ornelia if she would join
therein. Lentulus had ordered his freedmen not to deny her amusements;
anything, in fact, that would divert her from her morbid infatuation
for Drusus. The consul-designate had indeed reached the conclusion
that his niece was suffering some serious mental derangement, or she
would not thus continue to pursue a profitless passion, obviously
impossible of fulfilment. So Cornelia had every chance to make herself
a centre to those gay pleasure-seekers who were still at Baiae; for the
summer season was a little past, and all but confirmed or fashionable
invalids and professional vacationers were drifting back to Rome. For
a time all went merrily enough. Just sufficient of the Lucius
Ahenobarbus affair had come to the Baiaeans to make Cornelia the object
of a great amount of curiosity. When she invited a select number of
the pleasure-seekers to her dinner parties, she had the adulation and
plaudits of every guest, and plenty of return favours. Lucius
Ahenobarbus soon had a score of hot rivals; and Cornelia's pretty face
was chipped on more than one admirer's seal ring. But presently it
began to be said that the niece of the consul-designate was an
extremely stoical and peculiar woman; she did not enjoy freedom which
the very air of Baiae seemed to render inevitable. She never lacked wit
and vivacity, but there was around her an air of restraint and cold
modesty that was admirable in every way--only it would never do in
Baiae. And so Cornelia, without ceasing to be admired, became less
courted; and presently, quite tiring of the butterfly life, was thrown
back more and more on herself and on her books. This did not disturb
her. A levee or a banquet had never given her perfect pleasure; and it
was no delight to know that half the women of Baiae hated her with a
perfect jealousy. Cornelia read and studied, now Greek, now Latin; and
sometimes caught herself half wishing to be a man and able to expound
a cosmogony, or to decide the fate of empires by words flung down from
the rostrum. Then finally Agias came bringing Artemisia, who, as has
been related, was introduced--by means of some little contriving--into
the familia as a new serving-maid. Such Artemisia was in name; but
Cornelia, whose gratitude to Agias had known no bounds, took the
little thing into her heart, and determined to devote herself to
instructing an innocence that must not continue too long, despite its
charming naivete.

Thus the days