ors
would not open. He returned to his apartment; the guards had gone. Then
terror seized him. He was afraid to die, afraid to live, afraid of his
solitude, afraid of Rome, afraid of himself; but what frightened him
most was that everyone had lost their fear of him. It was time to go,
and a slave aiding, he escaped in disguise from Rome, and killed
himself, reluctantly, in a hovel.

"Qualis artifex pereo!" he is reported to have muttered. Say rather,
qualis maechus.

VI

THE HOUSE OF FLAVIA

It was in those days that the nebulous figure of Apollonius of Tyana
appeared and disappeared in Rome. His speech, a commingling of
puerility and charm, Philostratus has preserved. Rumor had preceded
him. It was said that he knew everything, save the caresses of women;
that he was familiar with all languages; with the speech of bird and
beast; with that of silence, for silence is a language too; that he had
prayed in the Temple of Jupiter Lycoeus, where men lost their shadows,
their lives as well; that he had undergone eighty initiations of
Mithra; that he had perplexed the magi; confuted the gymnosophists;
that he foretold the future, healed the sick, raised the dead; that
beyond the Himalayas he had encountered every species of ferocious
beast, except the tyrant, and that it was to see one that he had come
to Rome.

Nero was quite free from prejudice. Apart from a doll which he
worshipped he had no superstitions. He had the plain man's dislike of
philosophy; Seneca had sickened him of it, perhaps; but he was
sensitive, not that he troubled himself particularly about any lies
that were told of him, but he did object to people who went about
telling the truth. In that respect he was not unique; we are all like
him, but he had ways of stilling the truth which were imperial and his
own.

Promptly on Apollonius he loosed his bull-dog, Tigellin, prefect of
police.

Tigellin caught him. "What have you with you?" he asked.

"Continence, Justice, Temperance, Strength and Patience," Apollonius
answered.

"Your slaves, I suppose. Make out a list of them."

Apollonius shook his head. "They are not my slaves; they are my
masters."

"There is but one," Tigellin retorted--"Nero. Why do you not fear him?"

"Because the god that made him terrible made me without fear."

"I will leave you your liberty," muttered the startled Tigellin, "but
you must give bail."

"And who," asked Apollonius superbly, "would bail a man who