Chapter VI: Introduction: J. L. Vives: a Scholar of the Renascence (5)

_Spud._ He is the _propugnator_, who will receive the
attack of all, and who has become thin and pale by his
immoderate night-watches. He has done great things in
philosophy and is advanced in theology. But now you must
be quiet and listen, for he who is now making the attack
is accustomed to think out his arguments most acutely and
subtly, and presses most keenly the _propugnator_, and,
in the opinion of all, is compared with the very highest
in this discipline, and often compels his antagonist to
recant. Notice how the latter has tried to elude him,
but how the _oppugnator_ has met him effectively by
his irrefutable reasoning, and how the _propugnator_
cannot escape him! This arrow cannot be avoided. His
argument is like an invincible Achilles. It enters the
neck of the opponent. The _propugnator_ cannot protect
himself and soon will give in (_manus dabit_) unless
some god suggests a subterfuge to his mind. Behold, the
question is brought to an end by the decision of the
judge (_decretor_). Now I loosen your tongue to speak
as you wish. For he who now attacks is as vapid wine,
and contends as with a leaden dagger, yet he shouts
louder than the rest. Notice, and you will see that he
grows hoarse from the encounter. Though his weapons are
repulsed, he presses on none the less pertinaciously,
but without effect; nor does any one wish to have the
reversion to his argument, or to have him assuaged by
the answer of the defender or the president. He who now
enters the contest effeminately begs the judge for his
permission, and speaks with courtesy, though he argues
ineffectively and always leaves off tired, even gasping,
as if he had gone through the unpleasant business with
fortitude. Let us depart.

XIV

CUBICULUM ET LUCUBRATIO—_The Sleeping-room and Studies by Night_

PLINIUS, EPICTETUS, CELSUS, DYDIMUS

In this dialogue Vives treats of two matters: in
the first place he describes night-studies with
adjuncts of time, causes, and subjects; then the bed,
its apparatus and adjuncts. The assisting causes
(_causae adjuvantes_) of night-study are lights, the
night-study gown, Minerva or Christ, table, bookcase,
reader (_anagnostes_), a scribe (_exceptor_), pens,
sand-case (_theca pulveraria_). The subjects are Cicero,
Demosthenes, Nazianzenus, Xenophon. The apparatus of
the bed consists in a mattress, a bolster, cushions,
sheets, coverlets, curtains, mosquito-curtain, hangings,
rugs. Adjuncts are—gnats, fleas, lice, bugs, a striking
clock, a folding seat, a pot, a lyre. The names of the
persons are aptly allotted, for they were the four most
learned and studious men, concerning whom Volaterranus
has written in his _Anthropologia_. Plinius wrote _De
Historia Naturali_, in xxxvii. books. He was the uncle
of the other Pliny whose letters are still extant.
The latter writes thus to Marcus, of his uncle: “He
was sharp-witted, of incredible studiousness, of the
highest vigilance, most sparing of sleep. After food
(which he used to take in the daytime, of a light and
easily digestible kind, according to the custom of the
ancients), if he had leisure, often in the summer, he
would lie in the sun. Then read his book, annotate it,
and make extracts. He never read without making extracts.
He was even accustomed to say that no book was so bad as
not to be profitable in some part of it. I remember once
when a reader had pronounced something wrongly, one of
his friends had the man called up and made him repeat
it, whereupon my uncle said: ‘You understood, forsooth?’
He nodded. ‘Then why have the passage recalled? We have
lost more than ten verses by this interruption.’ So great
was his economy of time. This, too, in the midst of his
labours in the noise of the town. Even in the retirement
of his bath he spent his time in studies. When I say the
bath, I speak of the inner parts of the house generally.
For whilst he was stretching himself or drying himself,
he used to listen to reading or to dictate. On a journey,
as if relieved from other cares, he occupied himself in
study only. At his side was an amanuensis with a book and
writing tablets, whose hands were furnished in winter
with gloves, so that by no roughness of weather should
any time be snatched from studies. For the same reason,
when at Rome, he was carried about in a chair. I recall
that I was reproved by him when I went for a walk. ‘Are
you not able,’ said he, ‘not to waste your time?’ For
he thought all time wasted which was not devoted to
studies.” For an account of his death, see an epistle by
the same writer to Tacitus.

Epictetus (as the epigram concerning him testifies) was
both a slave and lame. He was poorer than Irus.[55]
But in wisdom and equanimity of mind and constancy (as
records about him testify) he was admirable and almost
divine. But he was the servant of Epaphroditus the
freedman of the Emperor Nero. Celsus was a renowned
physician, whose works are still extant, whose excellent
_dictum_ was: “That many grave diseases are cured by
abstinence and quiet.”

Dydimus, the grammarian, on account of the almost
incredible number of books which he is said to have
written, is called χαλκέντερος, as if having intestines
of brass, _i.e._, he was remarkably patient and
indefatigable in labour. He (as also Origen) was
called Adamantinus. On this same matter _see_ Proverb:
Adamantinus and Chalcenterus and the lamp of Aristophanes
and Cleanthes.

I. _Studies by Night_

_Plin._ It is five o’clock in the afternoon. Epictetus,
shut me the window and bring me light. I will work with a
light.

_Epict._ What light do you wish?

_Plin._ For the time being, whilst others are present,
tallow or wax candles; when they have retired, take them
away and place here for me the lampstand.

_Cels._ What for?

_Plin._ For working.

_Time_

_Cels._ Don’t you study better in the morning? Then it
seems to me the season of the time and the condition of
the body invite study, since at that time there is the
least exhalation from the brain, digestion having been
completed.

_Plin._ But this hour is very quiet, when every one has
gone to rest and everything is silent, and for those who
eat at mid-day and morning it is not inconvenient. Some
follow the old custom and only eat one meal and that in
the evening; others merely at mid-day, according to the
advice of the new doctors; and again others both mid-day
and evening, according to the usage of the Goths.

_Cels._ But were there no mid-day meals before the Goths?

_Plin._ There were, but light meals. The Goths introduced
the custom of eating to satiety twice a day.

_Cels._ On that account Plato condemned the meal-times of
the Syracusans, who had two good meals every day.

_Circumstances Aiding Studies_

_Plin._ For that very reason you may conclude that people
like the Syracusans were very rare.

_Cels._ Enough of them! Why do you prefer to work with a
lamp than a candle?

_Plin._ On account of the equable flame, which less tries
the eyes, for the flicker of the wick injures the eyes
and the odour of the tallow is unpleasant.

_Cels._ Then use wax candles, the odour of which is not
displeasing.

_Plin._ In them the wick is more flickering and the
vapour is no more healthy. In the tallow lights the wick
is for the most part of linen and not of cotton, as the
tradesmen seek to make a profit on all these things by
fraud. Pour oil into this lamp, bring a candle and take
out the wick and clean it.

_Epict._ Notice how the lampblack sticks to the needle.
They say this is a sign of rain, in the same manner as we
find in Vergil:—

Scintillare oleum et putres concrescere fungos.[56]

_Plin._ Bring hither also the snuffers and clean this
candle. But don’t throw the black on the floor lest it
smoke, but press it into the snuffers-box whilst it is
held together. Bring me my dressing-gown, that long one
lined with skin.

_Cels._ I will provide you with your books. May Minerva
be favourable to you!

_Plin._ May Paul or, what I should rather have said, may
Jesus Christ, the Wisdom of God, be with me.

_Cels._ Perhaps Christ is adumbrated in the fable of
Minerva and that of the birth from Jupiter’s brain.

_Plin._ Place the table on the supports in the
sleeping-chamber.

_Cels._ Do you prefer the table to the desk?

_Plin._ At this time, yes; but place a small desk on the
table.

_Epict._ A self-standing one or a movable one?

_Plin._ Which you like. But where is the Dydimus of my
studies?

_Cels._ I will summon him thither.

_Subjects of Study_

_Plin._ Fetch also my boy-scribe. For I should like to
dictate something. Give me those reed-pens and two or
three feather pens, those with thick stalk, and the
sand-case. Bring me also from the chest the Cicero and
Demosthenes, and from the desk, the book in which I make
all my notes and important extracts. Do you hear? And my
extemporaneous MS. book in which I will polish up some
passages.

_Dyd._ I believe the MS. book is not in the desk but in
the chest, locked up.

_Plin._ Do you yourself search for it. And bring me the
Nazianzenus.

_Dyd._ I don’t know it.

_Plin._ The book is of slight thickness, sewn together
and roughly bound in parchment. Bring also the volume,
the fifth from the end.

_Dyd._ What is its title?

_Plin._ Xenophon’s _Commentaries_. The book is in
finished style. It is bound in leather with fastenings
and knobs of copper.

_Dyd._ I don’t find it.

_Plin._ Now I remember. I put it in the fourth case.
Fetch it. In the same case there are only loose sheets
and rough books just as they have come straight from the
press.

_Dyd._ Which volume of Cicero do you want, for there are
four?

_Plin._ The second.

_Epict._ It is not yet back from the book-gluer, who had
it, I believe, five days ago to glue.

_Dyd._ How do you like that pen?

_Plin._ On that point I am not very particular; whatever
comes into my hand I use it as if it were good.

_Dyd._ You have learned that from Cicero.

_Plin._ You just be quiet. Open me the Cicero. Look me up
three or four pages of the _Tusculan Questions_. Seek the
passages on gentleness and joy.

_Epict._ Whose verses are these?

_Plin._ They are his own translations of Sophocles. This
he does with keen pleasure and therefore often.

_Epict._ He was, I think, sufficiently apt in writing
verses.

_Dyd._ Most apt and facile, and, for his time, not
unhappy in his verse, contrary to what very many think.

_Epict._ But wherefore hast thou left off pursuing the
art of poetry?

II. _The Bed—Its Equipment_

_Plin._ I hope that we yet at times may take it up
again in leisure hours, for there is much alleviation
in it from more serious studies. I am already weary of
studies, meditation, writing. Stretch out my bed.

_Epict._ In which sleeping-room?

_Plin._ In the big square room. Take away the reclining
cushion out of the corner, and put it in the dining-room.
Place over the feather-bed another of wool. See also that
the supports of the bed are sufficiently firm.

_Epict._ What is it that is troubling you? For you don’t
lie on one part or other of the frame-work, but in the
middle of the bed. It would be more healthy for you if
the bed were harder and one which would offer resistance
to your body.

_Plin._ Take the head-pillow away, and instead of it put
two cushions, and in this heat I prefer that lightly
woven, to the linen, cloth.

_Epict._ Without bed-covering!

_Plin._ Yes.

_Epict._ You will get cold, for the body is exhausted by
studies.

_Plin._ Then put on a light covering.

_Epict._ These? And no more?

_Plin._ No. If I feel cold in bed, then I will ask for
more clothes. Take away the curtains, for I prefer a
mosquito-net for the keeping off of gnats, a net of fine
gauze (_conopeum_).

_Epict._ I have noticed but few gnats, though of fleas
and lice a pretty fair number.

_Adjuncts_

_Plin._ I am surprised that you notice anything
particularly, for you sleep and snore so soundly.

_Epict._ No one sleeps better than he who does not feel
how badly he is sleeping.

_Plin._ None of the insects with which we are troubled in
bed in summer disgust me so much as the bugs because of
their ghastly odour.

_Epict._ Of which there is a good supply in Paris and
Lyons.

_Plin._ At Paris there is a kind of wood which produces
them, and in Lyons the potter’s earth. Place my
alarum-clock here, and place the pointer for four o’clock
in the morning, for I don’t wish to sleep later. Take
my shoes off, and place here the folding-chair in which
I may sit. Let the chamber-crockery be set near the bed
on a foot-stool. I don’t know what it is that causes a
bad smell here. Fumigate with frankincense or juniper.
Sing to me something on the lyre as I go to bed after the
custom of Pythagoras, so that I may the more quickly fall
asleep, and my dreams may be the more peaceful.

_Epict._

Somne, quies rerum, placidissime, somne, deorum,
Pax animi, quem cura fugit, qui corpora duris
Fessa ministeriis mulces, reparasque labori.[57]

OVID, _Metamorph._ book xi. ll. 623–623.

