lions: a hundred darts from the unerring
hand of Commodus laid them dead as they ran raging round the arena.
Neither the huge bulk of the elephant nor the scaly hide of the
rhinoceros could defend them from his stroke. AEthiopia and India yielded
their most extraordinary productions; and several animals were slain in
the Amphitheatre which had been seen only in the representations of art
or perhaps of fancy. In all these exhibitions the securest precautions
were used to protect the person of the Roman Hercules from the desperate
spring of any savage, who might possibly disregard the dignity of the
Emperor and the sanctity of the god.

But the meanest of the populace were affected with shame and indignation
when they beheld their sovereign enter the lists as a gladiator, and
glory in a profession which the laws and manners of the Romans had
branded with the justest note of infamy.[48] He chose the habit and arms
of the _secutor_, whose combat with the _retiarius_ formed one of the
most lively scenes in the bloody sports of the Amphitheatre. The secutor
was armed with a helmet, sword, and buckler; his naked antagonist had
only a large net and a trident; with the one he endeavored to entangle,
with the other to despatch his enemy. If he missed the first throw, he
was obliged to fly from the pursuit of the secutor till he had prepared
his net for a second cast.

The Emperor fought in this character seven hundred and thirty-five
several times. These glorious achievements were carefully recorded in
the public acts of the empire; and that he might omit no circumstance of
infamy, he received from the common fund of gladiators a stipend so
exorbitant that it became a new and most ignominious tax upon the Roman
people. It may be easily supposed that in these engagements the master
of the world was always successful; in the Amphitheatre his victories
were not often sanguinary; but when he exercised his skill in the school
of gladiators or his own palace, his wretched antagonists were
frequently honored with a mortal wound from the hand of Commodus, and
obliged to seal their flattery with their blood.

He now disdained the appellation of Hercules. The name of Paulus, a
celebrated secutor, was the only one which delighted his ear. It was
inscribed on his colossal statues and repeated in the redoubled
acclamations of the mournful and applauding senate. Claudius Pompeianus,
the virtuous husband of Lucilla, was the only senator who