as airily wanton, 15
Sweets more privy to guard than e'er grape-bunch shadowy-purpling;
He, he leaves her alone to romp idly, cares not a fouter.
Nor leans to her at all, the man's part; but helpless as alder
Lies, new-fell'd in a ditch, beneath axe Ligurian ham-strung,
As alive to the world, as if world nor wife were at issue. 20

Such this gaby, my own, my arch fool; he sees not, he hears not
Who himself is, or if the self is, or is not, he knows not.

Him I'd gladly be lowering down thy bridge to the bottom,
If from stupor inanimate peradventure he wake him,
Leaving muddy behind him his sluggish heart's hesitation, 25
As some mule in a glutinous sludge her rondel of iron.

XXI.

Sire and prince-patriarch of hungry starvelings,
Lean Aurelius, all that are, that have been,
That shall ever in after years be famish'd;

Wouldst thou lewdly my dainty love to folly
Tempt, and visibly? thou be near, be joking 5
Cling and fondle, a hundred arts redouble?

O presume not: a wily wit defeated
Pays in scandalous incapacitation.

Yet didst folly to fulness add, 'twere all one;
Now shall beauty to thirst be train'd or hunger's 10
Grim necessity; this is all my sorrow.

Then hold, wanton, upon the verge; to-morrow
Comes preposterous incapacitation.

XXII.

Suffenus, he, dear Varus, whom, methinks, you know,
Has sense, a ready tongue to talk, a wit urbane,
And writes a world of verses, on my life no less.

Ten times a thousand he, believe me, ten or more,
Keeps fairly written; not on any palimpsest, 5
As often, enter'd, paper extra-fine, sheets new,
New every roller, red the strings, the parchment-case
Lead-rul'd, with even pumice all alike complete.

You read them: our choice spirit, our refin'd rare wit,
Suffenus, O no ditcher e'er appeared more rude, 10
No looby coarser; such a shock, a change is there.

How then resolve this puzzle? He the birthday-wit,
For so we thought him--keener yet, if aught is so--
Becomes a dunce more boorish e'en than hedge-born boor,
If e'er he faults on verses; yet in heart is then 15
Most happy, writing verses, happy past compare,
So sweet his own self