History of Roman Literature from its Earliest Period to the Augustan Volume I Part 23

"Aut quam sidera multa, c.u.m tacet nox, Furtivos hominum vident amores."

These two lines seem to have been in the view of Ariosto, in the 14th canto of the _Orlando_-

"E per quanti occhi il ciel le furtive opre Degli amatori, a mezza notte, scopre."

Martial likewise imitates, and refers to this and to the 5th poem of Catullus, in the 34th epigram of the 6th book-

"Basia da n.o.bis, Diadumene, pressa: quot? inquis- Oceani fluctus me numerare jubes; Et maris aegaei sparsas per littora conchas, Et quae Cecropio monte vagantur apes.

Nolo quot arguto dedit exorata Catullo Lesbia: pauca cupit, qui numerare potest."

The verses of Catullus have been also imitated in Latin by Sannazzarius, by Joannes Secundus, of course, in his _Basia_, and by almost all the ancient amatory poets of France.

8. _Ad Seipsum_. This is quite in the Greek taste: About a third of the Odes of Anacreon are addressed ??? sea?t??. Catullus here playfully, yet feelingly, remonstrates with himself, for still pursuing his inconstant Lesbia, by whom he had been forsaken.

9. _Ad Verannium_. This is one of the most pleasing of the shorter poems.

Catullus congratulates his friend Verannius on his return from Spain, and expresses his joy in terms more touching and natural than anything in the 12th Satire of Juvenal, or the 36th Ode of the 1st Book of Horace, which were both written on similar occasions.

10. _De Varri Scorto_. Catullus gives an account of a visit which he paid at the house of a courtezan, along with his friend Varrus, and relates, in a lively manner, the conversation which he had with the lady on the subject of the acquisitions made by him in Bithynia, from which he had lately returned. There seems here a hit to have been intended against Caesar, of whose conduct in that country some scandalous anecdotes were afloat. The epigram, however, appears chiefly directed against those cross-examiners, who are not to be put off with indefinite answers, and in whose company one must be constantly on guard. In fact, the lady detects Catullus making an unfounded boast of his Bithynian acquisitions, and he accordingly exclaims,

"Sed tu insulsa male, et molesta vivis, Per quam non licet esse negligentem."

11. _Ad Furium et Aurelium_. This ode commences in a higher tone of poetry than any of the preceding. Catullus addresses his friends, Furius and Aurelius, who, he is confident, would be ready to accompany him to the most remote and barbarous quarters of the globe-

"Furi et Aureli, comites Catulli, Sive in extremos penetrabit Indos, Littus ut longe resonante Eoa Tunditur unda."

This verse was no doubt in the view of Horace, in the sixth Ode of the second Book, where he addresses his friend Septimius, and adopts the elegant and melodious Sapphic stanza employed by Catullus-

"Septimi, Gades aditure mec.u.m, et Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra, et Barbaras Syrtes, ubi Maura semper aestuat unda."

Horace, however, has closed his ode with a few lines, perhaps the most beautiful and tender in the whole circle of Latin poetry, and which strike us the more, as pathos is not that poet's peculiar excellence-

"Ille te mec.u.m locus et beati," &c.

Catullus, on the other hand, after preserving an elevated strain of poetry for four stanzas, concludes with requesting his friends to deliver a ridiculous message to his mistress, who

"Nec meum respectet, ut ante, amorem, Qui illius culpa cecidit; velut prati Ultimi flos, praetereunte postquam Tactus aratro est."

This last most beautiful image has been imitated by various poets. Virgil has not disdained to transfer it to his aeneid-

"Purpureus veluti c.u.m flos succisus aratro Languescit moriens(480)."

Fracastoro has employed the same metaphor with hardly less elegance in his consolatory epistle to Turri, on the loss of his child-

-- "Jacet ille velut succisus aratro Flos tener, et frustra non audit tanta gementem;"

and Ariosto has introduced it in the eighteenth canto of the Orlando-

"Come purpureo fior languendo muore Che 'l vomere al pa.s.sar tagliato la.s.sa."

13. _Ad Fabullum_. Our poet invites Fabullus to supper, on condition that he will bring his provisions along with him-

-- "Nam tui Catulli Plenus sacculus est aranearum."

