Vies with the state in riches: when that vile

And low-bred reptile, from the slime of Nile,
Crispinus, from his lady-shoulder throws

The purple cloke which too luxuriant flows,

To this man, and to his fortunes, might justly be applied the fine sarcasm of Claudian on the eunuch Eutropius:

"Culmine dejectum vitæ Fortuna priori

"Reddidit, INSANO JAM SATIATA LUDO!"

VER. 41. Cùm pars Niliaca plebis, cùm verna Canopi

Crispinus,

-] This man rose, under Nero, from the condition of a slave, to riches and honours. His connection with that monster recommended him to Domitian, with whom he seems to have been in high favour. He shared his counsels, ministered to his amusements, and was the ready instrument of his cruelties. For these, and other causes, Juvenal regarded him with perfect detestation. He cannot speak of him with temper; and whenever he introduces him, which he does on all occasions, it is with mingled contempt and horror. Here he is not only a Niliacan (an expression which conveyed more to Juvenal's mind than it does to ours) but a Canopian, a native of the most profligate spot in Egypt; not only one of the dregs of the people, but a slave; and not only a slave, but a slave born of a slave! Hence the poet's indignation at his effeminate luxury.

"

Martial, always begging, and always in distress, has a hue and cry after a purple cloke," stolen from this minion, while he was bathing: "Nescit cui dederit Tyriam Crispinus abollam *

"Dum mutat cultus," &c.

*The abolla (which I suppose to be the lacerna of our author), was a loose upper garment or wrapper, worn by philosophers, magistrates, senators, &c.: "that it was a grave habit" (says Holyday, on another occasion), " I nothing doubt, from Pegasus' taking it with him to the council." This, however, depended on circumstances. A cloke of coarse gray cloth was neither repugnant to the age, nor gravity of the præfect: but the abolla of Crispinus was a very different thing; it was dyed in Tyrian purple, the most expensive of all colours; and, from its size, must have cost an inconceivable sum.

It may seem odd, that he who could scarce bear the weight of a summer ring, should nevertheless load his shoulders with a robe of this kind: but it was the splendour and extravagance of it, which influenced his choice. Vanity, as Shakspeare somewhere says of misery, makes a man acquainted with strange garments!

Or fans his finger, labouring with the freight
Of a light summer ring; and, faint with heat,
Cries, "save me from a gem of greater weight!"
'Tis hard to choose a less indignant strain-
For who so slow of heart, so dull of brain,
So patient of the town's increasing crimes,
As not to burst impetuous into rhymes!
When bloated Matho, in a new-built chair,
Stuft with himself, is borne abroad for air;

and in an epigram equally contemptible for its baseness, and its impiety, entreats his favourable word with Domitian: Sic, says he,

"Sic placidum videas semper, Crispine, tonantem,

"Nec te Roma minus quam tua Memphis amat."

But he has his reward: his adulation was then neglected, and is now despised; while the severity of his manlier friend, was the admiration of his own age, and will be the delight of posterity.

I do not know whether Ammianus Marcellinus had the character of Cris

pinus in his thoughts, when he wrote the following elegant passage; but it certainly throws more light than any other I am acquainted with, on the humero revocante lacernas, the flinging back and recovering the "purple cloke." Alii summum decus in ambitioso vestium cultu ponentes, sudant sub ponderibus lacernarum, quas collis insertas cingulis ipsis adnectunt, nimia subteminum tenuitate perflabiles, expectantes crebris agitationibus, maximèque sinistra, ut longiores fimbria tunicaque perspicuè luceant.

VER. 44. Of a light summer ring, &c.] The "dainty pride" of the Romans, as Holyday calls it, had arrived at such a pitch, that they had different rings for different seasons: not that so absurd a refinement in luxury could be general; it serves, however, to mark the affected delicacy of Crispinus.

VER. 50. When bloated Matho, &c.] Matho (as we find from the seventh Satire) originally followed the profession of a lawyer; but meeting, perhaps deserving, no encouragement, he fell into the extremes of poverty, and broke.

Follow'd by him, who, to the imperial hate,
A noble friend betray'd; and now, elate
With one patrician's fall, aspires to wrest
The poor remains of greatness from the rest;
Whom Massa dreads, though of the informing tribe,
Whom anxious Carus softens with a bribe,

He then turned informer; the dreadful resource of men of desperate fortunes and desperate characters. In this he seems to have been successful: he has a chair, which Juvenal takes care to tell us had not been long in his possession, and he is grown immoderately fat, for he fills it himself.

