, and every picture is veiled over that
represents the other sex. Yet, even in those days, what man despised
the deity? or who had dared to ridicule Numa's earthen bowl and black
dish, and the brittle vessels from Mount Vatican. But now what altars
are there that a Clodius does not assail?
I hear the advice that my good friends of ancient days would give--"Put
on a lock! keep her in confinement!" But who is to guard the guards
themselves? Your wife is as cunning as you, and begins with them. And,
in our days, the highest and the lowest are fired with the same lust.
Nor is she that wears out the black pavement with her feet, better than
she who is borne on the shoulders of her tall Syrian slaves.
Ogulnia, in order that she may go in due state to the games, hires a
dress, and attendants, and a sedan, and pillow, and female friends;
and a nurse, and yellow-haired girl[264] to whom she may issue her
commands. Yet all that remains of her family plate, and even the very
last remnants of it,[265] she gives to well-oiled Athletes. Many women
are in straitened circumstances at home; yet none of them has the
modest selfrestraint that should accompany poverty, or limits herself
within that measure which her poverty has allotted and assigned to her.
Yet _men_ do sometimes look forward to what may be to their interest
hereafter, and, with the ant for their instructress, some have at last
felt a dread of cold and hunger. Yet woman, in her prodigality,
perceives not that her fortune is fast coming to naught; and as though
money, with vegetative power, would bloom afresh[266] from the drained
chest, and the heap from which she takes would be ever full, she never
reflects how great a sum her pleasures cost her. Some women ever take
delight in unwarlike eunuchs, and soft kisses, and the loss of all hope
of beard, that precludes the necessity of abortives. Yet the summit
of their pleasure is when this operation has been performed in the
heat and prime of manhood, and the only loss sustained is that the
surgeon Heliodorus cheats the barber of his fees. Such is his mistress'
will: and, conspicuous from afar, and attracting the eyes of all, he
enters the baths, and vies even with the god that guards our vines and
gardens. Let him sleep with his mistress! But, Postumus, suffer not the
youthful Bromius to enter the lists with him.
If she takes delight in singing, the fibula of none of these fellows
that sells his voice to the prætor holds out: the instruments are
forever in her hands; the whole lyre sparkles with the jewels thickly
set. She runs over the strings with the vibrating quill,[267] with
which the soft Hedymeles performed: this she holds in her hands;
with this she consoles herself, and lavishes kisses on the plectrum,
dear for its owner's sake. One of the clan of the Lamiæ,[268] a lady
of lofty rank, inquired with meal-cake and wine of Janus and Vesta,
whether Pollio might venture to hope for the oaken crown at the
Capitoline games,[269] and promise it to his lyre. What more could
she do were her husband sick? What, if the physicians had despaired
of her infant son? She stood before the altar, and thought no shame
to veil her head for a harper: and went through in due form the words
prescribed,[270] and grew pale as the lamb was opened. Tell me now, I
pray, tell me, thou ancientest of gods, father Janus! dost thou return
answer to these? Great must be indeed the leisure[271] of heaven! There
can be no business there, as far as I see, stirring among you. One
woman consults you about comic actors; another would fain commend a
tragedian to your notice: the soothsayer will become varicose.[272]
But let her rather be musical than fly through the whole city, with
bold bearing; and encounter the assemblies of men, and in her husband's
presence herself converse with generals in their scarlet cloaks,[273]
with unabashed face and breasts exposed. She too knows all that is
going on in the whole world--what the Seres[274] or Thracians are
engaged in--the secrets of the step-mother and her son--what adulterer
is in love, or is in great request. She will tell you who made the
widow pregnant--in what month it was--in what language and manner
each act of love takes place. She is the first[275] to see the comet
that menaces the Armenian and Parthian king; and she intercepts[276]
at the gates the reports and freshest news. Some she invents as well.
That Niphates[277] has overwhelmed whole nations, and that the whole
country is there laid under water by a great deluge; that cities are
tottering, the earth sinking down--this she tells in every place of
resort to every one she meets.
And yet that vice is not more intolerable, than that, though earnestly
entreated,[278] she will seize upon her poor neighbors, and have them
cut in two with lashes. For if her sound slumbers are disturbed by
the barking of a dog, "Bring the clubs[279] here at once!" she cries:
and orders the owner first to be beaten with them, and then the dog.
Terrible to encounter, most awful in visage, she enters the baths by
night--by night she orders her bathing vessels and camp to be set in
motion. She delights in perspiring with great tumult; when her arms
have sunk down wearied with the heavy dumb-bells; and the sly anointer
has omitted to rub down no part of her body. Her poor wretches of
guests meanwhile are overcome with drowsiness and hunger. At last the
lady comes; flushed, and thirsty enough for a whole flagon,[280] which