Chapter C: With the Carthaginian Fleet, 216 B.c (1)

_Letter from a Carthaginian Civilian to a Friend in Carthage_

On Board the _Hamilcar Barca_,
SARDINIA.

My dear Gisco,

It is now five weeks that we have been in this place, and we shall have to stay here until the “battering practice” is over. We have already got through our “rammers’ test.” I do not think it is a bad place myself, and most of the people seem to prefer it to Thule, where they spent the whole summer, except Mago our physician, who cannot endure either the Romans or the Sardinians, and who is longing to get back to the glittering quays and the broad market-places of Carthage. It is true that the Sardinians are a thievish race, and they seldom, if ever, speak the truth; moreover, they trade on the honesty and the good nature of our people, and our unfamiliarity with their various and uncouth jargons. For instance, a favourite plan of theirs is this: many of them gain their living by the catching of lobsters, which they send by Ostia to Rome to supply the banquets of the rich patricians of that city. One such fisherman came to the captain of our vessel with the following complaint: He professed that for many weeks he had toiled and caught a great number of lobsters; these lobsters, he said, he was keeping against the feasts of the Saturnalia at Rome, in a large wicker basket not far from the shore; and that some of our men having gone ashore in one of our swift and brass-prowed boats, had in the darkness of twilight collided with his wicker basket and caused the escape of many hundreds of live lobsters, for which loss he demanded a compensation amounting to two hundred talents. On consulting the Roman Magistrate of the place we learnt that this fisherman made a similar demand from every ship which visited the bay; moreover, that he had caught but one lobster. So although he reduced his demand to the eighth of one talent, it was refused to him.

Another stratagem of the Sardinian native is to demand money for the poultry destroyed by the sailors of our ship. Every family in the village complained that their poultry had been annihilated by our unprincipled mariners, but little credence was lent to the tale, because at the moment when the complaint was made there was only one hen in the village, a dead one that had just perished of old age.

Life on board this vessel is full of variety and interest to the stranger. Long before sunrise one is wakened by the sound of a brazen trumpet. This is followed by much whistling and a deep, but not unmusical, call from some elder sailor, who exhorts and finally persuades those over whom he is put in authority to rise from their narrow couches and to taste the morning air. They then set about to wash the upper part of the ship, an occupation which is pursued more from a disinterested love of cleaning than from any practical purpose, as by evening the ship is as dirty as it was before it was washed. But the men enjoy this work, and indeed the only people who suffer from it are such men as myself who are on board ship by chance, and who are used to sleeping uninterruptedly until some time after the sun has arisen. Some people have been known to sleep unconcernedly through all this noise, but such men are rare.

An hour or two after this process of washing is accomplished, food is served to the officers and men of the ship. The officers rarely partake of more than one olive in the early morning; such is their endurance and their self-denial. This they wash down with a small glass of red native wine, which is singularly pleasant and exhilarating. As soon as this light repast is over the real business of the day begins.

First of all the men are inspected on deck, and it is carefully noted whether they are in a state of cleanliness and order, and further whether they are sober enough to perform their daily duties. Any man who is found twice running to be in a state of absolute intoxication is drowned, and the ship is thereby disembarrassed of superfluous cargo. The greater part of the forenoon is spent in teaching the young their duties, and in teaching the lads who have lately arrived from Carthage the full duties of a seaman. This task is carried out with patience and persistence by the instructors, who are never known to raise their voice in anger, or to use a harsh word. Indeed the nearest approach to harshness which I observed was when one day I heard one of the elder mariners say to a lad who was slow to perform his duty, “Take care lest I should observe thee to bend.” This is a nautical expression which means, so I am told, “be strenuous in all things.”

At noon the second repast of the day is taken, the food consisting of black bread, herbs, preserved olives, and a small fish which is caught in great quantities in the bay by such as are skilful. When the meal is over the officers retire to a small cabin, where they aid their digestion by playful gambols, such as wrestling and beating each other with their fists, until they are weary. After this they fall into a profound slumber on the benches of the cabin, with the exception of one officer who needs must always remain on deck to observe the weather and the omens, and make note thereof, for the captain of the vessel is inquisitive with regard to such matters.

The younger officers are respectful to their seniors, and address them as “Suffetes”; but this outward form of respect when duty is concerned does not prevent the more youthful of the juniors from expressing the innate exuberance and impertinence which are natural to youth. Moreover, they call each other by familiar names, such as “Sheep,” “Hog,” “Little Hog,” “Little Pig,” “Canary,” “Cat,” “Little Cat.”

Later in the afternoon there is a further inspection on the deck, which takes place to the sound of many trumpets. At sunset, after a still louder blast of the trumpet, the third repast is held. The officers attend this in state, wearing silken togas, jewelled helmets, and golden chains, and during all the meal a hundred slaves make music on silver cymbals, harps, and drums. This they do with great skill, knowing that should they be unskilful in their art, they risk being hurled into the sea. All the officers dine together, with the exception of the Captain, who feeds in a small turret by himself and partakes of especial dainties due to his rank, such as nightingales’ tongues and the livers of peacocks.

At the end of the repast the eldest of the officers fills a golden bowl full of wine and water and drinks to the health of the “Gerusia.” Immediately before he does so the goblet of every officer present is filled with wine and water, but should any one taste of his wine before the Elder of the assembly rises to his feet, he is constrained to empty one after another every goblet at the board and to refill them at his own expense. And this proves a tax both on his moral courage, his physical endurance, and his material resources.

When this ceremony has been accomplished such officers who are skilled in the art make music on the flute or the tom-tom, while others sing plaintive Carthaginian ditties about the dark-eyed lasses they have left behind them. Sometimes others, still more skilful, give a display of dancing. After this has continued for about an hour another deafening blast on the trumpet announces that all must seek their cabins for the night, save those unhappy officers who take it by turn for a space of four hours at a time to observe the features of the landscape, the aspect of the heavens, the position of the stars, and the nature of the omens. According as these omens are favourable, or unfavourable, the nature of the following day’s work is determined.

There are in the ship a particular race of men who are neither soldiers nor sailors; these are called by the Latin name “Legio Classica.” Their duties consist in maintaining discipline amongst the company of the ship and in dealing out retribution when it is necessary; they are well known for the unerring accuracy of their statements, so much so that if any one in the ship makes a statement or relates a tale that bears in it the signs of improbability, he will be ordered to go and tell it to the men of this legion, for it is known that should the statement be untruthful or inaccurate they would be swift to detect it and to laugh the man to scorn.

The monotony of life on board ship, and the rigour of the discipline enforced, are relieved by many pleasant occupations. Thus the officers throw dice on a place of the ship specially appointed for the purpose, which is called the “bridge,” and often in the evening the sailors sing together in soft and tuneful chorus. With regard to the “ramming” and the “battering practice”--both of them most interesting spectacles--I will write to you another time. In the meantime, farewell.

HANNO.

_P.S._--The Roman Fleet is expected here to-morrow. It is said they intend to build eight _Hamilcar Barcas_.

LESBIA ILLA

... Lesbia illa,
Illa Lesbia, quam Catullus unam
Plus quam se atque suos amavit omnes.

_Extract from a letter written by Clodia, the wife of Metellus Celer, to her friend Portia in Athens_

We arrived at Baiae yesterday evening. I am most thankful the journey is over, because Metellus is a most trying traveller. He started, of course, by making a scene directly he saw my luggage. I had scarcely taken anything, only what was absolutely indispensable, and I got it all into eight boxes; but men never know how much room clothes take up. As it is, I have got nothing to wear at all. But as soon as Metellus saw the litters with my poor luggage in them he lost his temper, and during the whole journey he threw my extravagance at me. Needless to say, he took far more things than I did. Men think because their clothes are cheap and cost nothing, and because a toga lasts them four or five years, we ought to be able to do the same. But it’s no use discussing that with a husband. No husband in the world has ever understood, or ever will understand, how expensive our clothes are.

We found the villa looking very clean and fresh; and it is a great blessing to get away from Rome. I never mean to go back there as long as I live; especially after what has happened. I suppose you have heard all about it, but I want you to know the truth, as everybody in Rome is telling horrible lies about me and giving a wrong complexion to the whole story, especially Lalage, who is a spiteful cat, and is sure to write and tell you all about it.

Well, of course I’ve known Catullus for years. We were almost brought up together. He was always in and out of the house. He used to amuse me; Metellus liked him, and we were both very kind to him. I used to think he was thoroughly nice. He was so sympathetic when my sparrow died, and quite understood what a shock that was, and what a state of despair I was in. By the way, I’ve got a new sparrow now. It’s quite tame. I’ve called it Julius. We used, in fact, to see a great deal of Catullus. We were useful to him, too, because he met a great many clever and important people at our house; and when we first knew him nobody had ever heard of him. It only shows what a mistake it is to be kind to people. After a time he began to give himself airs, and treated the house as if it belonged to him. He complained of the food and the wine. He insisted upon my sending away Balbus, the best slave I have ever had. He made Metellus buy some old Falernian from a cousin of his (that disreputable Rufinus who lost all his money at Capua last year). The fact was, his head was turned. People flattered him (Lalage, of course, told him he was wonderful), and he began really to think he was a real poet, a genius, and I don’t know what, and he became quite insufferable. He began to meddle with my affairs, and to dictate to me about my friends. But it was when I got to know Julius Caesar that the crisis came.

Of course you know as well as I do that nobody could possibly be _in love_ with Julius Caesar. He is _quite_ bald now, and I think--in fact, I always did think--most tiresome. I never could understand what people saw in him. And, oh, what a bore he used to be when he told me about his campaigns, and drew imaginary plans on the table with his finger! But of course I was _obliged_ to be civil to him because of Metellus and my brother Clodius, to whom he has been useful. Directly he began coming to our house--and he came very often, he had to see Metellus on business constantly--Catullus became quite mad. He lost his head, and I had to arrange for them not to meet, which was most annoying and inconvenient, as they both came every day, and sometimes twice a day. I know I ought to have taken steps at once to put an end to all that nonsense. But I was foolishly kind-hearted for a time, and gave way weakly. It was a great mistake.

The crisis came the other day. I had arranged a supper party, really a divine party. Just Pollio, Julius Caesar, Marcus Tullius Cicero, Lavinia, Lalage, and a few others. I didn’t tell Catullus, as I thought he wouldn’t quite do (apart from Julius Caesar being there), as I had invited Bassianus, who is a _real_ professional poet, and writes the most beautiful things about the moonlight, memory, and broken hearts. His verses quite make me cry sometimes. They are far better than Catullus’s, which I confess I can’t read at all. But Metellus says it’s unfair to compare an amateur like Catullus with a _real_ writer like Bassianus.

Somebody told Catullus about the supper, I suspect it was Lalage--she is jealous of me, and Catullus made up to her years ago and then left her. He came to me and made a scene, and said he was coming too. Then he tried to find out who else was coming, and I refused to tell him. He said: “Of course, you have asked Julius Caesar,” and I said: “It’s not your business; I shall ask the people I choose to my own house without consulting you.” Then he said a lot of horribly unfair things about Julius Caesar, and a lot of absurd things about me; only I managed to calm him more or less. All this happened in the afternoon, and he went away really quite repentant and meek. He always was easy to manage if one had time, and I told him Cicero had praised his verses, which soothed him, although it wasn’t true. He never could resist flattery.

The supper began very well. Julius Caesar was, I must say, brilliant. He can be really clever and pleasant sometimes, and he talked to me the whole time, and this made Lalage very angry; she was between Metellus and Bassianus, and she bored them. Then suddenly in the middle of supper, just as I was beginning to feel more or less happy about it all, Catullus walked in, very flushed and excited. I saw at once he had been drinking. He was given a place between Cicero and Lavinia, and opposite me and Julius Caesar; and no sooner had he settled himself on his couch than he began to monopolize the conversation. He talked at the top of his voice. He was rather amusing at first, and Cicero answered him back, and for a time everything went well; but I was dreadfully uneasy, as I felt certain something would happen, and there was a dangerous look in his eye. Besides which he drank off a great bowl of wine and water (with very little water in it), and grew more and more flushed and excited. He didn’t pay any attention to Julius Caesar at all, and talked across to me as though Julius Caesar hadn’t been there. But Julius Caesar didn’t seem to notice that Catullus was being rude, and he turned to me and really was charming. He said, among other things, that the only woman he had ever seen who could compare with me for wearing clothes _properly_ was Cleopatra, but that she was dowdy in comparison with me. He said, too, that I was the only woman he had ever met who had any real grasp of the fiscal question. This made Catullus mad; and he asked Lavinia in a loud whisper, which we all heard, who the gentleman sitting opposite might be who was slightly bald. I was dreadfully uncomfortable, because Julius Caesar can’t bear any allusions to his baldness (it’s so silly, as if it mattered to us), and he turned red in the face.

Then Catullus began to chaff Cicero about his verses, but as Cicero knows him very well it didn’t much matter, he knew he didn’t mean it really. To make a diversion, I proposed that Bassianus should sing us a song. But Catullus broke in and said: “Rather than that I will recite a poem.”

I was very angry, and spoke my mind. I said I thought it was most rash and daring for an amateur to recite before professionals like Cicero and Bassianus. I was really frightened, because Catullus’s verses are either terribly long and serious--I have never been able to listen when he reads them out; in fact, I always used to ask him to read to me when I wanted to add up my bills mentally--or else they are short and quite _impossible_.

He then turned scarlet, and said something about drawing-room poetasters who wrote stuff fit for women, and, looking at Caesar, he recited a short poem which was _dreadful_. I didn’t understand it all, but I felt--and I am sure every one else felt--that he meant to be rude. I sent him a small note by a slave, telling him that if he did not know how to behave he had better leave the house. But I looked as if I hadn’t noticed anything, and tried to treat it all as a joke. But every one felt hot and uncomfortable.

I then ignored Catullus altogether, and devoted my whole attention to Julius Caesar. I suppose it was that which really made him lose all his self-control. He entirely forgot himself. He got up and said that, as the company did not like comic verse, he had written a serious poem, which he was quite certain would interest them. He had no wish, he said (and for once in his life he was modest!), to rival such great writers of verse, such masters of music and passion, as were Cicero and Bassianus, but his verse, although it could not rival theirs in art and inspiration, had at least the merit of truth and sincerity. He said (and he almost shouted this) he was a plain man, who expressed in the simplest possible words what were the common experiences of every one, from the Senator to the man in the street. (So vulgar!) He said his verses were about a woman (how could I ever have thought he was a gentleman!) who was far-famed for her beauty, and still better known for her heartlessness. She heightened her wickedness by the supreme coquetry of pretending to be virtuous. She professed virtue and practised vice. (He always was coarse.) He would not name her; he would call her by a name which was colourless, namely, Lesbia. (Of course every one knew he had written verses to me under that name!)

Then, looking me straight in the face, he recited a poem which was _quite_, _quite_ impossible, with a _horrible_ word in it (at least Lalage said it was horrible). Pollio came to the rescue, and said that Catullus was ill, and dragged him out of the room. And in a way it was true, for he was quite tipsy, and tears were rolling down his cheeks; and I do hate drunken men, but, above all, I hate coarseness.

The next day all Rome knew the poem by heart. And it was a cowardly, blackguard thing to do, and I shall _never_ speak to him again as long as I live, and I shall _never_, _never_ let him come into my house again. Not being a gentleman he can’t know what one feels about those kind of things. He is thoroughly second-rate and coarse to the core, although he oughtn’t to be. Of course, I really don’t care a bit. Only if Lalage writes and tells you about it, don’t believe a word she says. I hate Catullus. I must stop now.

Your loving
CLODIA.

_P.S._--Lalage had the impertinence to say that I ought to make allowance for men of genius. As if Catullus was a genius! I asked Cicero (who likes him) if his poetry was really good, and he said that, to be honest, it was a _bad_ imitation of Calvus’s and his own, only that it was very good for an amateur.

_P.P.S._--Julius Caesar is coming to stay with us next Saturday, if he can get away. Don’t forget the Persian silk, the palest shade, six and a half yards.

CLEOPATRA AT ROME

_Letter from Charmian, at Alexandria, to her friend Chloe, at Baiae, 44 B.C._

It all came so suddenly. I never thought that I should leave Rome without seeing you again and without being able to say farewell. Even now I cannot believe that it is true and that the whole thing is not a dream. I keep on thinking that I shall wake up and find myself once more by the banks of the Tiber, sitting in the shade of the terebinths, listening to the amusing discussions of Atticus, Cicero, and Caesar.

The suddenness with which everything happened was terrible. It all began with the dinner party which Cleopatra had arranged on the eve of the great event which was to happen on the Feast of the Lupercalia, when Caesar was to be offered the Crown. Cleopatra was in the highest spirits. Some months before this Cicero had asked her to get him from Alexandria some manuscripts and some Canopian vases, of which he had need, as such things are rare in your barbarous cities. Cleopatra had promised to do this, and she told him that she had done it. As a matter of fact she had forgotten all about it. He was invited to the dinner, and had sent her a note saying that he would be delighted to come, and reminding her of her promise with regard to the manuscripts and the vases. He had already reminded her two or three times before. As she read the note she was convulsed with laughter, and when I asked her what she would say to Cicero she answered that she would of course tell him what she had already said before, that the vases and the manuscripts were on the way. I asked her if she was going to send for them, and she answered firmly: “No, it is a great mistake to lend books to men of letters. They never give them back, or if they do there are always a lot of thumb marks on them, or notes in the margin, which are worse. I like my books to be clean.”

She took immense pains to dress herself that night for the dinner, according to the very latest Greek fashion, that is to say, in the austerest simplicity. She wore a gray silk robe made absolutely plain, and one wild flower in her fair hair. The curious thing is--which I have noticed since we got back to Alexandria--that here she is considered a real beauty, but we had not been back a week before she realized that what suited Rome does not suit Alexandria. So she has entirely changed her style of dress and of demeanour: She has had her hair dyed a dark bronzed red; she wears gold tissue, golden bracelets and chains, and she goes about fanned by Cupids with huge peacock feathers, and wearing a stiff gold train. Of course in Rome or in Greece this would be thought vulgar, but it is quite right here, and she is so clever that she divined this at once.

Well, to go on with the dinner party. It was not quite a success. Caesar, who had been anxious about politics during the last week, and in a frightfully bad temper, was preoccupied and absent-minded. When Cicero arrived he was very civil and did not mention the Greek vases directly, but we all saw he was thinking of nothing else, and he managed to get the conversation first on to Alexandria, then on to the library, and finally he said: “By the way, I can’t quite remember, but I think you were kind enough once to say that you were going to have a manuscript sent me from the library.”

Cleopatra clapped her hands together and said: “Of course! I think they must have arrived this morning. We had a messenger from Alexandria, but the things have not yet been unpacked, as everybody in the house has been busy. But I will let you know to-morrow morning without fail.”

Cicero kissed her hand and told her she was the divinest and most thoughtful of women.

There were quite a lot of people at dinner, and several came afterwards, among others a man called Mark Antony, who is a well-known gambler, and who is still in the Army. Cleopatra had once or twice asked Caesar to bring him, but Caesar had always said that he was not the kind of man she would like, as he was boisterous, uneducated, and rather common. Caesar was perfectly right about this, because Cleopatra would not look at him. He made several attempts to speak to her, and paid her one or two extravagant but badly-turned compliments, and she said to me afterwards that it was astonishing how tiresome these Roman soldiers were. During dinner she made signs to me as though to point out that Antony was drinking a great deal more than was good for him--which he did do, and his conversation and his jokes were in the worst possible taste. Cleopatra herself was at her very best, so modest, so quiet, so delicately witty, so highly distinguished and refined.

They talked of mathematics and astronomy, and Cleopatra astounded Atticus by her knowledge of these sciences. Mark Antony took no part in this conversation. He was frankly bored. From astronomy the talk went on to music, and from music to dancing. Here Mark Antony brightened up and monopolized the whole conversation by describing a dancer from Asia he had seen two or three days before. The play of the muscles on her arms, he said, was quite unparalleled, and she managed to execute a rippling movement which started from her shoulders and went to the tips of her fingers.

In the middle of dinner Caesar received a note. I guessed at once it was from his wife, whose jealousy lately had been something quite frightening. Caesar read the note and was visibly disturbed and irritated. Cleopatra pretended not to notice the incident. The moment dinner was over Caesar said that he would have to go home for a moment in order to despatch a piece of public business, but that he would be back shortly. He was still living, you know, in the public offices in the Via Sacra. Cleopatra did not make the slightest objection to his going; she only said that she hoped he would be back soon, and that as for herself she would be well occupied talking to Cicero, whom she had not seen for some time.

Caesar was just making ready to go, and the flute-players had been sent for, when Casca (who, I think, is the best-looking young man in Rome) walked up to Cleopatra and occupied the empty seat next to her. Caesar suddenly changed his mind, and said he would not go home after all. This was typical of his behaviour during these days: he had been constantly changing his mind about small matters and never seemed able to come to any decision. Besides this, he was always jealous of any one younger than himself, especially of Casca, who has got such thick hair.

Mark Antony tried to lure Cleopatra into conversation with him, paying her still more fulsome and still more crude compliments than before. And she, with perfect civility but with icy determination, ignored the compliments and took no notice of him.

After the flute-players had ceased we all had our fortunes told by an Asiatic soothsayer. He told Cleopatra and myself that we would be very lucky, but that we should beware of figs and the worms inside them. We laughed a great deal at this, because neither Cleopatra nor myself ever eat raw fruit. He told Mark Antony that he would love and be loved by the most wonderful woman in the world; upon which Mark Antony bent on one knee before Cleopatra and did mock homage. You should have seen her face! He did not feel inclined to do it twice, and there is no doubt that he knew he had made a grotesque exhibition of himself; in fact it was rather painful, and we were all sorry for him.

The soothsayer told Caesar that all would be well with him should he follow the advice of those who loved him most. When the soothsayer said this, Caesar looked at Cleopatra with infinite tenderness, and she smiled at him very sweetly. It was all I could do to keep from laughing. The vanity of men is extraordinary! I thought to myself--How can that conceited old politician think that a woman as young, as clever, and as pretty as Cleopatra could possibly care for him, or feel anything else but disgust at his attentions!

The soothsayer then told Cicero’s fortune. He said that his worst enemy was his tongue, but that if he went through life without offending any of the present company he would have a fortunate and successful career. We laughed a great deal at this, as every one in the room happened to be a great friend of his.

Caesar was not satisfied with what the soothsayer had told him, and asked further details; but the soothsayer said that it was unlucky to tell a person’s fortune twice in one evening, upon which Caesar desisted, since he is intensely superstitious.

The guests went away, leaving Caesar and Cleopatra alone. I was in the next room and could hear what they said through the silken curtain. I listened attentively. Caesar began by calling her the sun of his life, and she complained of headache. Then he turned the conversation on to serious topics, and said he was greatly in need of her advice with regard to the events of the next day. Should he or should he not receive the Crown which was to be offered him by Mark Antony in the Forum?

Cleopatra said that if he did not accept it he would be a fool and a coward, and she for her part would never speak to him again. This seemed to satisfy him, and he went away.

The next morning he did not appear at the villa. We heard the noise of cheering, but we first learnt what had happened from one of the slaves who had been in the crowd. He told us that Caesar had refused the Crown. Cleopatra was frightfully put out and really angry, for she had determined that if Caesar accepted the Crown she would make him divorce Calphurnia, and marry him herself. It was her great ambition to be Queen, though nobody knew of this at the time of course, because ever since she had lived in Rome, Cleopatra had been a model not only of Roman economy but of Greek moderation, and her household books had been a lesson to the strictest of Roman matrons. That is all changed now, and I must say it is rather a relief.

To go on with my story: Caesar himself came to see us before supper. He said that he had refused the Crown for the moment because he did not think the occasion was opportune, but that he firmly intended to accept it on a later occasion. “I am only drawing back,” he said, “in order to take a greater leap.” Cleopatra said sarcastically that no doubt he knew best and that he had been right to climb down. He told her, among other things, that a soothsayer--not the same one we had seen--had told him to beware of the Ides of March, when he intended to go to the Senate, and he asked Cleopatra whether she thought it would be wise for him to go.

She laughed at the superstition and told him that if he paid attention to such trifles people would begin to say that he was an old woman; in fact they were already saying it, and she was beginning to think it was true. This annoyed him so much that he banged the door, and went away in a huff. We expected him, however, to come to us the next day, as these sort of quarrels had often happened before.

But Caesar did not come the next day, and a week passed without our seeing him. I suggested to Cleopatra she had better write, but she was quite obdurate. The days passed, and it was fully three weeks before we had further news of him. That was on the Ides of March, when a slave rushed into the house and told us that Caesar had been murdered, and that we had better escape as soon as possible, since all friends of his were in danger.

Cleopatra showed great presence of mind. She packed her jewels and nothing else; she stained her face with walnut-juice, and put on a coarse peasant’s garment, bidding myself and Iras do likewise; then, taking plenty of money with us, we went out through the back gate, crossed the river, and quite unobserved reached the Gate of Ostia. There we took a litter and started for Ostia, whence we embarked for Alexandria.

We have now been here a week, and Cleopatra, as I have already told you, is completely changed. But the change as far as we are concerned is for the better, for I can give you no idea of the fun we are having. Please come here as soon as you can. Alexandria is far more amusing than either Rome or Athens, and there is no tiresome Caesar to interfere with us. Farewell.

CHARMIAN.

OVID’S BANISHMENT

_Letter from Diogenes, a Sculptor, to a friend in Athens_

My work, or rather the business which called me to Rome, is now accomplished, and the Caryatids which I was commissioned to make for the Pantheon of Agrippa are now in their place. But in what a place! Alas, they have been set up so high that their whole effect is lost, and the work might just as well be that of any Roman bungler. The Romans are indeed barbarians. They consider that as long as a thing is big and expensive it is beautiful; they take luxury for comfort, notoriety for fame, eccentricity for genius, and riches for wisdom; or rather they deem that wealth is the only thing which counts in the modern world, and here at Rome this is true. Their attempts at art are in the highest degree ludicrous. Yesterday I visited the studio of Ludius, who is renowned in this city for his decorative work. He paints walls and ceilings, and the Emperor has employed him to decorate his villa at Naples.

His work, which is not devoid of a certain talent, is disciplined by no sense of proportion. It would not be tolerated in Greece for a moment owing to an extravagance and an exaggeration which, so far from displaying any originality, merely form the futile mask of a fundamental banality. The man himself wears his hair yards long like a Persian, and favours a pea-green toga. I could not help saying to him that in Greece artists took pains to dress like everybody but to paint like no one.

Last night I supped with Maecenas at his house on the Esquiline. Let me do justice to my host and give praise where praise is due; here are no jarring notes and no foolish display. Maecenas has exquisite taste; his house is not overcrowded with ornaments nor overwhelmed by useless decoration. By a cunning instinct he has realized that art should be the servant of necessity. Everything in his house has a use and a purpose; but where a vase, a bowl, a cup, a chair, or seat is needed, there you will find a beautiful vase, a beautiful bowl, and so forth.

Maecenas himself is bald, genial, and cultivated; he looks older than he is, and dresses with a very slight affectation of coxcombry; his manner is a triumph of the art which conceals art. He talks to you as though you were the one person in the world he had been anxious to see, and as if the topic you were discussing were the preponderating interest of his life. As I entered his hall I found him pacing up and down in eager conversation with Agrippa, the famous admiral; my ears are sharp, and I just caught a fragment of their conversation, which happened to concern the new drains of Rome. Yet as Maecenas approached me he greeted me with effusion, and turning to Agrippa he said: “Ah, here he is,” as if their whole talk had been of me.

We reclined almost immediately. The fare was delicious, and distinguished by the same supreme simplicity and excellence as the architecture and the ornamentation of his dwelling. There were many celebrities present besides Agrippa--Ludius the painter, most grotesquely clothed, several officials and politicians, Cinna, Grosphus, three minor poets, Horatius Flaccus, Propertius and Crassus; Ovidius Naso, the fashionable writer; Vergilius, the poet, and many young men whose names escape me. Naso is by far the most prominent figure in the Roman literary world at present. He is the arbiter of taste, and sets the criterion of what is to be admired or not. Heaven forbid that I should read his verse, but there is no doubt about the flavour of his conversation, which is more interesting than his work.

The literary world despises Vergilius (the only Roman poet at present living worthy of the name!); on the other hand they admire this Crassus, who writes perfectly unintelligible odes about topics barren of interest. He has invented a novel style of writing, which is called symbolism. It consists of doing this: If you are writing about a tree and the tree seems to you to have the shape of an elephant you call it an elephant. Hence a certain chaos is produced in the mind of the reader, which these young men seem to find delectable. If you mention Vergilius to them they say: “If he only knew how to write. His ideas are good, but he has no sense of form, no ear for melody, and no power of expression.”

This, of course, is ridiculous; for although Vergilius is a writer who has no originality, his style is felicitous, delicate, and lofty, and often musical. In fact he writes really well. With regard to the other poets, they are of little or no account. Horatius Flaccus has a happy knack of translation; Propertius writes amiable, sentimental stuff, and Tibullus babbles of pastures; but they are all of them decadent in that they, none of them, have anything to say. And they either display a false simplicity and a false archaism, or else they are slavishly imitative or hopelessly obscure.

At first the conversation turned on naval matters. It was debated at some length whether the Romans needed a fleet at all, and, if they did, whether it should be a small fleet composed of huge triremes or a large fleet of smaller and swifter vessels. Agrippa, who has the great advantage of practical experience in naval warfare, was in favour of the latter type of vessel. But another sailor, a friend of Cinna’s, who was present, and who was also experienced, said that the day of small vessels was over. The conversation then veered to literary matters.

Ovidius--a little man with twinkling eyes, carefully curled hair, and elaborately elegant clothes--he has his linen washed at Athens--excelled himself in affable courtesy and compliment to Crassus, whom he had never met hitherto. He had always been so anxious, he said, to meet the author of odes that were so interesting, although they were to him a little difficult.

“I’m afraid you must be deeply disappointed,” said Crassus, blushing--he is a shy, overgrown youth with an immense tuft of tangled hair and a desperately earnest face.

“No,” said Ovidius, “I am never disappointed in men of letters. I always think they are the most charming people in the world. It is their works which I find so disappointing. Everybody writes too much,” he continued, “and, what is worse still, everybody writes. Even the dear Emperor writes hexameters; they do not always scan, but they are hexameters for all that. It has even been hinted that he has written a tragedy. Of course it doesn’t matter how much verse a young man writes as long as he burns it all, but our dear Master’s hexameters are preserved by the Empress. She told me herself with pride that she often ‘mends’ his verses for him. And they need mending sadly, because so many stitches in them are dropped. But how delightful it is to have a literary Emperor. He was good enough to ask me to read him a little poetry the other day. I did so. I chose the passage from the ‘Iliad’ where Hector says farewell to Andromache. He said it was very fine but a little old-fashioned. I then recited an ode of Sappho’s, perhaps the loveliest of all of them. He seemed to enjoy it, but said that it was not nearly as good as the original, and that he preferred that kind of song when it was set to music. What the ‘original’ might be to which he alluded I did not ask, as I have always held that a monarch’s business is to have a superficial knowledge of everything but a thorough knowledge of nothing. And therefore I say it is an excellent thing, Vergilius, that our dear Emperor is aware that you and Crassus and myself all write verse. But it would be in the highest degree undesirable that he should know so much about the business as to command you to write verses of society, and myself to write a Georgic.

“But, you will say, he is a poet himself, and the Empress mends his verses. It is true she mends his verses, but she also mends his socks, and a sensible monarch no more bothers to write his own verse than he bothers to make his own socks, or else what would be the use of being a monarch? But, again, you will object: if they are written for him, why don’t they scan? The answer is simple. The man who makes them knows his business, and he knows that if they did scan nobody would believe that our dear Master had written them.

“And in having his verse written for him by a professional, and a bad professional--I hope, Horatius, it is not you, by the way--the Emperor displays not only sense but a rare wisdom. For a gentleman should never bother to acquire technical skill. If he loves music let him hire professional flute-players, but do not let him waste his time in practising ineffectual scales; and if he wants poetry let him order of Vergilius an epic, and if he wishes to pose as a literary monarch let him employ our friend Horatius to write him a few verses without sense or scansion--although I am afraid Horatius would find this difficult. You are too correct, Horatius. That is your fault and mine. We write verse so correctly that I sometimes think that in the far distant future, when the barbarians shall have conquered us, we shall be held up as models somewhere in Scythia or Thule by pedagogues to the barbarian children of future generations! Horrible thought! When Rome falls may our language and our literature perish with us. May we be utterly forgotten. My verse at least shall escape the pedagogues, for it is licentious; and yours, Crassus, I fear they will scarcely understand across the centuries. But, O Vergilius, the spirit of your poetry, so noble and so pure, is the very thing to be turned into a bed of Procrustes for little Dacians!”

“You are unfair on the Emperor,” said Vergilius, “he has excellent taste.”

“In poets certainly,” said Ovidius, “but not in poetry.”

The conversation then turned to other topics: the games, the new drains, the theatre of Balbus, the Naumachia, and the debated question whether the Emperor was right in having caused Vedius Pollio’s crystal beakers to be broken because the latter had condemned a slave, who had accidentally dropped one of them, to be thrown into his pond of lampreys and eaten. The sentence would have been carried out had not the Emperor interfered and caused the slave to be released. Horatius said that Vedius Pollio deserved to be eaten by lampreys himself, but Ovidius and Ludius considered the punishment to be out of all proportion to the crime. Agrippa could not understand his minding the goblet being broken, as there were plenty of goblets in the world. Vergilius thought that Pollio’s act was monstrous. Cinna said that the slave was his own. Maecenas considered that although it was a reprehensible act (and such deeds created dangerous precedents) nobody but a collector knew how terribly severe the punishment was.

We sat talking till late in the night. I cannot write any more, but I have just heard a piece of startling news. Ovidius Naso has been banished _for life_ to some barbarous spot near Tauris. The reason of his disgrace is unknown. Hail!

THE CAPREAE REGATTA, A.D. 27

_Letter from Sabina to Chloe_

CAPREAE, _August_.

We arrived late the night before last from Rome, and never have I seen Capreae so crowded. There are hundreds of yachts here, and many from Egypt, Greece, and Asia, and the whole fleet has arrived, and is drawn up ready for inspection. Clothes are, of course, a difficulty, because one is expected to be elegant, and if one wears anything beautiful it is certain to be spoilt when one gets in and out of boats. Clodia looks too absurd in Egyptian silks and gold chains, just as if she were going to the Games, and Lesbia looks sillier still dressed up as a Greek sailor boy. I have tried to steer a middle course between the two extremes, and I have got a plain white peplum with brown sandals; this all looks cool and summer-like, but it is really substantial enough for the fickle, breezy weather.

Yesterday we went with Sejanus to be shown over one of the ships, the _Servius Tullius_. It was one of the new kind, with three decks and four of what they call turrets. The officers on board were very proud of themselves because in their “battering practice,” which they had just been doing in some outlandish place, they had successfully destroyed the _boom_ (which is a kind of mast sticking out from the ship) of the dummy ship on which they practise. Julius says that these experiments are a waste of money, because each of these dummy ships costs I don’t know how much money. But then Julius is a Little Roman, and I always tell him that if everybody thought as he did, we should have the barbarians in Rome in no time.

The officers have such a hard life on board. They have to get up before sunrise, and if any of them is at all disobedient he is told to climb up the mast and sit in a kind of basket for several hours with nothing to do. As for the sailors, they live in a dark hole with scarcely any light in it and no air at all. I asked one of them whether this didn’t give them a headache, and he said that some clever mathematician had invented a kind of fan which buzzed round and round so as to ventilate their cabin. He said this was a horrible invention, and made such a draught that nobody could sleep. If you live at sea, he told me, you want to be warm in your cabin. You have quite enough fresh air on deck. Julius said this showed how perverse and conservative sailors are. If he was the captain of a ship he would make the sailors sleep on deck in hammocks without any blankets. The sailor said they were all thankful Julius was a politician and not a sailor. And Julius, who has no sense of humour, thought it was meant as a compliment.

There have been heaps of visitors on board all the ships. The captain of the _Servius Tullius_ said it was wonderful what an interest people took in the fleet now, and what intelligent questions they asked, especially the women. I was rather flattered by this, as I have always taken an intelligent interest in naval things, and I had only just said to him (to show I wasn’t ignorant) that my favourite boat was a _spinnaker_.

To-morrow there are going to be some races. I am going to try to get Lucius Aemilius to take me on board his schooner, the _Hirundo_. I always think a schooner is a safer boat than a cutter. I don’t really like racing, because nobody will talk to one, and the men are all so rude and absent-minded while the race is going on, and whatever one does one is always in the way and in the wrong place, but I shall get rid of Julius for a whole day, because he is a very bad sailor and nothing would drag him on board a racing yacht.

Capreae is terribly crowded. I was invited upon Sejanus’ yacht, but I think it much more comfortable to live in the most uncomfortable villa than in the most comfortable yacht. There is no privacy in a yacht, and salt water ruins my skin. Our villa, which we have hired for the week, is quite clean, only there is only one bath in it, so that we all have to use it by turn.

Vitellius, the admiral, has put one of the little pinnaces belonging to his ship, the _Remus_, at our disposal. So we can go backwards and forwards whenever we like. The pinnace is managed by one of the quite young officers--such a nice little boy, and so willing! He doesn’t mind how long I keep him waiting at the pier. It seems extraordinary that such young boys should be able to manage a whole boat full of men, doesn’t it? Ours looks about fifteen years old, but I suppose he is really much older. I asked him to come and dine with us, and Julius was cross about it, and said I was making myself ridiculous by talking to children. But I promise you this boy has much more assurance than many grown-up men. In fact, once or twice I have had to speak severely to him because he was on the point of going too far. As it was, I treated it all as a joke, and told him I was old enough to be his mother.