“I fancied that you not only served the state but were my husband’s friend.”

“I am proud to call myself so.”

“Aye—­Hadrian has many, very many friends since he has worn the purple.  Have you got over your ill temper Titianus?  You must have become very touchy.  Poor Julia has an irritable husband!”

“She is less to be pitied than you think,” said Titianus with dignity, “for my official duties so entirely claim my time that she is not often likely to know what disturbs me.  If I have forgotten to dissimulate my vexation before you, I beg you to pardon me, and to attribute it to my zeal in securing a worthy reception for Hadrian.”

“As if I had scolded you!  But to return to your wife—­as I understand she shares the fate I endure.  We poor women have nothing to expect from our husbands, but the stale leavings that remain after business has absorbed the rest!  But your story—­go on with your story.”

“The worst moments I had at all were given me by the bad feeling of the Jews towards the other citizens.”

“I hate all these infamous sects—­Jews, Christians or whatever they are called!  Do they dare to grudge their money for the reception of Caesar?”

“On the contrary Alabarchos, their wealthy chief, has offered to defray all the cost of the Naumachia and his co-religionist Artemion.”

“Well, take their money, take their money.”

“The Greek citizens feel that they are rich enough to pay all the expenses, which will amount to many millions of sesterces, and they wish to exclude the Jews, if possible, from all the processions and games.”

“They are perfectly right.”

“But allow me to ask you whether it is just to prohibit half the population of Alexandria doing honor to their Emperor!”

“Oh!  Hadrian will, with pleasure, dispense with the honor.  Our conquering heroes have thought it redounded to their glory to be called Africanus, Germanicus and Dacianus, but Titus refused to be called Judaicus when he had destroyed Jerusalem.”

“That was because he dreaded the remembrance of the rivers of blood which had to be shed in order to break the fearfully obstinate resistance of that nation.  The besieged had to be conquered limb by limb, and finger by finger, before they would make up their minds to yield.”

“Again you are speaking half poetically, or have these people elected you as their advocate?”

“I know them and make every effort to secure them justice, just as much as any other citizen of this country which I govern in the name of the Empire and of Caesar.  They pay taxes as well as the rest of the Alexandrians; nay more, for there are many wealthy men among them who are honorably prominent in trade, in professions, learning and art, and I therefore mete to them the same measure as to the other inhabitants of this city.  Their superstition offends me no more than that of the Egyptians.”