XV

CULINA—_The Kitchen_

LUCULLUS, APICIUS, PISTILLARIUS, ABLIGURINUS

In this dialogue Vives describes the matters which
concern the kitchen. Nor is it any disgrace for a noble
youth to be able to call things, one by one, by their
right names, as also the interpreter of Aristophanes
thinks in the _Acharnians_:—

ἔστι δὲ τοῦτο ἀστεῖον καὶ πεπαιδευμένῳ ἀρμόξον, μήδε τῶν
κατὰ τὴν οἰκίαν σκευ ῶν τῆς καθημερινῆς χρείας, ἀγνοεῖν
τὰ ὀνόματα.[58]

The names of the interlocutors are aptly chosen, as is
always the case. Lucullus and Apicius are fit names of
men noted for luxury. As to Lucullus, see Plutarch in his
_Lucullus and Athenaeus_, book xii., who says that he:—

τρυφῆς πρῶτον εἰς ἅπαν Ῥωμαίοις ἡγεμόνα γενέσθαι.[59]

Also in Book iv. he says:—

τὸν’ Ἀπίκιον περὶ ἀσωτίᾳ πάντας ἀνθρώπους
ὑπερηκοντικέναι.[60]

Pistillarius and Abligurinus are fictitious names; the
former from the pounder of a mortar, and as if the
epithet for an obtuse man; the latter from a “licking
away,” as of a gourmand. This dialogue may be divided
into three parts, the management of the kitchen by
Apicius, his precepts, and songs.

I. _The Hiring of Apicius_

_Luc._ Are you an eating-house keeper (_popino_)?

_Apic._ I am.

_Luc._ Where do you work?

_Apic._ At the eating-house called the Poultry-Cock
(_galli gallinacei_). Do you want my services?

_Luc._ Yes, for a wedding.

_Apic._ Let me then hasten home, so that I may give
instructions to my wife how to treat the gourmandisers
(whom I know are not wont to be lacking in this city) and
their guests who are invited.

_Luc._ Do you hear? You will find me in the Stone
Street—in the shoemakers’ district.

_Apic._ I will soon be with you.

_Luc._ Very well. Get to your cook-shop.

II. _The Precepts of Apicius_

_Apic._ Hallo! Pistillarius and Abligurinus, make a fire
with big logs on the hearth under the flue, and let them
be as dry as possible.

_Pist._ Do you think you are at Rome? Here we have not
stalls for the sale of dry wood from which dry logs can
be got. But this which I have will be dry enough.

_Apic._ If you don’t get it dry enough, Abligurinus, you
will, by your work of blowing up the flame, lose your
eyesight.

_Ablig._ Then I shall drink so much the more freely.
Curse the wine!

_Apic._ Curse the water! For you shall not touch wine
to-day if I keep in my right mind. I am not going to let
you overturn the vessels, and break the small pots to
pieces, and ruin the food.

_Ablig._ This fire won’t burn!

_Apic._ Throw in a small bundle of sticks smeared in
brimstone, and kindling-wood, together with some chips.

_Ablig._ It is quite gone out.

_Apic._ Run across to the next house with the shovel and
bring us a great big firebrand and some good live coal.

_Ablig._ The master of that house is a metal-worker, nor
does he let a single piece of coal be taken from his
furnaces but he has his eye on it (_citius oculum_).

_Apic._ He is not a metal-worker, but a metal-cutter; go
therefore to the oven. What are you bringing there? This
is not a firebrand; it is rather a torch (_titionem magis
quam torrem_).

_Ablig._ They have not got burning coal.

_Apic._ What bad coal! You should rather call it turf.
Move these logs and stir the kindling wood with this
poker so that it may gather flame. Use the _pyrolabum_
(the tongs), you ass!

_Ablig._ What thing does that word signify?

_Apic._ _Forceps ignaria_ (tongs for the fire), a
_pruniceps_ (a fire-stirrer).

_Ablig._ Why do you give me words in Greek, as if there
were not Latin words for the things?

_Apic._ Are asses also grammarians?

_Ablig._ What wonder, since grammarians are certainly
_asses_.

_Apic._ Make an end of wrangling. I want some coals
or pieces of turf lighting for me on this hearth, for
cooking the cakes baked in earthen cups. Hang the bronze
vessel over the fire so that we can have plenty of hot
water. Then throw into the cooking-pot that shoulder
of mutton with the salted beef; add calf and lamb
flesh, and stir the cooking vessel on the fire. In the
_chytropus_[61] we will thoroughly boil the rice.

_Ablig._ What shall we do with the chickens?

_Apic._ They shall be cooked in brazen pots which are
lined with tin, so that they may have a more pleasant
taste. But don’t bring them too soon; the meat-spits and
the pans should be forthcoming about nine o’clock. Let
this pike play about in the water a little, then skin him.

_Ablig._ Are there to be meat and fish at the same meal?

_Apic._ Decidedly, according to the German fashion.

_Ablig._ And is this approved by the doctors?

_Apic._ It is not in accordance with the art of medicine,
but it will please the doctors. I thought this block of
a man (_stips_) was merely a grammarian; he is also a
doctor.

_Ablig._ Have you never heard of that question: Whether
there are in a city more doctors or fools?

_Apic._ Who has thrust you into the kitchen, when you are
such a salted herring (_saperda_)?

_Ablig._ My adverse fate.

_Apic._ Nay, what is quite clear,—it is thy sluggishness,
carelessness, voracity, thy throat and thy stomach, thy
degenerate and debased soul. Therefore must thou now
run about with naked feet, half-clothed, in old torn
garments which don’t cover you behind.

_Ablig._ What has my poverty got to do with you?

_Apic._ Nothing at all, and I should not like it to
concern me. But to work! And outside of work let us
have no more talk than necessary. Are my orders not
sufficient? Nothing apparently can be enough for you
in the way of closely laying down and insisting over
and over again on what is to be done. Give me my
cooking-trousers. I want to go out of doors, but I will
soon be back. Give me also, please, the olive-crusher
(_tudicula_), the badge of our art. This is my
thunderbolt and trident.

_Pist._ Hallo, Abligurinus, place those jugs on the
urn-table and wash this beef steadily, and give it a good
rubbing in the basin.

_Ablig._ Have you any other orders to give? One commander
is sufficient for one camp, but it does not seem to be
sufficient for one kitchen. Do it all yourself. You are a
sharper exactor of work than the master of the cook-shop
himself. For the future I won’t call you Pistillarius (a
pounder with the pestle), but a sharp sting (_stimulus
acutus_).

