The Satyricon of Petronius ArbiterPetronius Arbiter
General
The Satyricon of Petronius Arbiter
Petronius Arbiter
Rome -- Fiction; Satire, Latin -- Translations into English
Nor had we sooner stuff'd our selves with the supper Gito had got for
us, when a more than ordinary bounce at the door, put us into another
fright; and when we, pale as death, ask'd who was there, 'twas
answer'd, "Open the door and you'll see:" While we were yet talking,
the bolt drop'd off, and the door flew open, on which, a woman with
her head muffl'd came in upon us, but the same who a little before had
stood by the country-man in the market: "And what," said she, "do you
think to put a trick upon me? I am Quartilla's maid, whose sacred
recess you so lately disturb'd: she is at the inn-gate and desires to
speak with ye: not that she either taxes your inadvertency, or has a
mind to so resent it, but rather wonders, what god brought such civil
gentlemen into her quarters."
We were silent as yet, and gave her the hearing, but inclin'd to
neither part of what she had said, when in came Quartilla herself,
attended with a young girl, and sitting down by me, fell a weeping:
nor here also did we offer a word, but stood expecting what those
tears at command meant. At last when the showre had emptied it self,
she disdainfully turn'd up her hood and clinching her fingers
together, till the joints were ready to crack, "What impudence," said
she, "is this? or where learnt ye those shamms, and that slight of
hand ye have so lately been beholding to? By my faith, young men, I
am sorry for ye; for no one beheld what was unlawful for him to see,
and went off unpunisht: and verily our part of the town has so many
deities, you'll sooner find a god than a man in't: And that you may
not think I came hither to be revenged on ye, I am more concern'd for
your youth, than the injury ye have done me: for unawares, as I yet
think, ye have committed an unexpiable abomination.
"For my part it troubled me all night, and threw me into such a
shaking, that I was afraid I had gotten a tertian, on which I took
somewhat to have made me sleep; but the god appeared to me, and
commanded me to rise and find ye out, as the likeliest way to take off
the violence of the fit. But I am not so much in pain for a remedy,
as that a greater anguish strikes me to the heart, and will
undoubtedly make an end of me, for fear in one of your youthful
frolicks, you should disclose what you saw in Priapus's chappel, and
utter the counsels of the gods among the people. Low as your knees, I
therefore lift my hands t'ye, that ye neither make sport of our
night-worship, nor dishonour the mysteries of so many years, which,
'tis not every one, even among our selves, that knows."
After this she fell a crying again, and with many a pittiful groan,
fell flat on my bed: when I at the same time, between pity and fear,
bid her take courage and assure her self of both; for that we would
neither divulge those holy mysteries; nor if the god had prescribed
her any other remedy fot her ague, be wanting our selves to assist
providence, even with our own hazard.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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