.17. Translation: "So long as youth is fresh
and age is far away."

CHAPTER XII: THE DIVINITY THAT DOTH HEDGE A KING

But ah! Maecenas is yclad in claye,
And great Augustus long ygoe is dead,
And all the worthies liggen wrapt in lead,
That matter made for poets on to playe.+

[188] MARCUS AURELIUS who, though he had little relish for them
himself, had ever been willing to humour the taste of his people for
magnificent spectacles, was received back to Rome with the lesser
honours of the Ovation, conceded by the Senate (so great was the public
sense of deliverance) with even more than the laxity which had become
its habit under imperial rule, for there had been no actual bloodshed
in the late achievement. Clad in the civic dress of the chief Roman
magistrate, and with a crown of myrtle upon his head, his colleague
similarly attired walking beside him, he passed up to the Capitol on
foot, though in solemn procession along the Sacred Way, to offer
sacrifice to the national gods. The victim, a goodly sheep, whose
image we may still see between the pig and the ox of the [189]
Suovetaurilia, filleted and stoled almost like some ancient canon of
the church, on a sculptured fragment in the Forum, was conducted by the
priests, clad in rich white vestments, and bearing their sacred
utensils of massive gold, immediately behind a company of
flute-players, led by the great choir-master, or conductor, of the day,
visibly tetchy or delighted, according as the instruments he ruled with
his tuning-rod, rose, more or less adequately amid the difficulties of
the way, to the dream of perfect music in the soul within him. The
vast crowd, including the soldiers of the triumphant army, now restored
to wives and children, all alike in holiday whiteness, had left their
houses early in the fine, dry morning, in a real affection for "the
father of his country," to await the procession, the two princes having
spent the preceding night outside the walls, at the old Villa of the
Republic. Marius, full of curiosity, had taken his position with much
care; and stood to see the world's masters pass by, at an angle from
which he could command the view of a great part of the processional
route, sprinkled with fine yellow sand, and punctiliously guarded from
profane footsteps.

The coming of the pageant was announced by the clear sound of the
flutes, heard at length above the acclamations of the people--Salve
Imperator!--