Great Phoebus had drawn in his daily course,
And longer stretched the darksome hours of sleep.
The conquering Moon enlarged had her domain
And squalid Winter from rich Autumn now Usurped the throne.
To Bacchus the command Was 'Grow thou old!'
and the late vintager
Gathered the few last clusters of the grape.
You will probably understand me better if I say plainly that the month was October and the day the thirteenth. I cannot, however, be so precise about the hour - one can expect an agreement between philosophers sooner than between clocks but it was between twelve noon and one o'clock in the afternoon. `You're not much of a poet, Seneca,' I can hear my readers say. `Your fellow-bards, not content with describing dawn and sunset, work themselves up about the middle of the day too. Why do you neglect so poetical an hour?' Very well, then:
Phoebus had parted the wide heavens in twain
And somewhat wearily 'gan shake the reins,
Urging his chariot nightwards: down the slope
Of day the grand effulgence, waning, slid.
It was then that Claudius began to give up the ghost, but couldn't bring the matter to a conclusion. So Mercury, who had always derived great pleasure from Claudius's wit, took one of the three Fates aside and said: `I consider, Madam, that you are extremely cruel to allow the poor fellow to suffer so. Is he never to have any relief from torture? It's sixty-four years now since he first started gasping to keep alive. Have you some grudge against him and against Rome? Please let the astrologers be right for once: ever since he became Emperor they have laid him out for burial regularly once a month. However, they can't really be blamed for getting the hour of his death wrong, because nobody was ever quite sure whether he had really been born or not. Get on with the business, Clotho:
Slay him, and instead let a worthier rule.'
Clotho replied: `I did so wish to give him just a little longer, just enough time to make Roman citizens of the few outsiders who still remain: he had set his heart, you know, on seeing the whole world dressed in the white gown - Greece, France, Spain, even Britain. Still, if you think that a few foreigners ought to be kept for breeding purposes, and you really order me to put an end to him, it shall be done.' She opened her box and produced three spindles: one was for Augurinus, one for Baba, and the third for Claudius. `These are to die in the same year quite close to each other, because I don't want him to go off unattended it would be very wrong for him to be suddenly left alone, after always having had so many thousands marching before him and trailing behind him, and crowding up against him from either side. He will be grateful for these two friends of his as travelling companions.'
She spoke, and round the ugly spindle twined
The thread of that fool's life, then snapped it close.
But Lachesis, her tresses neatly prinked
And on her brow Pierian laurel set,
Plucks from a fleece new threads as white as snow
Which, as she draws' them through her happy hand,
Change hue. Her sisters at the marvel gaze. Not common wool,
this, but rich thread of gold,
That runs on, century by century,
Termless. They pluck; the fleeces with good will.
Rejoicing in their task, so dear the wool:
Nay, the thread spins itself, no task for them,
And as the spindle turns, drops silken down,
Passing Tithonus' lengthy count of years
(Aurora's husband) and old Nestor's count.
Phoebus attends, and from a hopeful breast
Chants as they work, and plucks upon his lyre
And otherwhiles himself assists the task.
Thus the Three Sisters hardly know they spin;
Too close intent on the sweet strains they hear,
And rapt with praise of their great brother's song,
They spin more than the fated human span.
Yet Phoebus cries: 'My Sisters, be it thus
Cut no years short from this illustrious life,
For he whose life you spin, my counterpart,
Yields not to me either in face or grace
For beauty, nor for sweetness in his song.
He is it, who'll restore the age of gold
And break the ban has silenced all the laws.
He is sweet Lucifer who puts to flight
The lesser stars; or Hesperus is he
Who swims up clear when back the stars return;
Nay, rather he's the Sun himself, what time
The blushing Goddess of the Dawn leads in
The earliest light of day, dispersed the shades
The Sun himself with shining countenance
Who pores upon the world, and from the gates
Of his dark prison whirls his chariot out.
A very Sun is NERO and all Rome
Shall look on NERO with bedazzled eyes,
His face ashine with regal majesty
And lovelocks rippling on his shapely neck.'
Apollo had spoken.
But Lachesis, who had an eye for a handsome man herself,
went on spinning and spinning
and bestowed a great many years
more on NERO as her own personal gift.
As for Claudius, they tell everyone to
Be of good cheer, and from these halls
Speed him with not impious lips.
And he really did bubble up the ghost at last,
and that was the end even of the old pretence
that he was alive.
(He passed away while listening to a performance given by some comedians,
so now you know that I have good cause to be wary, of the profession.) The last words that he was heard to utter in this world followed immediately upon a tremendous noise from the part of his body with which he always talked most readily. They were: `0 good Heavens, I believe I've made a mess of myself!' Whether this was actually so or not, I cannot say: but everyone agrees that he always made a mess of things.
It would be waste of time to relate what afterwards happened or earth. You all know, very well what happened. Nobody forgets his own good luck, so there's no fear of your ever forgetting the popular outburst of joy that followed the news of Claudius's death. But let me tell you what happened in Heaven; and if you don't believe me, there's my informant to confirm it all. First, a message came to Jove that someone was at the gate, a tallish man, with white hair; he seemed to be uttering some threat or other because he kept on shaking his head; and when he walked he- dragged his right foot.. He had been asked his nationality and had answered in a confused nervous manner, and his language could not be identified. It was not Greek or Latin or any other known speech. Jove told Hercules, who had once travelled over the whole earth and so might be expected to know all nations in it,