_Pist._ Nay, rather call me _Onocentron_ (the spur
of asses). Cut up then this calf’s flesh on this
flesh-board. Also powder the cheese so that we can
sprinkle it over this dumpling.

_Ablig._ How? With the hand?

_Pist._ No, but with the grater. Pour a few drops of oil
in from the cruse.

_Ablig._ Do you mean from this flask?

_Pist._ Place here the mortar.

_Ablig._ Which of them?

_Pist._ That brazen one with the pestle of the same metal.

_Ablig._ What for?

_Pist._ For grinding rock-parsley.

_Ablig._ This is done more satisfactorily in a marble
mortar with a wooden pestle.

III. _Songs_

_Pist._ Please sing us a song, as you are wont to do.

_Ablig._

Ego nolo Caesar esse,
Ambulare per Britannos,
Scythicas pati pruinas.[62]

FLORUS.[63]

Ut sapiant fatuae Fabiorum prandia betae,
O quam saepe petet vina piperque coquus.[64]

MARTIAL’S _Epigrams_, 13, 13.

_Pist._ Do you say the _Fabii_ or the _fabri_?

_Ablig._ On that point inquire of the bandy-legged
schoolmaster and you will get for your _Fabii_ and
_fabri_ a sound blow on the cheek or the back.

_Pist._ Is that the sort of man?

_Ablig._ He is a determined, courageous man, prompt with
blows. He compensates for the slowness of his tongue by
the swiftness of his hands.

_Pist._ Here, bring the beer-jug. My palate, throat,
gullet are parched with thirst.

_Ablig._

Et gravis attrita pendebat cantharus ansa.[65]

VERGIL, _Eclogue_, 6, 17.

Claudere quae coenas lactuca solebat avorum,
Dic mihi, cur nostros inchoat illa dapes?[66]

MARTIAL, _Epigram_, 13, 14.

Filia Picenae venio Lucanica porcae,
Pultibus hinc niveis grata corona datur.[67]

MARTIAL, _Epigram_, 13, 35.

_Apic._ Where hast thou thus learnt to ῥαψωδεῖν?

_Ablig._ Lately I served a schoolmaster in Calabria who
was a poetaster. He often used to give me no other meal
than a song of a hundred verses, in which he used to say
there was a wonderful savour. I, indeed, would rather
have had a little bread and cheese. There was, however,
enough water for the house, and we had permission to
drink from the well to our heart’s content. If I then
had gone hungry to bed, instead of food I chewed those
verses and digested them. Nor did there seem to me to be
any other remedy to drive away the keenness of hunger
(_bulimia_) than to betake myself to the art of cookery.

_Apic._ What services did you render that schoolmaster?

_Ablig._ Such as Caesar rendered to the Republic. I was
everything to him. I was his counsellor, though he had
nothing to advise about; he had nothing secret from me,
not even in his personal habits. I used to pour water on
his hand, which he never used to wash himself. I served
him as his treasurer.

_Apic._ What treasure had he?

_Ablig._ He had a few sheets of the trashiest poems which
the moths used to eat away and barbarian mice gnawed at.

_Apic._ Nay, say learned mice, since they bit their teeth
into bad poems.

XVI

TRICLINIUM—_The Dining-room_

ARISTIPPUS, LURCO

This dialogue is connected with the two following
dialogues. For this contains descriptions of the master
of a feast and his dining-room, the next of the banquet
itself, and the third, drunkenness. It has two parts—the
introduction and description (_narratio_). Triclinium is
so called from having three dining-couches (_lectus_).
For, of old, those about to breakfast or dine were
accustomed to arrange couches for lying on, for the most
part three. _See_ Castilionius in book 6; Vitruvius, cap.
5; Baysius de Vasculis. Aristippus was the disciple of
Socrates, from whom was derived the Cyrenaic teaching.
For he lived in ease, sumptuously, voluptuously. He
sought out every luxury of perfumes, clothes, women, and
counted life happy in so far as it was full of pleasure.

παριόντα ποτε αὐτὸν λάχανα πλύνων Διογένης
ἔσκωψε καί φησιν: εἰ ταῦτα ἔμαθες προσφέρεοθαι
οὐκ ἂν τυράννων αὐλὰς ἐθεράπευες. Ὁ δέ, καὶ σύ, εἶπεν,
εἴπερ ᾔδεις ἀνθρώποις ὁμιλεῖν, οὐκ ἂν λάχανα ἔπλυνες.[68]

DIOG. LAERT. i. 68.

I. _The Introduction (Initium)_

_Arist._ Why are you so late getting up and, indeed,
still half-asleep?

_Lurc._ I am surprised that I have waked up at all the
whole of this day, since yesterday we were eating and
drinking.

_Arist._ Nay, as it appears, you were simply gorging,
gourmandising, and overwhelming yourself with sumptuous
dishes and wine. But where was it you were thus loading
your swift-sailing ship?

_Lurc._ At the house of Scopas, at a banquet
(_convivium_).

_Arist._ Nay, rather, according to the manner of the
Greeks, call it a συμπόσιον than by the Latin word
_convivium_.

_Lurc._ One brawler aroused another to speech. Olives and
sauces pricked and pinched the sated stomach, and would
not let the appetite get wearied out.

_Arist._ Pray tell us all the courses so that by hearing
of them I can imagine that I was there, and as if I were
drinking with you, as that man who ate two great loaves
of bread in a Spanish inn, and enjoyed the exhalation of
a roasted partridge, in place of further viands.

_Lurc._ Who could tell all? This would be a greater
undertaking than to have bought the food, or prepared it,
or what would have beaten everything in difficulty, to
have eaten it all up.

_Arist._ Let us sit down here in this willow-plantation,
by the bank of this little stream, and, since we are
tired, let us talk of your yesterday’s dining out,
instead of other things. The grass will serve us for
bolsters. Lean on that elm-tree.

_Lurc._ On the grass? Won’t the moisture harm us?

_Arist._ How stupid! moisture, when the dog-star is
rising!

_Lurc._ Formerly I refused; now my mind desires to tell
you yet more than you ask. You inquire from me as to
the banquet; you shall also hear as to the host and the
dining-room. You asked that I would speak; I will do
so that, soon perhaps, you will ask, proclaim, command
silence, as was the case with the Arabian flute-player
who was induced to sing for an _obolus_, but was only
brought to silence by receiving three.

