Mindful of who thus helped him at a pinch,
Archangelus Procurator Pauperum—
And proved Hortensius Redivivus!
To earn the Est-est, merit the minced herb
That mollifies the liver’s leathery slice,
With here a goose-foot, there a cock’s-comb stuck,
Cemented in an element of cheese! (120)
I doubt if dainties do the grandsire good:
Last June he had a sort of strangling … bah!
He’s his own master, and his will is made.
So, liver fizz, law flit and Latin fly
As we rub hands o’er dish by way of grace!
May I lose cause if I vent one word more
Except,—with fresh-cut quill we ink the white,—
P-r-o-pro Guidone et Sociis. There!
What? Duxit in uxorem?—commonplace! (130)
Tædas jugales iniit, subiit,—ha!
He underwent the matrimonial torch?
Connubio stabili sibi junxit,—hum!
In stable bond of marriage bound his own?
That’s clear of any modern taint: and yet …
He shall attack me Terence with the dawn,
Shall Cinuccino! Mum, mind business, Sir!
Thus circumstantially evolve we facts,
Ita se habet ideo series facti: (140)
He wedded,—ah, with owls for augury!
Nupserat, heu sinistris avibus,
One of the blood Arezzo boasts her best,
Dominus Guido, nobili genere ortus,
Pompiliœ. …
Curb we this ardour! Notes alone, to-day,
The speech to-morrow and the Latin last:
Such was the rule in Farinacci’s time.
Indeed I hitched it into verse and good.
Unluckily, law quite absorbs a man, (150)
Or else I think I too had poetised.
“Law is the pork substratum of the fry,
“Goose- foot and cock’s-comb are Latinity,”—
And in this case, if circumstance assist,
We’ll garnish law with idiom, never fear!
Out-of-the-way events extend our scope:
For instance, when Bottini brings his charge,
“That letter which you say Pompilia wrote,
“To criminate her parents and herself
“And disengage her husband from the coil,— (160)
“That, Guido Franceschini wrote, say we:
“Because Pompilia could nor read nor write,
“Therefore he pencilled her such letter first,
“Then made her trace in ink the same again.”
—Ha, my Bottini, have I thee on hip?
How will he turn this nor break Tully’s pate?
“Existimandum” (don’t I hear the dog!)
“Quod Guido designaverit elementa
“Dictæ epistolæ, quæ fuerint
“(Superinducto ab ea calamo) (170)
“Notata atramento”—there’s a style!—
“Quia ipsa scribere nesciebat.” Boh!
Now, my turn! Either, Insulse!—I outburst,
Stupidly put! Inane is the response,
Inanis est responsio, or the like—
To-wit, that each of all those characters,
Quod singula elementa epistolæ,
Had first of all been traced for her by him,
Fuerant per eum prius designata,
And then, the ink applied a-top of that, (180)
Et deinde, superinducto calamo,
The piece, she says, became her handiwork,
Per eam, efformata, ut ipsa asserit.
Inane were such response! (a second time:)
Her husband outlined her the whole, forsooth?
Vir ejus lineabat epistolam?
What, she confesses that she wrote the thing,
Fatetur eam scripsisse, (scorn that scathes!)
That she might pay obedience to her lord?
Ut viro obtemperaret, apices (190)
(Here repeat charge with proper varied phrase)
Eo designante, ipsaque calamum
Super inducente? By such argument,
Ita pariter, she seeks to show the same,
(Ay, by Saint Joseph and what saints you please)
Epistolam ostendit, medius fidius,
No voluntary deed but fruit of force!
Non voluntarie sed coacte scriptam!
That’s the way to write Latin, friend my Fisc!
Bottini is a beast, one barbarous: (200)
Look out for him when he attempts to say
“Armed with a pistol, Guido followed her!”
Will not I be beforehand with my Fisc,
Cut away phrase by phrase from underfoot!
Guido Pompiliam—Guido thus his wife
Following with igneous engine, shall I have?
Armis munitus igneis persequens—
Arma sulphurea gestans, sulphury arms,
Or, might one style a pistol—popping-piece?
Armatus breviori sclopulo? (210)
We’ll let him have been armed so, though it make
Somewhat against us: I had thought to own—
Provided with a simple travelling-sword,
Ense solummodo viatorio
Instructus: but we’ll grant the pistol here:
Better we lost the cause than lacked the gird
At the Fisc’s Latin, lost the Judge’s laugh!
It’s Venturini that decides for style.
Tommati rather goes upon the law.
So, as to law,— (220)
To level the fellow,—don’t I know his trick!
How he draws up, ducks under, twists aside!
He’s a lean-gutted hectic rascal, fine
As pale-haired red-eyed ferret which pretends
’Tis ermine, pure soft snow from tail to snout.
He eludes law by piteous looks aloft,
Lets Latin glance off as he makes appeal
To the saint that’s somewhere in the ceiling-top,—
Do you suppose that I don’t see the beast? (230)
Plague of the ermine-vermin! For it takes,
It takes, and here’s the fellow Fisc, you see,
And Judge, you’ll not be long in seeing next!
Confound the fop—he’s now at work like me:
Enter his study, as I seem
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