SATIRE VIII.
Horace
_Priapus complains that the Esquilian mount is infested with the
incantations of sorceresses_.
Formerly I was the trunk of a wild fig-tree, an useless log: when the
artificer, in doubt whether he should make a stool or a Priapus of me,
determined that I should be a god. Henceforward I became a god, the
greatest terror of thieves and birds: for my right hand restrains
thieves, and a bloody-looking pole stretched out from my frightful
middle: but a reed fixed upon the crown of my head terrifies the
mischievous birds, and hinders them from settling in these new gardens.
Before this the fellow-slave bore dead corpses thrown out of their
narrow cells to this place, in order to be deposited in paltry coffins.
This place stood a common sepulcher for the miserable mob, for the
buffoon Pantelabus, and Nomentanus the rake. Here a column assigned a
thousand feet [of ground] in front, and three hundred toward the fields:
that the burial-place should not descend to the heirs of the estate. Now
one may live in the Esquiliae, [since it is made] a healthy place; and
walk upon an open terrace, where lately the melancholy passengers beheld
the ground frightful with white bones; though both the thieves and wild
beasts accustomed to infest this place, do not occasion me so much care
and trouble, as do [these hags], that turn people's minds by their
incantations and drugs. These I can not by any means destroy nor hinder,
but that they will gather bones and noxious herbs, as soon as the
fleeting moon has shown her beauteous face.
I myself saw Canidia, with her sable garment tucked up, walk with bare
feet and disheveled hair, yelling together with the elder Sagana.
Paleness had rendered both of them horrible to behold. They began to
claw up the earth with their nails, and to tear a black ewe-lamb to
pieces with their teeth. The blood was poured into a ditch, that thence
they might charm out the shades of the dead, ghosts that were to give
them answers. There was a woolen effigy too, another of wax: the woolen
one larger, which was to inflict punishment on the little one. The waxen
stood in a suppliant posture, as ready to perish in a servile manner.
One of the hags invokes Hecate, and the other fell Tisiphone. Then might
you see serpents and infernal bitches wander about, and the moon with
blushes hiding behind the lofty monuments, that she might not be a
witness to these doings. But if I lie, even a tittle, may my head be
contaminated with the white filth of ravens; and may Julius, and the
effeminate Miss Pediatous, and the knave Voranus, come to water upon me,
and befoul me. Why should I mention every particular? viz. in what
manner, speaking alternately with Sagana, the ghosts uttered dismal and
piercing shrieks; and how by stealth they laid in the earth a wolf's
beard, with the teeth of a spotted snake; and how a great blaze flamed
forth from the waxen image? And how I was shocked at the voices and
actions of these two furies, a spectator however by no means incapable
of revenge? For from my cleft body of fig-tree wood I uttered a loud
noise with as great an explosion as a burst bladder. But they ran into
the city: and with exceeding laughter and diversion might you have seen
Canidia's artificial teeth, and Sagana's towering tete of false hair
falling off, and the herbs, and the enchanted bracelets from her arm.
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