On his own part, he promises only a hearty welcome, and the most exquisite ointments. In the poetry of social kindness and friends.h.i.+p, Catullus is eminently happy; and we regret to find that this tone, which has so much prevailed in the preceding odes, subsequently changes into bitter and gross invective.

The thirteen following poems are chiefly occupied with vehement and indelicate abuse of those friends of the poet, Furius and Aurelius, who were men of some quality and distinction, but had wasted their fortunes by extravagance and debauchery. In a former ode, we have seen him confident that they would readily accompany him to the wildest or remotest quarters of the globe: But he had subsequently quarrelled with them, partly because they had stigmatized his verses as soft and effeminate; and, in revenge for this affront, he upbraids them with their poverty and vices. Of these thirteen poems, the last, addressed to Furius, is a striking picture of the sheltered situation of a villa. In the common editions, the description refers to the villa of Catullus himself, but Muretus thinks, it was rather meant to be applied to that of Furius:

"Furi, villula vostra non ad Austri," &c.

27. _Ad Pocillatorem puerum_. This address, in which Catullus calls on his cupbearer to pour out for him copious and unmixed libations of Falernian, is quite in the spirit of Anacreon: it breathes all his easy and joyous gaiety, and the enthusiasm inspired by the grape.

28. _Ad Verannium et Fabullum_-

"Pisonis comites cohors inanis," &c.

Catullus condoles with these friends on account of the little advantage they had reaped from accompanying the Praetor Piso to his province-comparing their situation to the similar circ.u.mstances in which he had himself been placed with Memmius in Bithynia.

There is a parody on this piece of Catullus by the celebrated Huet, Bishop of Avranches-

"Bocharti comites cohors inanis." &c.

In his youth, Huet had accompanied Bochart to Sweden, on the invitation of Queen Christina, and appears to have been as little gratified by his northern expedition, as Catullus by his voyage to Bithynia.

29. _In Caesarem_. Julius Caesar, while yet but the general of the Roman republic, had been accustomed, during his stay in the north of Italy, to lodge at the house of the father of Catullus in Verona. Notwithstanding the intimacy which in consequence subsisted between Caesar and his father, Catullus lampooned the former on more than one occasion. In the present epigram, he pours on him an unmeasured abuse, chiefly for having bestowed the plunder of Britain and Gaul on his favourite, the infamous Mamurra, who appropriated the public money, and the spoils of whole nations, to support his boundless extravagance. There is a story which has become very common on the authority of Suetonius, that Caesar invited Catullus to supper on the day on which he first read some satirical verses of the poet against himself and Mamurra, and that he continued to lodge with his father as before(481). It appears that on one occasion, when some scurrilous verses by Catullus were shown to him, he supped with Cicero at his villa near Puteoli. On the 19th, he staid at the house of Philippus till one in the afternoon, but saw n.o.body; he then walked on the sh.o.r.e across to Cicero's villa-bathed after two o'clock, and heard the verses on Mamurra read, at which he never changed countenance(482). Now, this was in the year 708, after the civil war had been ended, by the defeat and death of the younger Pompey in Spain. It is most likely that this 29th epigram was the one which was read to him at Cicero's villa; and the 57th epigram, also directed against Caesar and Mamurra, is probably that concerning which the above anecdote is related by Suetonius. Though it stands last of the two in the works of Catullus, it was evidently written before the 29th. He talks in it of Caesar and Mamurra, as of persons who were still on a footing of equality-in the other, he speaks of their dividing the spoils of the provinces, Gaul, Britain, Pontus, and Spain. The coolness and indifference which Caesar showed with regard to the first epigram written against him, and the forgiveness he extended to its author, encouraged Cicero, who was a gossip and newsmonger, or those who attended him, to read to him another of the same description while bathing at the Puteolan Villa.

31. _Ad Sirmionem Peninsulam_. This heart-soothing invocation, which is perhaps the most pleasing of all the productions of Catullus, is addressed to the peninsula of Sirmio, in the territory of Verona, on which the princ.i.p.al and favourite villa of our poet was situated. Sirmio was a peninsular promontory, of about two miles circ.u.mference, projecting into the Benacus, now the Lago di Garda-a lake celebrated by Virgil as one of the n.o.blest ornaments of Italy, and the praises of which have been loudly re-echoed by the modern Latin poets of that country, particularly by Fracastoro, who dwelt in its vicinity, and who, while lamenting the untimely death of his poetical friend, Marc Antonio del Torri, beautifully represents the shade of Catullus, as still nightly wandering amidst these favourite scenes-

"Te ripae flevere Athesis; te voce vocare Auditae per noctem umbrae, manesque Catulli, Et patrios mulcere nova dulcedine lucos(483)."

