employed in smoothing her hair
and adjusting her dress, 'if ye are all good friends again, I recommend
you to be quiet and orderly; for some young noblemen, your patrons and
backers, have sent to say they will come here to pay you a visit: they
wish to see you more at their ease than at the schools, before they make
up their bets on the great fight at the amphitheatre. So they always
come to my house for that purpose: they know we only receive the best
gladiators in Pompeii--our society is very select--praised be the gods!'

'Yes,' continued Burbo, drinking off a bowl, or rather a pail of wine,
'a man who has won my laurels can only encourage the brave. Lydon,
drink, my boy; may you have an honorable old age like mine!'

'Come here,' said Stratonice, drawing her husband to her affectionately
by the ears, in that caress which Tibullus has so prettily
described--'Come here!'

'Not so hard, she-wolf! thou art worse than the gladiator,' murmured the
huge jaws of Burbo.

'Hist!' said she, whispering him; 'Calenus has just stole in, disguised,
by the back way. I hope he has brought the sesterces.'

'Ho! ho! I will join him, said Burbo; 'meanwhile, I say, keep a sharp
eye on the cups--attend to the score. Let them not cheat thee, wife;
they are heroes, to be sure, but then they are arrant rogues: Cacus was
nothing to them.'

'Never fear me, fool!' was the conjugal reply; and Burbo, satisfied with
the dear assurance, strode through the apartment, and sought the
penetralia of his house.

'So those soft patrons are coming to look at our muscles,' said Niger.
'Who sent to previse thee of it, my mistress?'

'Lepidus. He brings with him Clodius, the surest better in Pompeii, and
the young Greek, Glaucus.'

'A wager on a wager,' cried Tetraides; 'Clodius bets on me, for twenty
sesterces! What say you, Lydon?'

'He bets on me!' said Lydon.

'No, on me!' grunted Sporus.

'Dolts! do you think he would prefer any of you to Niger?' said the
athletic, thus modestly naming himself.

'Well, well,' said Stratonice, as she pierced a huge amphora for her
guests, who had now seated themselves before one of the tables, 'great
men and brave, as ye all think yourselves, which of you will fight the
Numidian lion in case no malefactor should be found to deprive you of
the option?'

'I who have escaped your arms, stout Stratonice,' said Lydon, 'might
safely, I think, encounter the lion.'

'But tell me,' said Tetraides, 'where i