Like him who, pestered by his donkey's vice,
Got off and pushed it down the precipice;
For who would lose his temper and his breath
To keep a brute alive that's bent on death?
Yet one thing more: your fate may be to teach
In some suburban school the parts of speech,
And, maundering over grammar day by day,
Lisp, prattle, drawl, grow childish, and decay.
Well, when in summer afternoons you see
Men fain to listen, tell them about me:
Tell them that, born a freedman's son, possessed
Of slender means, I soared beyond my nest,
That so whate'er's deducted for my birth
May count as assets on the score of worth;
Say that I pleased the greatest of my day:
Then draw my picture;—prematurely grey,
Of little person, fond of sunny ease,
Lightly provoked, but easy to appease.
Last, if my age they ask you, let them know
That I was forty-four not long ago,
In the December of last year, the same
That goes by Lepidus' and Lollius' name.
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