“Tell us, go on, out with your stories.  They are all old friends!” stammered Florus.  “But while Favorinus chatters we can drink.”

The Gaul cast a contemptuous glance at the Roman, and answered promptly: 

“My stories are too good for a drunken man.”

Florus paused to think of an answer, but before he could find one, the praetor’s body-slave rushed into the hall crying out:  “The palace at Lochias is on fire.”

Verus kicked the mat of lilies off his feet on to the floor, tore down the net that screened him in, and shouted to the breathless runner.

“My chariot-quick, my chariot!  To our next merry meeting another evening my friends, with many thanks for the honor you have done me.  I must be off to Lochias.”

Verus flew out of the hall, without throwing on his cloak and hot as he was, into the cold night, and at the same time most of his guests had started up to hurry into the open air, to see the fire and to hear the latest news; but only very few went to the scene of the conflagration to help the citizens to extinguish it, and many heavily intoxicated drinkers remained lying on the couches.

As Favorinus and the Alexandrians raised themselves on their pillows Florus cried: 

“No god shall make me stir from this place, not if the whole house is burnt down and Alexandria and Rome, and for aught I care every nest and nook on the face of the earth.  It may all burn together.  The Roman Empire can never be greater or more splendid than under Caesar!  It may burn down like a heap of straw, it is all the same to me—­I shall lie here and drink.”

The turmoil and confusion on the scene of the interrupted feast seemed inextricable, while Verus hurried off to Sabina to inform her of what had occurred.  But Balbilla had been the first to discover the fire and quite at the beginning, for after sitting industriously at her studies, and before going to bed, she had looked out toward the sea.  She had instantly run out, cried “Fire!” and was now seeking for a chamberlain to awake Sabina.

The whole of Lochias flared and shone in a purple and golden glow.  It formed the nucleus of a wide spreading radiance of tender red of which the extent and intensity alternately grew and diminished.  Verus met the poetess at the door that led from the garden into the Empress’ apartments.  He omitted on this occasion to offer his customary greeting, but hastily asked her: 

“Has Sabina been told?”

“I think not yet.”

“Then have her called.  Greet her from me—­I must go to Lochias”

“We will follow you.”

“No, stay here; you will be in the way there.”

“I do not take much room and I shall go.  What a magnificent spectacle.”

“Eternal gods! the flames are breaking out too below the palace, by the
King’s harbor.  Where can the chariots be?”

“Take me with you.”

“No you must wake the Empress.”