At the same time Diodoros heard his next neighbor, a member of the city senate, say: 

“How quietly it is going off!  My proposal that Caesar should come in to a dim light, so as to keep him and his unpopular favorites out of sight for a while, has worked capitally.  Who could the mob whistle at, so long as they could not see one from another?  Now they are too much delighted to be uproarious.  Caesar’s bride, of all others, has reason to thank me.  And she reminds me of the Persian warriors who, before going into battle, bound cats to their bucklers because they knew that the Egyptian foe would not shoot at them so long as the sacred beasts were exposed to being hit by his arrows.”

“What do you mean by that?” asked another, and received the brisk reply: 

“The lady Euryale is the cat who protects the damsel.  Out of respect for her, and for fear of hurting her, too, her companion has hitherto been spared even by those fellows up there.”

And he pointed to a party of “Greens” who were laying their heads together in one of the topmost tiers.  But his friend replied: 

“Something besides that keeps them within bounds.  The three beardless fellows just behind them belong to the city watch, who are scattered through the general mass like raisins in doughcakes.”

“That is very judicious,” replied the senator.

“We might otherwise have had to quit the Circus a great deal quicker than we came in.  We shall hardly get home with dry garments as it is.  Look how the lights up there are flaring; you can hear the lashing of the storm, and such flashes are not produced by machinery.  Zeus is preparing his bolts, and if the storm bursts—­”

Here his discourse was interrupted by the sound of trumpets, mingling with the roar of distant thunder following a vivid flash.  The procession now began, which was the preliminary to every such performance.

The statues of the gods had, before Caesar’s arrival, been placed on the pedestals erected for them to prevent any risk of a demonstration at the appearance of the deified emperors.  The priests now first marched solemnly round these statues, and Timotheus poured a libation on the sand to Serapis, while the priest of Alexandria did the same to the tutelary hero of the town.  Then the masters of the games, the gladiators, and beast-fighters came out, who were to make proof of their skill.  As the priests approached Caesar’s dais, Caracalla came forward and greeted the spectators, thus showing himself for the first time.

While he was still sitting behind the screen, he had sent for Melissa, who had obeyed the command, under the protection of Euryale, and he had spoken to her graciously.  He now took no further notice of her, of her father, or her brother, and by his orders their places had been separated by some little distance from his.  By the advice of Timotheus he would not let her be seen at his side till the stars had once more been consulted, and he would then conduct Melissa to the Circus as his wife-the day after to-morrow, perhaps.  He thanked the matron for having escorted Melissa, and added, with a braggart air of virtue, that the world should see that he, too, could sacrifice the most ardent wish of his heart to moral propriety.