Do not suppose for a moment that Catullus is speaking here of castrated he-goats, which would be against the sense of the word, one invariably used to designate entire he-goats. The sense is the same, but got at in another way. He says: “Do you believe that you alone have members fit to do the girls’ business? that all the others betray by their goatish breath their vile trade as _cunnilingues_ or _fellators_, and consequently the inertness of their mentulas, their feebleness, their inability for erection? You will better appreciate the sting of Atellane verse respecting Tiberius Cæsar: “An old buck licking the she-goats’ parts.” It was thought better to be taken for a fornicator than for a _cunnilingue_; in the first place, because your friends would not kiss you; Martial, VII., 94: “I had rather confront a hundred _cunnilingues_.” Suetonius, _De Illustribus Grammaticis_, ch. 23: “He (Remmius Palaemon) was passionately fond of women, so much so as to prostitute his mouth to please them, and it is said that he was one day rebuked in the following way by a man who in the throng could not contrive to avoid one of his kisses: “Master,” he said, “if you see a man in a hurry to get away, will you lick him off?” In the second place for fear of scaring away your guests. Aristophanes says of Ariphrades, in the _Knights_, 1285, 86: “Whoever does not execrate that man, may he never drink from the same cup with us”—lastly, for fear of letting it be plainly known how shrunken one was, and how miserable one’s member. Martial, III., 96: “You lick my mistress, but you do not enter her; yet you boast yourself adulterer and copulator!” Hence the _cunnilingues_ took no less care than the _fellators_ to hide the fetidness of their breath by means of essences and perfumes, Martial, VI., 55: “Always scented with cassia and cinnamon, and your skin darkened with perfumes from the Phœnix’ nest, you reek of the leaden jars of Nicerotus’ shop. You mock at us, Coracinus, because we are unscented. Rather than smell sweet like you, I’d not smell at all.” To remove every doubt as to Coracinus being a _fellator_ or a _cunnilingue_, we will quote _Epigr._ IV., 43, where he is expressly called a _cunnilingue_: “I did not say you were a cinede, Coracinus; I am not so rash and reckless. What I did say in a light, insignificant matter, one perfectly well known, that you will not deny yourself,—I said, Coracinus, you were a _cunnilingue_.” It was believed that Venus revenged injuries done to herself or to hers, not only by condemning the guilty to submit to be the passive party, but by turning them into _cunnilingues_. Hence the pathic tastes of Philoctetes: “With which the destitution of Lemnos inspired the heir of Heracles.” To use the very words of Ausonius, _Epigr._ LXXI; and by inflicting these tastes Venus is said to have avenged the wounds of Paris, Martial, II., 84: