ed him--since all the
slaves seemed busy, and the poor house philosopher was often sent on
menial errands--to go to the _Forum Boarium_,[70] and bring back some
ribs of beef for a dinner that evening. Pisander went as bidden,
tugging a large basket, and trying to muster up courage to continue
his walk to the Fabrician Bridge, and plunge into the Tiber. In
classic days suicide was a commendable act under a great many
circumstances, and Pisander was perfectly serious and sincere in his
belief that he and the world had been companions too long for the good
of either. But the jar and din of the streets certainly served to make
connected philosophical meditation upon the futility and unimportance
of human existence decidedly unfruitful. By the time he reached the
cattle-market the noise of this strange place drove all suicidal
intentions from him. Butchers were slaughtering kine; drovers were
driving oxen off of barges that had come down the Tiber; sheep and
goats were bleating--everywhere around the stalls, booths, shops, and
pens was the bustle of an enormous traffic. Pisander picked his way
through the crowd, searching for the butcher to whom he had been
especially sent. He had gone as far as the ancient shrine of Mater
Matuta, which found place in these seemingly unhallowed precincts,
when, as he gazed into the throng before him, his hair stood as it
were on end, his voice choked in his throat, and cold sweat broke out
over him. The next moment his hand was seized by another, young and
hearty, and he was gasping forth the name of Agias.

[70] Cattle-market.

Chapter V

A Very Old Problem

I

Drusus had at last finished the business which centred around the
death of his uncle, old Publius Vibulanus. He had walked behind the
bier, in company with the other relatives of the deceased--all very
distant, saving himself. On the day, too, of the funeral, he had been
obliged to make his first public oration--a eulogy delivered in the
Forum from the Rostra--in which Drusus tried to pay a graceful but not
fulsome tribute to the old eques, who had never distinguished himself
in any way, except the making of money. The many clients of Vibulanus,
who now looked upon the young man as their patron, had raised a
prodigious din of applause during the oration, and Quintus was
flattered to feel that he had not studied rhetoric in vain. Finally,
as next of kin, he had to apply the torch to the funeral pyre, and
preside over