_Arist._ Say as much as thou wishest of the feast; I
shall not be pained by it, since we are now sitting in
a shady place, and the goldfinch there accompanies thy
narrative, or at least will bring harmony into it, as
the slaves with the flute did into the speech of C.
Gracchus.[69]

II. _Narration—Description of Scopas_

_Lurc._ What was that story?

_Arist._ When you have finished your account of the
feast you shall have the story of the _Gracchi_, of the
_graculi_,[70] and the _Graeculi_.

_Lurc._ We were going for a walk by chance across the
market (_forum_), Thrasybulus and I. We happened to have
got more leisure than is usual with us. Scopas joined
us. When he had made his first salutations, and started
a suave conversation, Scopas began earnestly to entreat
us that we would, on the next day, which was yesterday,
go to his house. First we excused ourselves, the one for
one reason, the other for another; I, on account of an
important engagement with a magistrate (_praetor_), a
very irritable gentleman. But Scopas, a man who likes to
boast of his wealth, began an elaborate speech, as if his
life were in question. What need of further words? We
said yes, so that he should not continue to worry us.

_Arist._ Do you know why he arranged the banquet?

_Lurc._ What was it, pray, do you suppose?

_Arist._ He is indeed himself a rich man, well provided
with silver, clothes, and house-provisions. But he had
bought three gilded silver phials and six cups. These
would have lost their value to him, had he not invited
some guests to whom he might show them. For he believes
that it is in the ostentation of wealth that its pleasure
consists. He is driven on to profuse expenditure by his
wife, who calls it magnificence.

_Description of the Dining-hall_

_Lurc._ Yesterday, then, about mid-day we came together
to his dining-room.

_Arist._ What kind of a lunch was it?

_Lurc._ In the open air, in the cool shade. All was
splendidly prepared, decorated, polished up. Nothing
was lacking in elegance, splendour, and magnificence.
Immediately on entrance, our eyes and souls were
exhilarated by the most beautiful and most pleasant
sights. There was a great sideboard, full of beautiful
vases of all kinds, of gold, silver, crystal, glass,
ivory, myrrh-wood; also others of more common material,
tin, horn, bone, wood, shell, or earthenware, in which
art lent a merit to the commonness of the material,
for there were very many pieces of embossed work, all
brightly cleaned and polished; the glitter almost
dazzled the eyes. You might have seen there two great
silver wash-hand-basins with gilded borders. The middle
part together with the ornaments about it were of gold.
Every basin had its outlet whose bung was gilded. There
stood there also another water-basin of glass, similarly
with gilded pipe, as well as an earthenware wash-basin
varnished with red _sandarach_,[71] a piece of work of
the Spanish city of Malaca. Besides, there were phials of
every kind and two silver ones for the most generous kind
of wines.

_Arist._ From my own experience I prefer flasks of glass
or of shells, which they call stone-ware.

_Lurc._ What are you to do? Such is the nature of man! He
does not in these things seek so much convenience as the
opinion of being thought rich.

_Arist._ These very rich people pretty often seem so to
others whilst to themselves they seem poor. So there is
no end of bringing forward, and presenting, to the eyes
of others, their possessions. Especially is this so with
those who have no other kind of skill in which they can
trust. But proceed.

_Lurc._ The border of the sideboard was covered with a
shaggy carpet brought from Turkey. At a distance from
the sideboard there were placed two small tables with
quadrants and silver orbs. Every one had his salt-cellar,
knife, bread, and napkin. Under the sideboard stood a
refrigerator and large wine-decanters. Then they had
various kinds of seats, settles, double-seats, benches,
and the seat of the lady of the house, arranged so as
to fold up, a noteworthy piece of work with silken
upholstery, and provided with a foot-stool.

_Arist._ Lay the table now, and unfold the napkins, for
my vitals cry out for hunger.

_Lurc._ The dining-table was large. It was inlaid with
ancient mosaic work. It had belonged to the Prince
Dicæarchus.

_Arist._ O old table, what a different master is yours
now!

_Lurc._ He had bought the table at an auction sale at a
sufficiently high price, only because it had belonged to
the prince, and he would thus have something that had
been his. Water is given for the washing of hands. At
first there are great mutual refusings and invitations
and yielding by turns.

_Arist._ The same thing happened in all this yielding
of dignity, when each one made himself of less account
than the other, and exalted the other with the haughtiest
courteousness, whilst in reality every one thought
himself more important than all the rest.

_Lurc._ But the host, by his own right, allotted the
seats. Grace was said by a little boy briefly and
perfunctorily, but not without rhythm:—

Quod appositum est et apponetur, Christus benedicere dignetur.[72]

Each one unfolds his napkin and throws it over the left
shoulder. Then he cleans his bread with his knife, in
case he did not think it had been sufficiently cleaned by
the servant, for it had been placed before him with the
crust taken off.

_Arist._ Did you sit in ease?

_Lurc._ Never with more ease.

_Arist._ You couldn’t get a poor lunch. For the eatables
had been supplied to redundancy, so far as ever the
market had them; this I know.

_Lurc._ In no place has this more certainly happened.
But the very abundance palled. The director of the table
busied himself with laying knives and forks. Then came
in, with great pomp, the chief steward with a long band
of boys, younger and older, who bore away the dishes of
the first course.

XVII

CONVIVIUM—_The Banquet_

SCOPAS, SIMONIDES, CRITO, DEMOCRITUS, POLAEMON

Concerning Scopas, _see_ Cicero, book 2, _de Orat._ As to
Polaemon, _see_ Val. Max. bk. 6, cap. 11. There are three
kinds of banquets, είλαπίνη, a magnificent and splendid
banquet; γάμος, a nuptial banquet; and ἔρανος, when each
guest came at his own expense and brought his own food.
Homer links together those forms of banquets: εἰλαπίνη ἠὲ
γάμος· ἐπεὶ οὐκ ἔρανος τάδε γ’ ἐστί (_Odyssea_, i. 226).

The parts of this dialogue are these: Initium, apparatus,
finis. Apparatus contains two courses.

