This is tolerably self-evident, but some require special information as:—­

  “You can behold what you can scarce believe
   There is but one eye, yet a thousand heads,
   Who sells what he has, whence shall he get what he has not?”

Few would ever guess that this referred to a one-eyed man selling garlic.  But the greater number of these conceits are merely emblematic descriptions of well-known things, and are more vague than epigrammatic, as,

  “I am the purple of the earth suffused with lovely tints and girt,
  lest I be wronged with pointed spears.  Happy indeed! had I but
  length of life.”

  “There’s a new capture of some well-known game, that what you catch
  not, you bear off with you.”

  “Hoarsely amidst the waves I raise my voice
   It sounds with praise with which it lauds itself,
   And though I ever sing, no one applauds.”

  “Spontaneous coming, I show various forms,
   I feign vain fears, when there is no true conflict,
   But no one can see me till he shuts his eyes.”

  “By art four equal sisters run
   As if in contest, though the labour’s one,
   And both are near, nor can each other touch."[32]

We know little of Macrobius except that he was a Greek, and lived in the fifth century.  His principal work was his “Saturnalia,” and he selected for it this title and plan, because, as he tells us, men were in his day so much occupied with business, that it was only in the annual festival of misrule that they had any time for reflection or social intercourse.  The “Saturnalia,” occupied the greater part of December, and Macrobius represents a company of magnates and wits agreeing to meet daily to discuss in the morning topics of importance, and to spend the evening in light and jocund conversation.  His work treats of astronomy, mythology, poetry and rhetoric, but it is most interesting with regard to our present subject, where he brings before us one of those scenes of convivial merriment of which we have often heard.  The party are to relate humorous anecdotes in turn.  Avienus says that they should be intellectual not voluptuous, to which the president, Praetextatus, replies, that they will not banish pleasure as an enemy, nor consider it to be the greatest good.  After these suggestions they commence:—­

Praetextatus records a saying of Hannibal.  Antiochus, to whom he had fled, showed him in a plain a vast army he had collected to make war with the Romans; the men were adorned with gold and silver, there were chariots with scythes, elephants with towers, cavalry shining with ornamental bits and housings.  Then turning to Hannibal, he asked him if he thought they would be enough for the Romans.  The Carthaginian, smiling at the weakness and cowardice of the gaudily accoutred host, replied, “Certainly, I think they will be enough for them, however greedy they may be.”

Furius Albinus says that after the flight at Mutina, on some lady asking what Antony was doing, one of his friends replied, “What the dogs do in Egypt—­drink and run!” “It is well known,” he adds, “that there the dogs run while they drink, for fear of the crocodiles.”