Certain slave-dealers, landing a cargo of slaves at Brundisium, and having with them a very beautiful boy of great value, fearing lest the custom-house officers should lay hands upon him, put upon him the bulla and the purple-edged robe that free-born lads were wont to wear.  The deceit was not discovered.  But when they came to Rome, and the matter was talked of, it was maintained that the boy was really free, seeing that it was his master who of his own free will had given him the token of freedom.

I shall conclude this chapter with a very pretty picture, which a Roman poet draws of the life which he led with his teacher in the days when he was first entering upon manhood.  “When first my timid steps lost the guardianship of the purple stripe, and the bulla of the boy was hung up for offering to the quaint household gods; when flattering comrades came about me, and I might cast my eyes without rebuke over the whole busy street under the shelter of the yet unsullied gown; in the days when the path is doubtful, and the wanderer knowing naught of life comes with bewildered soul to the many-branching roads—­then I made myself your adopted child.  You took at once into the bosom of another Socrates my tender years; your rule, applied with skillful disguise, straightens each perverse habit; nature is molded by reason, and struggles to be subdued, and assumes under your hands its plastic lineaments.  Ay, well I mind how I would wear away long summer suns with you, and pluck with you the bloom of night’s first hours.  One work we had, one certain time for rest, and at one modest table unbent from sterner thoughts.”

It accords with this charming picture to be told that the pupil, dying in youth, left his property to his old tutor, and that the latter handed it over to the kinsfolk of the deceased, keeping for himself the books only.

CHAPTER II.

A ROMAN UNDERGRADUATE.

In the last chapter we had no particular “Roman Boy” in view; but our “Roman Undergraduate” will be a real person, Cicero’s son.  It will be interesting to trace the notices which we find of him in his father’s letters and books.  “You will be glad to hear,” he writes in one of his earliest letters to Atticus, “that a little son has been born to me, and that Terentia is doing well.”  From time to time we hear of him, and always spoken of in terms of the tenderest affection.  He is his “honey-sweet Cicero,” his “little philosopher.”  When the father is in exile the son’s name is put on the address of his letters along with those of his mother and sister.  His prospects are the subject of most anxious thought.  Terentia, who had a considerable fortune of her own, proposes to sell an estate.  “Pray think,” he writes, “what will happen to us.  If the same ill fortune shall continue to pursue us, what will happen to our unhappy boy?  I cannot write any more.  My tears fairly overpower me; I should be sorry to make you as sad as myself.  I will say so much.  If my friends do their duty by me, I shall not want for money; if they do not, your means will not save me.  I do implore you, by all our troubles, do not ruin the poor lad.  Indeed he is ruined enough already.  If he has only something to keep him from want, then modest merit and moderate good fortune will give him all he wants.”