Vestiges of the magnificent house supposed to have belonged to Catullus, are yet shown on this peninsula. Its ruins, which lie near the borders of the lake, still give the idea of an extensive palace. There are even now, as we are informed by travellers(484), sufficient remains of mason-work, pilasters, vaults, walls, and subterraneous pa.s.sages, to a.s.sist the imagination in representing to itself what the building was when entire, at least in point of extent and situation. The length of the whole construction, from north to south, is about 700 feet, and the breadth upwards of 300. The ground on which it stood does not appear to have been level, and the fall to the west was supplied by rows of vaults, placed on each other, the top of which formed a terrace. On the east, the structure had been raised on those steep and solid rocks which lined the sh.o.r.e; on the front, which was to the north, and commanded a magnificent view of the lake, an immense portico seems to have projected from the building: under the ruins, there are a number of subterraneous vaults, one of which ran through the middle of the edifice, and along its whole length(485).

The peninsula on which the villa of Catullus was situated, is not surpa.s.sed in beauty or fertility by any spot in Italy. "Sirmione," says Eustace(486), "appears as an island, so low and so narrow is the bank that unites it to the mainland. The promontory spreads behind the town, and rises into a hill entirely covered with olives. Catullus," he continues, "undoubtedly inhabited this spot, and certainly he could not have chosen a more delightful retreat. In the centre of a magnificent lake, surrounded with scenery of the greatest variety and majesty, secluded from the world, yet beholding from his garden the villas of his Veronese friends, he might have enjoyed alternately the pleasures of retirement, and society; and daily, without the sacrifice of his connexions, which Horace seemed inclined to make in a moment of despondency, he might have contemplated the grandeur and agitation of the ocean, without its terrors and immensity. Besides, the soil is fertile, and its surface varied; sometimes shelving in a gentle declivity, at other times breaking in craggy magnificence, and thus furnis.h.i.+ng every requisite for delightful walks and luxurious baths; while the views vary at every step, presenting rich coasts or barren mountains, sometimes confined to the cultivated scenes of the neighbouring sh.o.r.e, and at other times bewildered and lost in the windings of the lake, or in the recesses of the Alps. In short, more convenience and more beauty are seldom united(487)." No wonder, then, that Catullus, jaded and disappointed by his expedition to Bithynia, should, on his return, have exclaimed with transport, that the spot was not to be matched in the wide range of the world of waters; or that he should have unloaded his mind of its cares, in language so perfect, yet simple, that it could only have flowed from a real and exquisite feeling. No poem in the Latin language expresses tender feelings more tenderly, and home feelings more naturally, than the Invocation to Sirmio, in which the verses soothe and refresh us somewhat in the manner we suppose Catullus himself to have been, by the trees that shaded the promontory, and by the waters of the lake below-

"Quam te libenter, quamque laetus inviso!

Vix me ipse credens Thyniam, atque Bithynos Liquisse campos, et videre te in tuto.

O quid solutis est beatius curis?

c.u.m mens onus reponit, ac peregrino Labore fessi venimus larem ad nostrum, Desideratoque acquiescimus lecto.

Hoc est, quod unum est pro laboribus tantis.

Salve, O venusta Sirmio, atque hero gaude."

These lines show that the most refined and tender feelings were as familiar to the bosom of Catullus as the grossest. Nothing can be more delicate than his description of the emotions of one, who, after many wanderings and vicissitudes of fortune, returns to his home, and to the scenes beloved in youth or infancy: Nothing can be more beautiful than his invocation to the peninsula-his fond request that the delightful promontory, and the waters by which it was surrounded, should join in welcoming him home; and, above all, his heartfelt expression of delight at the prospect of again reclining on his accustomed couch.

It appears to me, however, that the beauty and the pathos of the poem is in some degree injured by the last verse,-

"Ridete quicquid est domi cachinnorum,"

which introduces the idea of obstreperous mirth, instead of that tone of tenderness which pervades the preceding lines of the ode. One would almost suppose, as probably has happened in some other cases, that a verse had been subjoined to this which properly belonged to a different ode, where mirth, and not tenderness, prevailed.