they did not belong to any booty he had taken;—­quite the reverse:  and besides allowing the truce he made an outlay of a great deal of money immediately and also presented to Decebalus artisans of every imaginable profession, peaceful and warlike, and promised that he would give him a great deal more.  These exhibits came from the imperial furniture which he at all times treated as captive goods, because he had enslaved the empire itself.

[Sidenote:  A.D. 91 (a.u. 844)] So many rewards were voted him that almost the whole world (so far as under his dominion) was filled with his images and statues of both silver and gold.  He also gave an extremely costly spectacle in regard to which we have noted nothing that was striking for historical record, save that virgins contended in the foot-race.  After this, in the course of holding what seem to have been triumphal celebrations, he arranged numerous contests.  First of all, in the hippodrome he had battles of infantry against infantry, and again battles of cavalry, and next he gave a naval battle in a new place.  And there perished in it practically all the naval combatants and numbers of the spectators.  A great rain and violent storm had suddenly come up, yet he allowed no one to leave the spectacle; indeed, though he himself changed his clothing to a thick woolen cloak, he would not permit the people to alter their attire.  As a result, not a few fell sick and died.  By way of consoling them for this, he provided them at public expense a dinner lasting all night.  Often, too, he would conduct games at night, and sometimes he would pit dwarfs [Footnote:  Reading [Greek:  nanous] (Dindorf)] and women against each other.

[Sidenote:—­9—­] So at this time he feasted the populace as described, but on another occasion he entertained the foremost men of the senate and the knights in the following fashion.  He prepared a room that was pitch black on every side, ceiling, walls and floor, and had ready bare couches, all alike, resting on the uncovered ground; then he invited in his guests alone, at night, without their attendants.  And first he set beside each of them a slab shaped like a gravestone, bearing a person’s name and also a small lamp, such as hangs in tombs.  Next well-shaped, naked boys, likewise painted black, entered after the manner of phantoms, and, after passing around the guests in a kind of terrifying dance, took up their stations at their feet.  After that, whatever is commonly dedicated in the course of offerings to departed spirits was set before them also, all black, and in dishes of a similar hue.  Consequently, every single one of the guests feared and trembled and every moment felt certain that he was to be slain, especially as on the part of everybody save Domitian there was dead silence, as if they were already in the realms of the dead, and the emperor himself limited his conversation to matters pertaining to death and slaughter.  Finally he dismissed them.  But