Page:Juvenal and Persius by G. G. Ramsay.djvu/241

 What of Ventidius and Tullius? What made their fortunes but the stars and the wondrous potency of secret Fate? The Fates will give kingdoms to a slave, and triumphs to a captive! Nevertheless that fortunate man is rare—rarer than a white crow. Many have repented them of the Professor's vain and unprofitable chair; witness the ends of Thrasymachus and Secundus Carrinas. Him too didst thou see in poverty on whom thou, O Athens, hadst nothing better to bestow than a cup of cold hemlock! Grant, O Gods, that the earth may lie soft and light upon the shades of our forefathers; may the sweet-scented crocus and a perpetual spring-time bloom over their ashes; who deemed that the teacher should hold the place of a revered parent! Achilles trembled for fear of the rod when already of full age, singing songs in his native hills; nor would he then have dared to laugh at the tail of his musical instructor. But Rufus and the rest are cudgelled each by his own pupils—that Rufus whom they have so often styled "the Allobrogian Cicero."

Who pours into the lap of Celadus, or of the learned Palaemon, as much as their grammatical labours deserve? And yet, small as the fee is—and it is smaller than the rhetor's wage—the pupil's unfeeling attendant nibbles off a bit of it for himself; so too does the steward. But give in, 155