o the hands of robbers, they spared
him on account of the celebrity his name had acquired.

He was so luxurious, that he took the bath many times in a day; nor did
his means suffice for his extravagance, although his school brought him
in forty thousand sesterces yearly, and he received not much less from
his private estate, which he managed with great care. He also kept a
broker's shop for the sale of old clothes; and it is well known that a
vine [901], he planted himself, yielded three hundred and fifty bottles
of wine. But the greatest of all his vices was his unbridled
licentiousness in his commerce with women, which he carried to the utmost
pitch of foul indecency [902]. They tell a droll story of some one who
met him in a crowd, and upon his offering to kiss him, could not escape
the salute, "Master," said he, "do you want to mouth every one you meet
with in a hurry?"

XXIV. MARCUS VALERIUS PROBUS, of Berytus [903], after long aspiring to
the rank of centurion, being at last tired of waiting, devoted himself to
study. He had met with some old authors at a bookseller's shop in the
provinces, where the memory of ancient times still lingers, and is not
quite forgotten, as it is at Rome. Being anxious carefully to reperuse
these, and afterwards to make acquaintance with other works of the same
kind, he found himself an object of contempt, and was laughed (523) at
for his lectures, instead of their gaining him fame or profit. Still,
however, he persisted in his purpose, and employed himself in correcting,
illustrating, and adding notes to many works which he had collected, his
labours being confined to the province of a grammarian, and nothing more.
He had, properly speaking, no scholars, but some few followers. For he
never taught in such a way as to maintain the character of a master; but
was in the habit of admitting one or two, perhaps at most three or four,
disciples in the afternoon; and while he lay at ease and chatted freely
on ordinary topics, he occasionally read some book to them, but that did
not often happen. He published a few slight treatises on some subtle
questions, besides which, he left a large collection of observations on
the language of the ancients.

LIVES OF EMINENT RHETORICIANS.

(524)

I. Rhetoric, also, as well as Grammar, was not introduced amongst us
till a late period, and with still more difficulty, inasmuch as we find
that, at times, the practice of it was even