was better, he thought, to be a
good husband than a great senator. His domestic discipline was
strict. The servants were not allowed to leave the house without
orders, nor to talk of what occurred to the household to strangers.
The more severe punishments were not inflicted capriciously, but
sentence was pronounced and executed according to a quasi-judicial
procedure: the strictness with which offences were punished may be
inferred from the fact, that one of his slaves who had concluded a
purchase without orders from his master hanged himself on the matter
coming to Cato's ears. For slight offences, such as mistakes
committed in waiting at table, the consular was wont after dinner to
administer to the culprit the proper number of lashes with a thong
wielded by his own hand. He kept his wife and children in order no
less strictly, but by other means; for he declared it sinful to lay
hands on a wife or grown-up children in the same way as on slaves.
In the choice of a wife he disapproved marrying for money, and
recommended men to look to good descent; but he himself married in
old age the daughter of one of his poor clients. Moreover he adopted
views in regard to continence on the part of the husband similar to
those which everywhere prevail in slave countries; a wife was
throughout regarded by him as simply a necessary evil. His writings
abound in invectives against the chattering, finery-loving,
ungovernable fair sex; it was the opinion of the old lord that "all
women are plaguy and proud," and that, "were men quit of women, our
life might probably be less godless." On the other hand the rearing
of children born in wedlock was a matter which touched his heart and
his honour, and the wife in his eyes existed strictly and solely for
the children's sake. She nursed them ordinarily herself, or, if she
allowed her children to be suckled by female slaves, she also allowed
their children in return to draw nourishment from her own breast; one
of the few traits, which indicate an endeavour to mitigate the
institution of slavery by ties of human sympathy--the common impulses
of maternity and the bond of foster-brotherhood. The old general was
present in person, whenever it was possible, at the washing and
swaddling of his children. He watched with reverential care over
their childlike innocence; he assures us that he was as careful lest
he should utter an unbecoming word in presence of his children as if
he had been in