COURSES

{ _Cibus_ { Panis { Carnes
{ { Obsonia { Pultes
{ { Pisces
FIRST { _Potus_ { Vinum
{ { Aqua
{ { Cerevisia
{ { Pocula

{ Fructus
SECOND { Casei
{ Tragemata

I. _The Beginning (Initium)_

_Scop._ Where is our Simonides?

_Crit._ He said he would come immediately after he had
met a debtor of his in the market.

_Scop._ He does rightly. He will more easily get away
from a debtor than he would from a creditor.

_Crit._ How is this?

_Scop._ It is as in a victory, the victor imposes the
conditions, not the vanquished. The debtor comes away
from the creditor when he will, the creditor when the
debtor is willing. But have you not all met, as you
arranged, and left the seriousness of home, bringing with
you cheerfulness, wit, grace, pleasantness?

_Crit._ Clearly these things are so, I hope, and we will
be as M. Varro advises, an agreeable company.

_Scop._ Let the rest be my concern.

_Crit._ Here is Simonides coming!

_Scop._ Happy event!

_Sim._ All prosperity to you!

_Scop._ We have keenly desired you!

_Sim._ Ah, how boorish it all is! But you see I was
invited to lunch, not for a period of detention in
business. But have I really kept you waiting long?

_Scop._ No, indeed not.

_Sim._ Why did you not set to the meal without me? At
least you could have begun with the fruit which I am not
much given to eating.

_Scop._ Courteous words, but how could we sit down
without you?

II. _First Course—Bread_

_Crit._ Enough of civilities. Let us begin our
description. The best and lightest of bread! It is as
light in weight as a sponge. The wheat is soft as a
medlar. You must have an industrious miller.

_Scop._ Roscius has the mill in his charge.

_Sim._ Is he never hurled into it?

_Scop._ Far be such a fate from such a thrifty servant!

_Dem._ Pass me the coarse bread (made of unbolted flour).

_Sim._ And me the bread made of the middle quality of
foreign wheat.

_Scop._ Why do you wish that?

_Sim._ Because I have both heard and found from
experience that I eat less when the bread has not a fine
taste.

_Scop._ Here, boy, bring him common bread, and even the
black bread if he prefers. We will have the most pleasant
of meals, if every one shall take what most pleases him.

_Pol._ This bread, which you praise so much, is spongy,
watery; I prefer it thicker.

_Crit._ I indeed don’t dislike it spongy—so long as
it isn’t hastily made. But this also has cracks such
as cakes baked on the hearth are accustomed to have,
although, as is sufficiently clear, this came out of the
oven.

_Pol._ This black bread is both sour and full of chaff;
you would say that it was from flour of second-rate wheat.

_Scop._ So our husbandmen are accustomed to do with all
wheat which they bring hither; first to make it pungent
with the common, and to mix it with all kinds of seeds;
the taste then comes from the leaven being excessive.

_Pol._ No class of men are more deceptive than
husbandmen. They only act wrongly through ignorance.

_Crit._ This bread is not sufficiently fermented.

_Dem._ For to-day think thyself a Jew, one of those who,
by the ordinance of God, only feed on bread which is
unleavened.

_Crit._ And this, indeed, was because they were such very
bad men that the eating of swine was forbidden them,
than which nothing is more pleasing to the palate; nor
if taken moderately is anything more healthful. With
unleavened bread sauces must be eaten together with field
lettuce, which is extremely bitter.

_Pol._ All this has too much depth of meaning. Let us
leave the subject.

_Scop._ Yes, indeed, and the whole discussion about
bread! If there is so much difference of opinion about
what is eaten with bread, how much discord there will be
over every part of the menu of the whole meal!

_Crit._ It happens, forsooth, as Horace says:—

Tres mihi convivae prope dissentire videntur,
Poscentes vario multum diversa palato.[73]

_Fruits_

_Scop._ Bring those dishes and plates with the cherries,
plums, pomegranates, ripe fruit, and early ripe fruit.

_Pol._ Why did Varro say that the number of guests ought
not to exceed the number of the Muses, when the number
of the Muses is not settled? For some put the number at
three; others six; others nine.

_Crit._ He spoke as if it were established that
there were nine, and so it was commonly accepted.
Whence Diogenes made his joke at the expense of the
schoolmaster, who had only a small number of scholars in
the school, whilst he had the Muses painted on the walls.
The master, said he, has many scholars, if you reckon in
the Muses (σὺν ταῖς μοῦσαις).

_Dem._ But is it true that the Persians introduced into
Greece the fruit which they regarded as so deadly as to
be a pestilence to those against whom they were waging
war?

_Crit._ So I have heard.

_Dem._ How wonderful is the variety of products in the
different nature of soils!

_Crit._ India sends ivory, says Vergil,[74] the
effeminate Sabaeans their frankincense. Oh! look at those
Persian quinces!

_Sim._ This is a new kind of grafting which the ancients
did not know of. Reach me the bowl with the hard-skinned
figs, which are, as you know, early ripe.

_Scop._ Enough of the fruits! Let us be filled with more
healthful foods of the body.

_Crit._ What is, then, healthier?

_Scop._ Nothing, if to be health-giving and of good
taste are the same thing as in a mid-day dream.

_Crit._ I forgive fruits their harmfulness on account of
their pleasantness of taste.

_Meats_

_Scop._ Do you remember the verse of Cato?

Pauca voluptati debentur; plura saluti.[75]

Give every one a platter of meat with sauce, so that he
may swallow it down, and this will warm the intestines
and pleasantly wash and so soften the body.

_Sim._ Here, boy, give me at once some salted pork. Oh!
most savoury leg of pork! It is a barrow-hog. If you can
hear what I say, return the cabbage and bacon, to the
cook, at this season of the year, or preserve it till the
winter. Cut me a couple of bits off this sausage, so that
the first cup of wine may taste the sweeter.

_Crit._ Let us follow the advice of physicians that wine
be taken with pork. Pour out wine.

_Wine_

_Scop._ Now follows action after talk. Surely this is
wisest at this time of the year. Look at the necessary
preparations for our drinking wine. First of all the
keeper of the sideboard (_custos abaci_) has set out
the cups of brightest crystal glass with purest white
wine; you would think it water by its mere appearance. It
is San Martin wine and partly Rhein wine, but not mixed
as they are accustomed to drink it in Belgium, but such
as they drink in mid-Germany. The wine-seller to-day
has tapped two casks, one of yellow Helvell from the
neighbourhood of Paris, and one of blood-red Bordeaux.
Others are in readiness kept cool, dark (_fuscus_) from
Aquitaine and black from Saguntum. Let every one choose
according to his liking.

