Читать книгу Yale Classics - Roman Classical Literature - Луций Анней Сенека - Страница 89

XXXIX.

Egnatius, spruce owner of superb white teeth,

Smiles sweetly, smiles for ever: is the bench in view

Where stands a pleader just prepar'd to rouse our tears,

Egnatius smiles sweetly; near the pyre they mourn

Where weeps a mother o'er the lost, the kind one son,

Egnatius smiles sweetly; what the time or place

Or thing soe'er, smiles sweetly; such a rare complaint

Is his, not handsome, scarce to please the town, say I.

So take a warning for the nonce, my friend; town-bred

Were you, a Sabine hale, a pearly Tiburtine,

A frugal Umbrian body, Tuscan huge of paunch,

A grim Lanuvian black of hue, prodigious-tooth'd,

A Transpadane, my country not to pass untax'd,

In short whoever cleanly cares to rinse foul teeth,

Yet sweetly smiling ever I would have you not,

For silly laughter, it's a silly thing indeed.

Well: you're a Celtiberian; in the parts thereby

What pass'd the night in water, every man, come dawn,

Scours clean the foul teeth with it and the gums rose-red;

So those Iberian snowy teeth, the more they shine,

So much the deeper they proclaim the draught impure.