Critics are divided about the man who followed Matho. The old Scholiast says it was Heliodorus the Stoic, who informed against his friend and pupil Silanus; or it was Egnatius Celer, or Demetrius, the lawyer, &c. It was more probably, however, Marcus Regulus, who carried on the trade of an informer under Nero, and again under Domitian. Pliny gives an entertaining account of his cowardly apprehensions for himself after the death of the latter; and pronounces him to be the wickedest of all two-legged creatures, omnium bipedum nequissimus.

The difficulty of fixing on any particular name, affords matter for deep reflection. That so many people should at the same period be guilty of the complicated crimes of treachery and ingratitude (for such is the charge) could only be believed on the credit of concurring testimonies; and gives us a dreadful picture of the state of corruption into which Rome was now fallen. VER. 56. Whom Massa dreads, &c.] He speaks of Bæbius Massa, who took up the trade of an informer under Domitian, and rose to great eminence in guilt. Tacitus calls him a pernicious enemy to all good men, and the cause of many evils to the state. He was prosecuted in his turn for malpractices in his government (of the province of Bætica), and condemned to refund his ill-gotten property. It seems, however, from Pliny, who was one of his prosecutors, that there was some collusion among the judges; and that the sentence was never inforced.

But though Massa might be rich, he was now no longer powerful: for Martial, who was never accused of temerity, attacks him without fear.

And pale Latinus, trembling for his life,
Seeks to propitiate with a handsome wife.
When brawny knaves defeat thee of thy right
By the lewd labours of a lusty night;

For now, the hoary grandam's itch supplies
The readiest means to wealth, and power to rise:-
Not that an equal rank her minions hold,

Or all that share her favours, share her gold:
More prudent, she, their different merits known,
By nature's bounty regulates her own;
And Proculeius mourns his scanty measure,
While Gillo triumphs in exuberant treasure.
And let him triumph! 'tis the price of blood—
While thus defrauded of the generous flood,

Humourously exaggerating the thievish propensities of one Hermogenes, a thief by descent, he observes, that he was as great a stealer of napkins, wherever he went, as Massa was of money!

VER. 57. Whom anxious Carus, &c.] This was Carus Metius, no less conspicuous for villany than Massa. He did not, indeed, begin so early; for when Tacitus was writing the life of Agricola, he had obtained "but one victory;" that, probably, over the virtuous Senecio, who assisted Pliny in the prosecution of Massa.

The first draught of this Satire (for it was afterwards considerably improved and enlarged), might be formed, I should think, soon after the above event: since we find Carus, infamous as he was, and ready to join in the destruction of the worthiest characters, not yet so firmly established in the Emperor's favour, but that he needed the protection of a more powerful villain.

Carus obtained more "victories," as Tacitus calls them, afterwards, and outlived his execrable master; when he fell into poverty and contempt. Of Latinus, or rather the mime represented by him (for he himself had been put to death in a former reign), I have nothing to relate with certainty.

The colour flies his cheek, as though he press'd,
With naked foot, the invenom'd aspic's crest;
Or stood prepared at Lyons to declaim,
Where the least hazard is the loss of fame.

Heavens! need I tell what frenzy fires my brain,
When yon vile spoiler, with his numerous train,
Chokes up the street, and leaves his orphan charge

To prostitution, and the world at large?
When, by a juggling sentence damn'd in vain,
(For who that holds the plunder, heeds the pain?)
Marius to wine devotes his morning hours,

And laughs, in exile, at the offended powers;

VER. 74. Or stood prepared at Lyons to declaim, &c.] It was here that Caligula instituted games of oratory. The meed of the conqueror is no where mentioned, but the punishment of the vanquished was to obliterate what he had written with his tongue, to be ducked in the river, &c. &c. Tyranny, like dullness, sometimes "loves a joke,” and this was a most miserable one. If Caligula himself were one of the candidates, and any other won the palm, his reward was certain death. Dio tells a curious story of Caligula's accusing Domitius Afer in a set speech. Domitius wisely determined not to answer it; but throwing himself into an ecstacy at the beauty of the composition, he repeated parts of it here and there, affecting to be so enraptured by it, as utterly to forget that it was pronounced against himself. The artifice succeeded; his life was spared, because, when ordered to plead, he prostrated himself—καὶ χαμαι κειμενΘ, ικετευσεν, ὡς καὶ τον ρητορα αυτον μαλλον ή τον Kairaga posuere. Lib. LIX. c. xix.

The scene of these contests, which was at the confluence of the Soane and the Rhone, had been looked on as a sacred spot from the earliest ages. After the subjection of the country, the natives built a temple and altar here to Augustus, and established, or rather renewed, the ancient festival, to which there was annually a great resort. The happy thought of instituting oratorical games at this altar, is, as I have already observed, due to Caligula.