“I fear,” said Pratinas, doing as bidden, and testing the essence with evident satisfaction, “that I have interrupted your philosophical studies.”  And he glanced at Pisander, who was sitting lonesome and offended in his corner.

“Oh! not in the least,” ran on Valeria; “but though I know you are Epicurean, surely you enjoy Plato?”

“Certainly,” said Pratinas, with dramatic dignity, “I suck the sweets from the flowers left us by all the wise and good.  Epicurean though I am, your ladyship must permit me to lend you a copy of an essay I have with me, by that great philosopher, the Stoic Chrysippos,[39] although I cannot agree with all his teachings; and this copy of Panaitios, the Eclectic’s great Treatise on Duty, which cannot fail to edify your ladyship.”  And he held out the two rolls.

  [39] Born 180 B.C.

“A thousand thanks,” said Valeria, languidly, “hand them to Pisander.  I will have him read them.  A little more white lead, Arsinoe, I am too tanned; make me paler.  Just run over the veins of my temples with a touch of blue paint.  Now a tint of antimony on my eyelids.”

“Your ladyship seems in wonderfully good spirits this morning,” insinuated Pratinas.

“Yes,” said Valeria, with a sigh, “I endure the woes of life as should one who is consoled by philosophy.”

“Shall I continue the Plato?” edged in poor Pisander, who was raging inwardly to think that Pratinas should dare to assume the name of a “lover of learning.”

“When you are needed, I can tell you,” snapped Valeria, sharply, at the feeble remonstrance.  “Now, Semiramis, you may arrange my hair.”

The girl looked puzzled.  To tell the truth, Valeria was speaking in a tongue that was a babel of Greek and Latin, although she fondly imagined it to be the former, and Semiramis could hardly understand her.

“If your ladyship will speak in Latin,” faltered the maid.

“Speak in Latin!  Speak in Latin!” flared up Valeria.  “Am I deceived?  Are you not Greeks?  Are you some ignorant Italian wenches who can’t speak anything but their native jargon?  Bah!  You’ve misplaced a curl.  Take that!” And she struck the girl across the palms, with the flat of her silver mirror.  Semiramis shivered and flushed, but said nothing.

“Do I not have a perfect Greek pronunciation?” said the lady, turning to Pratinas.  “It is impossible to carry on a polite conversation in Latin.”

“I can assure your ladyship,” said the Hellene, with still another bland smile, “that your pronunciation is something exceedingly remarkable.”

Valeria was pacified, and lay back submitting to her hairdressers[40], while Pratinas, who knew what kind of “philosophy” appealed most to his fair patroness, read with a delicate yet altogether admirable voice, a number of scraps of erotic verse that he said friends had just sent on from Alexandria.

  [40] Ornatrices.