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Juvenal’s third Satire (Lines 190-231 (Falling buildings and fire…

- - - - Line 193-4 we enhabit a Rome held up for the most part by slender props.
      - Line 195-6 they’ve covered some ancient yawning crack
      - Line 197-8 the place to live is far from all these fires, and all these panics in the night
      - Line 200 you’re unaware if the alarm was raised downstairs
- - - - Line 236-7 the endless traffic in narrow twisting streets, and the swearing at stranded cattle.
      - Line 239-240 the crowd gives way as the rich man’s litter, rushes by, right in their faces, like some vast Liburnian galley.
      - Line 243 as I hasten, the tide ahead obstructs me.
      - Line 244 the huge massed ranks that follow behind crush my kidneys.
      - Line 246 this man strikes my head with a beam, that one with a barrel.
      - Line 245 this man sticks out his elbow, that one flails with a solid pole.
      - Line 247-8 Legs caked with mud, I’m forever trampled by mighty feet from every side, while a soldier’s hobnailed boot pierces my toe.
      - Line 249-253 Do you see all the smoke that rises, to celebrate a hand-out? There’s a hundred diners each followed by his portable kitchen. Corbulo, that huge general, could scarce carry all those vast pots, with all the rest that the poor little slave transports, on his head. Fanning the oven, he runs along, his body held perfectly upright.
      - Line 254-261 Recently-mended tunics are ripped, while a long fir log judders as it looms near, while another cart’s bearing a whole pine-tree. They teeter threateningly over the heads of those people below. Now, if that axle breaks under the weight of Ligurian marble, and spills an upturned mountain on top of the dense crowd, what will be left of the bodies? What limbs, what bones will survive? Every man’s corpse wholly crushed will vanish along with his soul.
      - Line 264-267 The slave-boys bustle about on various tasks, while their master, is now a newcomer on the banks of the Styx, shuddering there at the hideous ferryman, without hope, poor wretch, of a ride over the muddy river, and no coin in his mouth for the fare.
- - - - Line 269-272 What a long way it is for a tile from the highest roof to fall on your head; how often a cracked and leaky pot plunges down from a sill; what a crash when they strike the pavement, chipping and cracking the stones.
      - Line 272-275 If you go out to dinner without making a will, you’re thought of as simply careless, dismissive of those tragic events that occur: there are many opportunities to die, as there are open windows watching you, when you go by, at night.
      - Lines 276-279 So I’d make a wretched wish and a prayer, as you go, that they’ll rest content with simply emptying their brimming pots over you. The impudent drunk’s annoyed if by chance there’s no one at all to set upon.
      - Lines 299-305 This is the freedom accorded to the poor: when their beaten, knocked down by fists, they can beg and plead to be allowed to make their way home afterwards with a few teeth left. And that’s not all we need to fear; there’ll be no shortage of thieves to rob you, when the houses are all locked up, when all the shutters in front of the shops have been chained and fastened, everywhere silent. And, ever so often, there’s a vagabond with a sudden knife at work.
- - - - Line 315-317 The beasts of burden are braying, the sun is setting. It’s time for me to leave; the muleteer has been waving his whip, to signal he’s been ready to go for a while.