ne while endeavoring with wine, another while with sleep, to cheat
care--in vain: for the gloomy companion presses upon you, and pursues
you in your flight.

"Where can I get a stone?" "What occasion is there for it?" "Where some
darts?" "The man is either mad, or making verses." "If you do not take
yourself away in an instant, you shall go [and make] a ninth laborer at
my Sabine estate."

* * * * *

SATIRE VIII.

_A smart description of a miser ridiculously acting the extravagant._

How did the entertainment of that happy fellow Nasidienus please you?
for yesterday, as I was seeking to make you my guest, you were said to
be drinking there from mid-day. [It pleased me so], that I never was
happier in my life. Say (if it be not troublesome) what food first
calmed your raging appetite.

In the first place, there was a Lucanian boar, taken when the gentle
south wind blew, as the father of the entertainment affirmed; around it
sharp rapes, lettuces, radishes; such things as provoke a languid
appetite; skirrets, anchovies, dregs of Coan wine. These once removed,
one slave, tucked high with a purple cloth, wiped the maple table, and a
second gathered up whatever lay useless, and whatever could offend the
guests; swarthy Hydaspes advances like an Attic maid with Ceres' sacred
rites, bearing wines of Caecubum; Alcon brings those of Chios, undamaged
by the sea. Here the master [cries], "Maecenas, if Alban or Falernian
wine delight you more than those already brought, we have both."

Ill-fated riches! But, Fundanius, I am impatient to know, who were
sharers in this feast where you fared so well.

I was highest, and next me was Viscus Thurinus, and below, if I
remember, was Varius; with Servilius Balatro, Vibidius, whom Maecenas
had brought along with him, unbidden guests. Above [Nasidienus] himself
was Nomentanus, below him Porcius, ridiculous for swallowing whole cakes
at once. Nomentanus [was present] for this purpose, that if any thing
should chance to be unobserved, he might show it with his pointing
finger. For the other company, we, I mean, eat [promiscuously] of fowls,
oysters, fish, which had concealed in them a juice far different from
the known: as presently appeared, when he reached to me the entrails of
a plaice and of a turbot, such as had never been tasted before. After
this he informed me that honey-apples were most ruddy when gathered
under the waning moon. What differ