[25] No teaming was allowed in Rome by day.

“Heracles! Was ever one in such a city!  What malevolent spirit brought me here?  Throat-cutting on the streets at night; highwaymen in every foul alley; unsafe to stir at evening without an armed band!  No police worth mentioning; freshets every now and then; fires every day or else a building tumbles down.  And then they must wake me up at an unearthly hour in the morning.  Curses on me for ever coming near the place!” And the speaker rolled over on the bed, and shook himself, preparatory to getting up.

“Bah!  Can these Roman dogs never learn that power is to be used, not abused?  Why don’t they spend some of their revenues to level these seven hills that shut off the light, and straighten and widen their abominable, ill-paved streets, and keep houses from piling up as if to storm Olympus?  Pshaw, I had better stop croaking, and be up and about.”

The speaker sat up in bed, and clapped his hands.  Into the ill-lighted and unpretentiously furnished room came a tall, bony, ebon-skinned old Ethiopian, very scantily attired, who awaited the wishes of his master.

“Come, Sesostris,” said the latter, “get out my best himation[26]—­the one with the azure tint.  Give me a clean chiton,[27] and help me dress.”

  [26] Greek outer mantle.

  [27] Greek under garment.

And while the servant bustled briskly about his work, Pratinas, for such was his lord’s name, continued his monologue, ignoring the presence of his attendant.  “Not so bad with me after all.  Six years ago to-day it was I came to Rome, with barely an obol of ready money, to make my fortune by my wits.  Zeus!  But I can’t but say I’ve succeeded.  A thousand sesterces here and five hundred there, and now and then a better stroke of fortune—­politics, intrigues, gambling; all to the same end.  And now?—­oh, yes, my ‘friends’ would say I am very respectable, but quite poor—­but they don’t know how I have economized, and how my account stands with Sosthenes the banker at Alexandria.  My old acquaintance with Lucius Domitius was of some use.  A few more months of this life and I am away from this beastly Rome, to enjoy myself among civilized people.”

Pratinas went over to a large wooden chest with iron clasps, unlocked it, and gazed for a moment inside with evident satisfaction.  “There are six good talents in there,” he remarked to himself, “and then there is Artemisia.”

He had barely concluded this last, hardly intelligible assertion, when the curtain of the room was pushed aside, and in came a short, plump, rosy-faced little maiden of twelve, with a clearly chiselled Greek profile and lips as red as a cherry.  Her white chiton was mussed and a trifle soiled; and her thick black hair was tied back in a low knot, so as to cover what were two very shapely little ears.  All in all, she presented a very pretty picture, as the sunlight streamed over her, when she drew back the hangings at the window.