the sun rose I started home."

"Come along, prudent youth," he said, "we need you. The sub-procurator in
charge of the beast-train which the brigands interfered with is at the
villa: so are half his beast-tenders and teamsters. The animal-keepers vow
they dare not attempt to recapture their charges and the procurator is
angry and worried and anxious about his responsibility and what will be
expected of him by his superiors. He does not want to lose one single lion
or tiger or even hyena; wants them recaged at once. So do I. I've lost
more stock than I like to think of. The hyenas and panthers and leopards
have slaughtered a host of my sheep and goats, and the lions and tigers
have banqueted on some of my most promising colts and on many of my
cattle.

"Can you duplicate your feat with the panther loose on the highway?"

"I can repeat it as often as I can get anywhere near any of those beasts
by daylight," I said. "Let us start at once. There is no hurry, for the
beasts will do little damage in daytime, as most of them will hide till
dark. But there seems to be a large number loose; I doubt if I can catch
all of them before dusk."

"It'll take you two days, Felix, or three," the _Villicus_ laughed. "The
procurator states that his train had in its cages twenty-five panthers, as
many leopards, fifty tigers, a hundred lions and two hundred hyenas.
That's four hundred beasts for you to catch as fast as they can be located
by their keepers, assisted by my whole force of horse-wranglers, herdsmen,
shepherds, and the rest and all the farmers hereabouts, and all their
slaves. We'll have plenty of help. Three farmers are at the villa now
raving over the loss of sheep or cattle; every farmer will turn out with
his men to help us; anyhow, every bumpkin and yokel will want to enjoy the
fun and they'll all flock to the scene."

I do not know how many days I spent catching the escaped beasts for the
procurator. I enjoyed the first day, did not mind the second and was not
painfully weary on the third; but the rest passed in a daze of exhaustion;
though I had good horses, a fresh horse whenever I asked for it, wine and
good wine as often as I was thirsty, plenty of good food and every
consideration; and although the various farms at which I spent the nights
(for we did not once return to the villa) did all they could for my
comfort, the repetition, for hundreds of times, of dismounting,
approaching a lion or tiger in his daylight