Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 378, April, 1847

Before a table I will set you,
A few days hence, with welcome hearty,
To my domestic dinner-party.
That is to say—you bring the food,
(Which must be plentiful and good,)
With wine—remembering, I presume,
For one fair girl I've always room.
On these conditions you shall dine
Luxurious, boon-companion mine.
Seeing that your Catullus' purse
Has nought but cobwebs left to nurse,
I can but give you in return
The loves that undiluted burn;
And, something sweeter, neater still—
A scented unguent I'll impart,
Which Venus and her Loves distil
To please the girl that owns my heart:
Which when you smell, this boon—this solely
You'll ask the gods to recompose;
And metamorphose you, and wholly,
To one extensive Roman nose.

Aquilius.—What nose would a Roman wish to have? I object to Roman, though it is not a bad one for the purpose. The metamorphosed would certainly have a ballad written on him and sung about the streets. Write it, and call him "The Man-mountain, or real and undoubted Promontory of Noses."

Gratian.—It should seem they were like enough to feast—like their gods they so irreverently prayed to—on the smell and the smoke only; so they needed good noses and bad appetites. There is something a little abrupt in the latter part, which I doubt if I like: the Loves and Graces should not be made parties to the making of such a monster; and as monster is now-a-days all adopted adjective, follow the fashion of speech, and call it "One extensive Monster-Nose."—Well, what next?

Aquilius.—A little piece of extravagant badinage. It seems Calvus Licinius had sent Catullus a collection of miserable poems, and that, too, on commencement of the Saturnalia, dedicated to joy, and freedom from care and annoyance. Our author writes to complain of the malicious present. There is some force, and a fair fling of contempt at the bad poets of the day in it.

AD CALVUM LICINIUM, ORATOREM

Now if I loved you less, my friend,
Facetious Calvus, than these eyes,
You merit hatred in such wise
As men Vatinius hate. To send
Such stuff to me! Have I been rash
In word or deed? The gods forfend!
That you should kill me with such trash,
Of vile and deleterious verse—
Volumes on volumes without end,
Of ignominious poets, worse
Than their own works. May gods be pliant,
And grant me this: that poison—pest
Light on 'em all, and on that client
Who sent 'em you; and you in jest
Transfer them, odious, and mephitic,
And execrable. I suspect 'em
Sent you by that grammarian critic,
Sulla. If so, and you have lost
No precious labour to collect 'em,
'Tis well indeed; and little cost
To you, with malice aforethought,
To send (and with intent to kill him,
And on this blessed day, when nought
But Saturnalian joys should fill him)
Your friend Catullus such a set
Of murderous authors; but the debt
I'll pay, be even with you yet—
For no perfidious friend I spare.
At early dawn, ere the sun shine, I
Will rise, and ransack shop and stall,
Collect your Cæsii and Aquini,
And that Suffenus: and with care
And diligence, will have all sent
To you, for a like punishment.
Hence, poets! with your jingling chimes:
Hence, miserables! halt and lame;
Be off, ye troublers of our times!
I send you packing whence ye came.

Gratian.—Kicking about the volumes, doubtless, as the "Friend of Humanity" did the "Needy Knife-grinder."

Curate.—I did not translate that—for I thought the authors might easily have been burned for writing bad verses (no hint to you, Aquilius; nothing personal); and that Calvus Licinius, having that remedy, need not have written about them. And I confess I don't see much in what he has written. This Suffenus, however, was no fool, but a man of wit and sense.

Aquilius.—Yes,—and Catullus writes to Varrus specially about him. I have translated that too. Here it is:—

AD VARRUM

This man Suffenus, whom you know,
Varrus, is not without some show
Of parts, and gift of speech befitting
A man of sense. Yet he mistakes
His talents wondrously, and makes
His thousand verses at a sitting.
And troth, he makes them look their best:
For, not content with palimpsest,
He has them writ on royal vellum,
Emboss'd and gilded, rubb'd and polish'd:
But read 'em, and you wish abolish'd
The privilege to make or sell 'em.
You read them, and the man is quite
Another man: no more polite—
No more "the man about the town,"
But metamorphosed to a clown—
Milker of goats, a hedger, digger,
So thoroughly is changed his figure,
So quite unlike himself. 'Tis odd,
Most strange, the man for wit so noted,
Whose repartees so much were quoted,
Is changed into a very clod!
And stranger still—he never seems