_Crit._ What suggestion could be more delightful? as
nothing is harder fortune than to perish of thirst.
For myself I should prefer that you had set before
us the best water. I would rather have heard such an
announcement than that of the wines.

_Scop._ Nor shall that be lacking.

_Sim._ Lately when I was in Rome, I drank at a cardinal’s
house, the noblest wines of every flavour; sweet, sharp,
mild, fruity, and tart. I was indeed extremely friendly
with the wine-cellarer.

_Dem._ I dearly like fiery wine.

_Pol._ So also do Belgian women. In some places in France
they offer you the dregs of wine. They most delight in
two and three year old vintage. But these are rather
sampling of wine than real wine-drinking, and French
wine especially bears neither the addition of water nor
years. Therefore soon after it is racked off it is drunk.
Indeed, in a year it begins to get worse, and becomes
uncertain, then its flavour escapes and it becomes sour.
Had it been kept longer it would become mouldy and flat.
The Spanish and Italian wines, on the other hand, improve
with age, and with the addition of water.

_Dem._ What do you mean by wine getting “flat”? The casks
become shrunken, the wine is enclosed in cells, and the
casing of the cask falls in, if need be.

_Pol._ Like as fruit gets uneatable through decay by age
and does not keep, and, as we say commonly, goes bad. The
opposite term is “still wine” (_consistens_).

_Dem._ Pour me first a half-cupful of water and then pour
in the wine, after the old custom.

_Crit._ Nay, to-day’s custom is yet the same with many
people, the French and Germans being exceptions.

_Dem._ The nations who drink water with wine pour wine to
the water; those who will drink wine watered, pour water
on to the wine.

_Crit._ And what do those drink who mix no water with
their wine?

_Dem._ Pure, unmixed wine.

_Crit._ That is, if the wine-dealer did not first water
it himself.

_Pol._ They call that baptising it, so that the wine
should be Christian. This was in my time a fine,
philosophical way of speaking.

_Dem._ They baptise the wine, and themselves are
unbaptised (_i.e._, unwatered or unwashed).

_Pol._ They do worse to wine who add chalk, sulphur,
honey, alum, and other more noisome things than which
nothing is more pernicious to one’s body. Against such
people the state ought to proceed as against robbers or
assassins. For thence are incredible kinds of diseases
and especially gout.

_Crit._ By conspiracy with physicians they can do this.
Then both share the profit.

_Dem._ The cup you reach to me is too full. Empty it a
little, I beg, so that there may be a space for water.

_Drinking_

_Crit._ Pour me wine in that chestnut-coloured cup. What
is that?

_Scop._ A great Indian nut, surrounded with a silver
edge. Won’t you drink out of that bowl of ebony wood?
They say that this is the healthiest. But don’t give me
too much water. Don’t you know the old proverb: “You
spoil wine when you pour water into it”?

_Dem._ Yes, then you spoil both the water and the wine.

_Pol._ I would rather spoil both, than be spoiled by one
of them.

_Scop._ Would it not be pleasant, according to the Greek
custom, to drink out of the bowls and from the bigger
beakers?

_Pol._ By no means. You reminded us just now of the old
proverb. In my turn I remind you of the Pauline precept:
“Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess”; and that
of our Saviour: “And take heed to yourselves lest at
any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and
drunkenness.”

_Water_

_Crit._ Whence is this cold water, so pure and pellucid?

_Scop._ Out of the spring near by here.

_Crit._ Rather than mixing of wine I prefer cistern
water, if it is thoroughly pure.

_Dem._ What do you think of spring-drawn water?

_Crit._ It is more appropriate for washing purposes than
for drinking.

_Pol._ Very many people commend flowing water.

_Crit._ And quite rightly if the streams flow through
gold veins, as in Spain, and the water is peaceful and
clear.

_Beer_

_Sim._ Bring me in that Samian phial some beer which, in
this heat, should be very good for refreshing one’s body.

_Scop._ Which sort of beer will you have?

_Sim._ The lightest you have, for other kinds muddle the
mind too much and make the body too fat.

_Pol._ Give me some also, but in the round glass.

_Scop._ Run to the kitchen and see what they are waiting
for. Why don’t they send another course? You see that
already no one further tastes of this. Bring young cocks
cooked with lettuce, garden oxtongue, and endive; also
mutton and calf’s flesh.

_Crit._ Add also a little mustard or rock-parsley in
small dishes.

_Dem._ Mustard seems to me a strong (_violenta_) food.

_Crit._ It is not suitable for bilious people, but is not
without its usefulness for those who abound in thick and
cold humours.

_Pol._ Therefore are the countries of northern latitudes
wise in using it, for whom it is of great service,
especially with thick and hard food, _e.g._, with beef
and salted fish.

_Pottage_

_Scop._ In this place, I think broth and rice come
seasonably, also ash-coloured bread, fine wheaten bread,
starch-food, rice, “little worms” (_vermiculi_). Let
every one take according to his taste.

_Dem._ I have seen those who shuddered terribly at
“little worms” because they believed they were out of the
earth and from mud, and had previously been alive.

_Crit._ Such people deserve to have these “worms” come to
life again in their stomachs. They say that rice is born
in water and dies in wine. Give me, therefore, wine.

_Dem._ Drink not immediately after warm food. Eat first
something cold and solid.

_Crit._ What?

_Dem._ A crust of bread, or a rissole or two of meat.

_Fish_

_Sim._ Bah! fish and meat at the same sitting! To mix
earth and sea. This is forbidden by physicians.

_Scop._ Nay, rather physicians are pleased by it.

_Sim._ I think it is because it is profitable to them.

_Scop._ Why, then, do the physicians forbid it?

_Sim._ I have made a mistake. I ought to have said
that it is prohibited by the art of medicine, not by
physicians. But what sort of fish is this?

