Page:The Satyricon of Petronius Arbiter (1922), vol. 1.djvu/234

when Trimalchio presently called out, “Change your tune,” we had another surprise, for a slave, sitting at Habinnas’ feet, egged on, I have no doubt, by his own master, bawled suddenly in a singsong voice, “Meanwhile Æneas and all of his fleet held his course on the billowy deep”; never before had my ears been assailed by a sound so discordant, for in addition to his barbarous pronunciation, and the raising and lowering of his voice, he interpolated Atellane verses, and, for the first time in my life, Virgil grated on my nerves. When he had to quit, finally, from sheer want of breath, “Did he ever have any training,” Habinnas exclaimed, “no, not he! I educated him by sending him among the grafters at the fair, so when it comes to taking off a barker or a mule driver, there’s not his equal, and the rogue’s clever, too, he’s a shoemaker, or a cook, or a baker: a regular jack of all trades. But he has two faults, and if he didn’t have them, he’d be beyond all price: he snores and he’s been