Carmina

Catullus

Catullus, Gaius Valerius. The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus. Burton, Sir Richard Francis, translator. London, Printed for the Translators, 1894.

  1. Never (so love me the Gods!) deemed I 'twas preference matter
  2. Or Aemilius' mouth choose I to smell or his . . . .
  3. Nothing is this more clean, uncleaner nothing that other,
  4. Yet I ajudge . . . . cleaner and nicer to be;
  5. For while this one lacks teeth, that one has cubit-long tushes,
  6. Set in their battered gums favouring a muddy old box,
  7. Not to say aught of gape like wide-cleft gap of a she-mule
  8. Whenas in summer-heat wont peradventure to stale.
  9. Yet has he many a motte and holds himself to be handsome—
  10. Why wi' the baker's ass is he not bound to the mill?
  11. Him if a damsel kiss we fain must think she be ready
  12. With her fair lips . . . .