But if I still seem personal and bold, Perhaps you’ll pardon when my story’s told. When my good father taught me to be good, Scarecrows he took of living flesh and blood. Thus, if he warned me not to spend, but spare The moderate means I owe to his wise care, ’Twas, “See the life that son of Albius leads! Observe that Barrus, vilest of ill weeds! Plain beacons these for heedless youth, whose taste Might lead them else a fair estate to waste”: If lawless love were what he bade me shun, “Avoid Scatanius’ slough,” his words would run: “Wise men,” he’d add, “the reason will explain Why you should follow this, from that refrain: For me, if I can train you in the ways Trod by the worthy folks of earlier days, And, while you need direction, keep your name And life unspotted, I’ve attained my aim: When riper years have seasoned brain and limb, You’ll drop your corks, and like a Triton swim.”[67] The fifth _Satire_ is an account of the journey to Brundusium in the train of Mæcenas with Virgil, Varius, and others; the sixth, again addressed to Mæcenas, tells us how the poet became acquainted with the great man, reverts to his father’s attentive care, and declares that Horace has no reason to be ashamed of his origin or discontented with his lot. The seventh tells of a joke in a lawsuit between Publius Rupilius Rex and a banker, Persius; the eighth, of some interrupted magic rites before a statue of the god Priapus; and the ninth, of the poet’s ineffectual efforts to get rid of a bore, who stuck to him until he was dragged off to the court by a plaintiff. In the tenth _Satire_, which serves as an epilogue to the collection, Horace returns to his criticism of Lucilius, maintaining that what he had said in the fourth _Satire_ was really not too severe, and at the same time he expresses his opinion of some of the other Roman poets and of his own ability: No hand can match Fundanus at a piece Where slave and mistress clip an old man’s fleece; Pollio in buskins chants the deeds of kings; Varius outsoars us all on Homer’s wings; The Muse that loves the woodland and the farm To Virgil lends her gayest, tenderest charm. For me, this walk of satire, vainly tried By Atacinus and some few beside, Best suits my gait; yet readily I yield To him who first set footstep on that field, Nor meanly seek to rob him of the bay That shows so comely on his locks of gray.[68] [Sidenote: The Epodes.] The _Epodes_ were written in the same period as the first book of _Satires_, and, like them, are on various subjects. About 31 B. C. Horace yielded to the persuasions of Mæcenas and published a collection of seventeen pieces which he had written at various times since 40 B. C. The first ten are in the _epodic_ metre, that is, an iambic trimeter followed by an iambic dimeter, as in the lines: