one’s name.  In their state of panic even those who had never visited the house of Apronianus, and not only the baldheaded but those whose foreheads were indifferently bare grew afraid.  No one felt easy save those who had unusually thick hair.  We all looked around at such men, and a whisper ran about:  “It’s so-and-so.  No, it’s so-and-so.”  I will not conceal how I was then affected, however absurd it may be.  I felt with my hand to see whether I had any hair on my head; and a number of others behaved in the very same way.  We were very careful to direct our gaze upon baldish persons as if we could thereby divert our own danger upon them.  This we did until it was further read that the particular baldhead in question wore a purple toga.  When this statement came out, we turned our eyes upon Baebius Marcellinus.  He had been aedile at the time and was extremely bald.  So he stood up and coming forward said:  “He will certainly be able to point me out, if he has seen me.”  We commended this speech, the informer was brought in while the senator stood by, and for a long time was silent, looking about for the man to point out.  Finally, following the direction of an almost imperceptible nod that somebody gave, he said that this was he.

[Sidenote:—­9—­] Thus was Marcellinus convicted of a baldhead’s peeping, [Footnote:  The phrase [Greek:  phalakrou parakupseos] has a humorous ring to it, and I am inclined to believe, especially considering the situation, that Dio had in his mind while writing this the familiar proverb [Greek:  honou parakupseos], a famous response given by a careless ass-driver, whose animal being several rods in advance of its lagging master had stuck its head into an open doorway and thereby scattered the nucleus of a promising aviary.  The fellow was haled to court to answer to a charge of contributory negligence and when some bystander asked him for what misdeed he had been brought to that place, he rejoined with a great air of injured innocence:  “For an ass’s peeping!”] and bewailing his fate he was conducted out of the senate-house.  When he had passed through the Forum, he refused to advance farther, but right where he was took leave of his children, four in number, and uttered this most affecting speech:  “There is only one thing that I am sorry for, children; it is that I must leave you behind alive.”  Then he had his head cut off before Severus learned even that he had been condemned.

Just vengeance, however, befell Pollenius Sebennus, who had preferred the charge that caused his death.  He was delivered by Sabinus to the Norici, for whom he had shown scant consideration during his governorship of them, and went through a most disgraceful experience.  We saw him stretched on the ground, pleading piteously, and had he not obtained mercy, thanks to his uncle Auspex, [Footnote:  A.  Pollenius Auspex.] he would have perished pitiably.  This Auspex was the cleverest imaginable man for jokes and chit-chat,