Perde 2
[Textpart 3]
Syrus, I say!
SYRUS
Go on; I shall still do that which I said.Still do that which I said: Perge porro, tamen istuc ago. Stallbaum observes that the meaning is: Although I’m going off, I’m still attending to what you’re saying. According to Schmieder and others, it means: Call on just as you please, I shall persist in sending Bacchis away.
CLINIA
Whether you may have another opportunity hereafter or ever again.
CLITIPHO
I’faith, that’s true. (Calling.) Syrus, Syrus, I say, harkye, harkye, Syrus!
SYRUS
He warms a little. (To CLITIPHO.) What is it you want?
CLITIPHO
Come back, come back.
SYRUS
Here I am; tell me what you would have. You’ll be presently saying that this, too, doesn’t please you.
CLITIPHO
Nay, Syrus, I commit myself, and my love, and my reputation entirely to you: you are the seducer; take care you don’t deserve any blame.
350
SYRUS
It is ridiculous for you to give me that caution, Clitipho, as if my interest was less at stake in this affair than yours.
Here, if any ill luck should perchance befall us, words will be in readiness for you, but for this individual blows (pointing to himself). For that reason, this matter is by no means to be neglected on my part: but do prevail upon him (pointing to CLINIA) to pretend that she is his own mistress.
355
CLINIA
You may rest assured I’ll do so. The matter has now come to that pass, that it is a case of necessity.
CLITIPHO
’Tis with good reason that I love you, Clinia.
360
CLINIA
But she mustn’t be tripping at all.
SYRUS
She is thoroughly tutored in her part.
CLITIPHO
But this I wonder at, how you could so easily prevail upon her, who is wont to treat such great peoplelSuch great people: Quos, literally, What persons! with scorn.
SYRUS
I came to her at the proper moment, which in all things is of the first importance:
for there I found a certain wretched captain soliciting her favors: she artfully managed the man, so as to inflame his eager passions by denial; and this, too, that it might be especially pleasing to yourself. But hark you, take care, will you, not to be imprudently impetuous.
365
You know your father, how quick-sighted he is in these matters; and I know you, how unable you are to command yourself. Keep clear of words of double meaning,Words of double meaning: Inversa verba, eversas cervices tuas. Inversa verba clearly means, words with a double meaning, or substituted for others by previous arrangement, like correspondence by cipher. Lucretius uses the words in this sense, B. i., l. 643. A full account of the secret signs and correspondence in use among the ancients will be found in the 16th and 17th Epistles of the Heroides of Ovid, in his Amours, B. i., El. 4, and in various passages of the Art of Love. See also the Asinaria of Plautus, l. 780. It is not known for certain what eversa cervix here means; it may mean the turning of the neck in some particular manner by way of a hint or to give a side-long look, or it may allude to the act of snatching a kiss on the sly, which might lead to a discovery. your sidelong looks, sighing, hemming, coughing, tittering.
370
CLITIPHO
You shall have to commend me.
SYRUS
Take care of that, please.
