me, and come down hand over hand without putting his foot on a rest.

He and Marcus built another crow's-nest thirty feet above the first.
They drew up the lumber by ropes, and Antoninus being sinewy and strong
climbed up first, and with thongs and nails they fixed the boards in
place, and made a rope ladder such as sailors make, that they could pull
up after them so no one could reach them. When the kind old Emperor came
to the villa they showed him what they had done. He said he would not
try to climb up now as he had a touch of rheumatism. But a light was
fixed in the upper lookout, drawn up by a cord, so they could signal to
the Emperor down at the palace.

Then Antoninus taught Marcus to ride horseback and pick up a spear off
the ground, with his horse at a gallop. This was great sport for the
Consul and the Emperor, who looked on, but they did not try it then,
but said they would later on when they were feeling just right.

And beside all this Aurelius Antoninus taught Marcus to read from
Epictetus, and told him how this hunchback slave, Epictetus, who was
owned by a man who had been a slave himself, was one of the sweetest,
gentlest souls who had ever lived. Together they read the Stoic-slave
philosopher and made notes from him. And so impressed was Marcus that,
boy though he was, he adopted the simple robe of the Stoics, slept on a
plank, and made his life and language plain, truthful and direct.

This was all rather amusing to those near him--to all except Antoninus
and the boy's mother. The others said, "Leave him alone and he'll get
over it."

Faustina was still fond of admiration--the simple, studious ways of her
husband were not to her liking. He was twenty years her senior, and she
demanded gaiety as her right. Her delight was to tread the borderline of
folly, and see how close she could come to the brink and not step off.
Julius Caesar's wife was put away on suspicion, but Faustina was worse
than that! She would go down to the city to masquerades, leaving her
little girl at home, and be gone for three days.

When she returned Aurelius Antoninus spoke no word of anger or reproof.
Her father said to her, "Beware! your husband's patience has a limit. If
he divorces you, I shall not blame him; and even if he should kill you,
Roman law will not punish him!"

But long years after, Marcus, in looking back on those days, wrote: "His
patience knew no limit; he treated her as a perverse child, and he once
sa