y personal tastes concerning
lodging, bathing, hunting, food and clothing and was I a good sailor and
fond of the sea; and stated that I suited him.

I was not present at his chaffering with Olynthides but, after no long
interval I was summoned into the courtyard and Olynthides handed me over
to Nonius Libo, along with a bill of sale.

CHAPTER XXXII

PHORBAS

Olynthides had said to me:

"I make it a point always to forget the names of the slaves I buy for cash
without any guarantees and resell the same way. I have as bad a memory for
names as any man alive and I help my bad memory to be as much worse as I
can. I'll forget your name in a few days. I am not sure I remember it now.
What is it?"

I was ready for him, for I had made up my mind to change my name again and
had selected my new name.

"Phorbas" I answered.

"Oh, yes!" he ruminated, "Phorbas, to be sure. I should have said Florus
or Foslius or something like that. Phorbas! I'll remember Phorbas till
after you are sold and the cash in my hands and you and your new master
out of sight. Then I'll forget that too, like all the rest."

As Phorbas, Phorbas the Art Connoisseur, I began my life with Nonius. He
was domiciled in a palace of a residence on the Carinae, which he had
leased for the short term of his proposed stay in Rome. There I was lodged
in a really magnificent apartment, with a private bath, a luxurious
bedroom, a smaller bedroom for the slave detailed to wait on me, a tiny
_triclinium_ and a jewel of a sitting-room, gorgeous with statuettes and
paintings, crammed with objects of art and walled with a virtuoso's
selection of the best books of the best possible materials and
workmanship.

There I spent some happy days. Nonius had told me I might go out all I
pleased. I had replied that I preferred to remain indoors until we set out
for Carthage. He smiled, nodded and said:

"I understand: do as you like."

I passed my time most agreeably, except for several intrusions by Libo's
wife, Rufia Clatenna. She was a tall, raw-boned, lean woman, with
unmanageable hair which would not stay crimped, a hatchet face, too much
nose and too little chin, a stringy neck, very large, red, knuckly hands
and big flat feet. She had a mania for economy and close bargains, seemed
to regard her husband as an easy mark for swindlers and to be certain that
he had been cheated when he bought me. She thought herself an art-expert,
whereas she had no sound kno