The Last of the Legions and Other Tales of Long Ago

s and strollers, for the Romans were so early-rising a people that many a Patrician preferred to see his clients at six in the morning. Such was the good r

much as a pretence of sleep come straight from his night of debauch into his day of business, turning wit

an summoned his chosen friends at the high palace on the Palatine. Now, having reached the portals of the house of Flaccus, they stood together under the pomegranate-fringed port

leman with yellow-shot angry eyes. "What had we? Upon my life, I have forgotten.

e to confess that he takes even less than he gives. At least they ca

mon drink of the carters at every wine-house on the country roads. I longed for a glass of my own rich Falernian or the mellow Coan t

r way. My Greek physician Stephanos has a rare prescription for a morning head

lemon-tinted liquid. The master of the house filled up a bitter aromatic bumper, and was about to drink it off when his hand was arrested by a sudden perception that something was much amiss in his household. It was to be read all around him-in the frightened eyes of the black boy, in the agitated face of

had left him in no mood for patience. "Why do you stand moping there? Stephanos, Vacculus, is anything amis

rd and mottled with anxiety, laid his hand

lord. It is for him to tell you the terribl

him in, and let him explain it hims

"Another minute, and I will have you dragged to the ergastulum, where, with your feet in the stocks

man stammered; "the Gre

ut worst of all-insufferable sacrilege!-her own beautiful nude body of glistening Pentelic marble, as white and fair as when the inspired Greek had hewed it out five hundred years before, had been most brutally mishandled. Three fingers of the gracious outstretched hand had been struck off, and lay upon the pedestal beside her. Above her delicate breast a dark mark showed, where a blow had disfigured the marble. Emilius Flaccus, the most delicate and judicious connois

as the especial mark of his breed. He had entered through the peristyle with a swaggering, rolling gait, as one who walks upon his own ground, and now he stood,

that your household was the best-ordered in

d to come under my roof," said the courtier. "This is ind

hat I would have a breath of morning air by coming down to you, and seeing this Grecian Venus of yours, about which you discoursed so el

, and this trouble was, as the Fates have willed it, brought forth by that very statue in which you have been gracio

his fierce eyes at the shrinking slaves. "You were always overmerciful, Emilius. It is the common talk that your caten? are rus

his place to tend the atrium," said Flaccus.

ter. "If it please you, sir, the mischi

! Who

oom to brush out the litter of the birds. His eyes fell upon the Venus, and in an instant he had rushed upon her and struck her two blows with his woode

while the Patrician's thi

the fellow

your honour, with th

her and summon

h his basting-ladle in his hand; the pompous nomenclator, who ushered the guests; the cubicularius, who saw to their accommodation; the silentiarius, who kept order in the house; the structor, who set forth the tables; the carptor, who carved the food; the cinerarius, who lit the fires-these and many more, half-curious, half-terrified, came to the judging of Datus. Behind them a chattering, giggling swarm of Lalages, Marias, Cerusas, and Amaryllides, from the laundries and the spinning-rooms, stood upon thei

e scavenger?" ask

up proudly. "Yes,"

this injury

, I

man's reply which compelled respect. The wra

ou do this

it was

ur duty to destroy yo

one eternal, and all else are sticks and stones. What has this naked harlot to do with Him to whom the great

ore the lions in the arena. As to argument, not all the philosophers of Rome can break them down. Before my very face they refu

uld C?sa

eopard which King Juba has sent from Numidia. This slave may give u

to him to think of any injury befalling them. Perhaps even now, if this strange fanatic would sho

give why it should not befall you, since you have injured th

a, and I am ready to do the same. It is true that I have injured your statue, but I am able to find you somethi

Emilius," he said. "I know his breed of old. He is r

ll hesitated. He woul

s, I have released you to show you that I trust you. I have no wish to do you any hurt if you

acknowledge my err

er forgiveness for the violence you have done he

before her," sa

g he tore the baton out of the hand of one of his guardians, leaped upon the pedestal, and showered his blows upon the lovely marble woman. With a crack and a dull thud her right arm dropped to the ground. Anot

d. "Are you wiser than your Emperor? Can yo

rom his brow. "He is yours, great

Emperor. "Now, Emilius, the night has been a merry one. My Ligurian galley waits by the river qu