Satires 2.8 (Fairclough)

HORACE. How did you like your dinner with the rich Nasidienus? Yesterday, when I tried to get you as my own guest, I was told you had been dining there since midday.

FUNDANIUS. So much so that never in my life did I have a better time.

HOR. Tell me, if you don’t mind, what was the first dish to appease an angry appetite?

FUN. First there was a wild boar. It was caught when a gentle south wind was blowing, as the father of the feast kept telling us. Around it were pungent turnips, lettuces, radishes—such things as whet a jaded appetite—skirret, fish-pickle, and Coan lees. When these were removed, a high-girt slave with purple napkin wiped well the maple-wood table, while a second swept up the scraps and anything that could offend the guests. Then, like an Attic maid bearing Ceres’ sacred emblems, there came forward dusky Hydaspes with Caecuban wine, and Alcon with Chian, unmixed with brine. Then said our host: “If Alban is more to your taste, Maecenas, or Falernian, we have both.”

HOR. O the misery of wealth! But who, Fundanius, were those at dinner, with whom you had so fine a time? I am eager to know.

FUN. Myself at the top, then next to me Viscus of Thurii, and below, if I remember, Varius. Then Vibidius and Servilius Balatro, the “shades” that Maecenas had brought with him. Above our host was Nomentanus; below him, Porcius, who made us laugh by swallowing whole cheese-cakes at a mouthful. Nomentanus was there to see that if anything perchance escaped our notice, he might point it out with his forefinger; for the rest of the folk—we, I mean—eat fowl, oysters, and fish, which had a flavour far different from any we knew, as, for instance, was made clear at once, after he had handed me the livers of a plaice and a turbot, a dish I had never tasted before. After this he informed me that the honey-apples were red because picked in the light of a waning moon. What difference that makes you would learn better from himself.

Then said Vibidius to Balatro: “Unless we drink him bankrupt, we shall die unavenged,” and he calls for larger cups. Then did paleness overspread the face of the host, who dreaded nothing so much as hard drinkers, either because they chaff one too freely or because fiery wines dull the delicate palate. Vibidius and Balatro tilt whole decanters of wine into Allifan goblets. All followed suit, save the guests on the lowest couch, who did no harm to the flagons.

Then is brought in a lamprey, outstretched on a platter, with shrimps swimming all round it. Upon this the master: “This,” said he, “was caught before spawning; if taken later, its flesh would have been poorer. The ingredients of the sauce are these: oil from Venafrum of the first pressing, roe from the juices of the Spanish mackerel, wine five years old, but produced this side of the sea, poured in while it is on the boil—after boiling, Chian suits better than anything else—white pepper, and vinegar made from the fermenting of Lesbian vintage. I was the first to point out that one should boil in the sauce green rockets and bitter elecampane; Curtillus would use sea-urchins, unwashed, inasmuch as the yield of the sea-shellfish itself is better than a briny pickle.

Meantime the canopy spread above came down in mighty ruin upon the platter, trailing more black dust than the North-wind raises on Campanian plains. We feared a worse disaster, but finding there was no danger recover ourselves. Rufus drooped his head and wept as if his son had fallen by an untimely fate. What would have been the end, had not Nomentanus, the philosopher, thus rallied his friend: “Ah, Fortune, what god is more cruel toward us than thou! How thou dost ever delight to make sport of the life of man!” Varius could scarce smother a laugh with his napkin. Balatro, who sneers at everything, said: “These are the terms of life, and therefore the meed of fame will never equal your labour. To think that, in order that I may have lavish entertainment, you are to be racked and tortured with every anxiety, lest the bread be burned, lest sauce be served ill-seasoned, that all your slaves may be properly attired and neat for waiting! Then, too, these risks besides—the canopy falling, as it did just now, or a numskull stumbling and breaking a dish! But one who entertains is like a general: mishaps oft reveal his genius, smooth going hides it.” To this replies Nasidienus: “Heaven grant you every blessing you crave, so kind a man are you, so civil a guest!” and calls for his slippers. Then on each couch you might note the buzz of whispers in secret ears exchanged.

HOR. No play would I have rather seen; but pray tell me, what did you find to laugh at next?

FUN. While Vibidius is asking the servants whether the flagon also was broken, since cups were not brought him when called for, and while we were laughing at pretended jests, Balatro egging us on, back you come, Nasidienus, with altered brow, as if bent on mending misfortune by art. Then follow servants, bearing on a huge charger the limbs of a crane sprinkled with much salt and meal, and the liver of a white goose fattened on rich figs, and hares’ limbs torn off, as being more dainty than if eaten with the loins. Then we saw blackbirds served with the breast burnt, and pigeons without the rumps—real dainties, did not our host unfold their laws and properties. But off we ran, taking our revenge on him by tasting nothing at all, as though the things were blasted with Canidia’s breath, more deadly than African serpents.