ray after my custom. The particular god and the
precise material I left to his choice, my only stipulation being that
it should be made of wood. He therefore first attempted to work in
boxwood. Meanwhile, during my absence in the country, Sicinius
Pontianus, my step-son, wishing to gratify me,[22] procured some ebony
tablets from that excellent lady Capitolina and brought them to his
shop, exhorting him to make what I had ordered out of this rarer and
more durable material: such a gift, he said, would be most gratifying
to me. Our artist did as Pontianus suggested, as far as the size of
the ebony tablets permitted. By careful dove-tailing of minute
portions of the tablets he succeeded in making a small figure of
Mercury.

[Footnote 22: _gratum factum_ (Van der Vliet).]

62. You heard all the evidence just as I repeat it. Moreover it
receives exact confirmation from the answers given to you in
cross-examination by Capitolina's son, a youth of the most excellent
character, who is here in court to-day. He said that Pontianus asked
for the tablets, that Pontianus took them to the artist Saturninus.
Nor does he deny that Pontianus received the completed signet from
Saturninus and afterwards gave it me. All these things have been
openly and manifestly proved. What remains, in which any suspicion of
sorcery can lie concealed? Nay, what is there that does not absolutely
convict you of obvious falsehood? You said that the seal was of secret
manufacture, whereas Pontianus, a distinguished member of the
equestrian order, gave the commission for it. The figure was carved in
public by Saturninus as he sat in his shop. He is a man of sterling
character and recognized honesty. The work was assisted by the
munificence of a distinguished married lady, and many both among the
slaves and the acquaintances who frequented my house were aware both
of the commission for the work and its execution. You were not ashamed
falsely to pretend that I had searched high and low for the requisite
wood through all the town, although you know that I was absent from
Oea at that time, and although it has been proved that I gave a free
hand as to the material.

63. Your third lie was that the figure which was made was the lean,
eviscerated frame of a gruesome corpse, utterly horrible and ghastly
as any goblin. If you had discovered such definite proof of my
sorceries, why did you not insist on my producing it in court? Was it
that you might have complet