_Scop._ Place them in order. The first is roasted pike
with vinegar and capers, then turbot cooked with the
juice of pointed sorrel, fried soles, a fresh pike and
a _capito_ (large-headed fish)—the salted pike serve
for yourself—fresh roasted and salted tunny-fish, fresh
_maenae_ (small sea fish) fried, pasties, in which are
many bearded-fishes, _murenae_, and trout, with suitable
relishes, fried gudgeon and boiled lobsters and crabs.
Mingle with them dishes with garlic, pepper, mustard,
pounded up.

_Sim._ I will indeed speak of the fish, but not eat of
them.

_Crit._ If a philosopher begins to conduct a controversy
on fish, _i.e._, on a most uncertain, debatable question,
then let us have a bed set up, so that we can sleep here.

_Scop._ No one is worthy to even taste these dishes. Take
them away.

_Sim._ And yet formerly banquets at Rome were most
splendid and they were accustomed to say that sumptuous
ones were given which consisted entirely of fish.

_Crit._ Thus have times changed, although this custom
also lasts with some people.

_Birds_

_Scop._ Bring up roasted chickens, partridges, thrushes,
ducklings, teal, wood-pigeons, rabbits, hares, calf’s
flesh, kids, and sauce or flavours, vinegar, oil, fruit
penetrating in its medical properties, also citrons,
olives from the Balearic Islands, preserved, pressed, and
kept in pickle.

_Dem._ Are no Bethica (district of Spain) olives there?

_Scop._ Those from the Balearic Islands taste better.

_Crit._ What will happen to those big animals there, the
goose, the swan, the peacock?

_Scop._ Merely show them, and take them back to the
kitchen.

_Pol._ See there a peacock! Where is Q. Hortensius who
held a peacock for such a delicacy?[76]

_Sim._ Take the lamb-meat away.

_Scop._ Why?

_Sim._ Because it is unsound. They say it does not go out
by any other way than that it entered.

_Crit._ I have seen someone who swallowed olive stones
like an ostrich.

_Scop._ From what meat are those pasties made?

_Crit._ This here is stag’s flesh.

_Scop._ This is deer’s flesh; and that there, I believe,
is boar’s flesh.

_Crit._ I prefer the condiments to meat itself.

_Sim._ And that is clearly right, for spice renders the
sourest things sweet.

_Crit._ What is the spice of the whole of life?

_Dem._ An equable mind.

_Crit._ I can name something else, which is of larger
scope and more august.

_Dem._ What can be more important than what I have named?

_Crit._ _Pietas_, under which equanimity is included.
Moreover, “piety” is the most suitable and pleasant sauce
for all things hard and easy, and those things which lie
between these extremes.

_Scop._ Pour white Spanish wine in that beaker and bear
it round to the guests.

_Dem._ What are you preparing to do? When dinner is
finished, bring us some strong and generous wine. We can
afterwards drink something more diluted, if we wish to
take care of our health.

_Sim._ Thy counsel seems to me good, for it behoves us
to have colder food at the end of a meal, which by its
weight may thrust down the other food to the bottom of
the stomach, and may restrain the vapours from escaping
to the head.

III. _Second Course_

_Scop._ Take away those things; change the round and
square plates, and lay the second table (dessert). For
no one is anywhere further stretching forth his hand to
the dishes.

_Crit._ I have eaten so heartily from the beginning that
I have quite lost all further appetite.

_Dem._ I also have no more appetite, but I was led on by
the desire of the fruit dishes here, and so have eaten to
satiety.

_Pol._ I have eaten I don’t know how much fish. This has
repulsed all my appetite.

_Sim._ And is there so much of splendid dainties and
delicacies before us when there is no longer the desire
of eating? Pears, apples, and cheese of many kinds! The
most attractive to my palate is the horse-cheese.

_Crit._ I believe that it is not horse-cheese at all, but
Phrygian cheese from asses’ milk, such as is brought from
Sicily in the form of columns and squares. When one is
broken, it cleaves into layers or, as it were, sheets (of
paper).

_Dem._ This cheese is porous as if it were from England,
and will not in my opinion be pleasing to you.

_Crit._ Nor will this spongy Dutch cheese. This from
Parma is thicker and, as it seems, fairly fresh, and that
Penasellian (Spanish) will easily vie with it.

_Dem._ This cheese is not from Parma but Placentia.

_Crit._ It also is pleasant. Commonly the cheese dearest
to the Germans is old cheese, putrid, fried up and wormy.

_Sim._ He who eats such cheese is hunting for thirst and
he eats in order to drink.

_Scop._ The pastry-cook delays too long with his sweets.
Why does he not bring his tarts, his wine-cakes and
cup-cakes and the fried cakes made of a concoction thrown
into a vessel of boiling oil with honey poured over it?

_Crit._ Give me a few dates, both some to eat and some to
keep by me. Perhaps I shall to-night eat nothing else.

_Scop._ Then take the whole of this branch of them. Will
you have some pomegranates?

_Pol._ Here, boy, relieve me of these wild dates and give
me something eatable.

_Scop._ I advise you to drink. Don’t you know that it was
the opinion of Aristotle that the dessert was introduced
into meals to invite us to drinking lest the food should
be digested dry?

_Crit._ The discoverer must have been either a sailor or
fish to be so much afraid of dryness.

_Scop._ Take away those things which are ordinarily
called the seal of the stomach, because after them
nothing more is to be eaten or drunk, biscuits,
quince-cakes, coriander covered with sugar. But such food
must be chewed, not eaten. What remains from the portion
chewed must be spit out, for it is uneatable. Collect
the bits and what remains over in baskets; bring scented
waters, of rose, of the flowers of the healing apple
(citron), and of musk-melon.

IV. _End of the Banquet_

_Pol._ Let us return thanks to Christ.

_The Boy._

Agimus tibi gratias, Pater, qui tam multa ad hominum usus
condidisti: annue, ut tuo favore ad coenam illam veniamus
tuae beatitudinis.[77]

_Pol._ Now then let us return thanks to the host.

_Crit._ Well, you do it.

_Pol._ Nay, rather Democritus, who is strong on these points.

_Dem._ I cannot return thanks as in duty bound to thee, deserving well of the republic, for all has been confused by Bacchus, but I will recite what once Diogenes said to Dionysius; I have committed his speech to memory. If I have a lapse of memory or a faltering tongue you will forgive me after so great a soaking of drink.

_Scop._ Say what you will; it will be written in wine.