fragments that his readers and himself believed them to be new ones of
his own and would have found it very difficult to separate the mosaic
into its borrowed portions. Passions had never furrowed this smooth
face: the lines around the eyes were not graven by pain, but by the
passage of the years.

This kindly natured man, who himself saw everything on its best side,
thought the whole world most admirably arranged. He believed seriously
that all men who had not committed great crimes, and therefore deserved
punishment, fared just as well as the very, very wealthy, benevolent,
and much praised Decimus Magnus Ausonius of Burdigala (Bordeaux), the
delightful city of villas; that they fared as well as Ausonius, who was
petted by all who surrounded him, and who in the opinion of his
contemporaries--and especially his own--was the greatest poet of his
age. Even had this been true, it certainly would not have meant much.

This really amiable, kindly man, whose only fault was a little undue
self-satisfaction, was now playing the part which best suited him,--far
better than that of poet or statesman,--the part of the host who,
comfortable himself, desires to make all his guests equally so. His
pleasant, cheery, friendly kindness of heart, which would fain see
everybody happy, though of course without too much self-sacrifice,
found in this _role_ its fullest expression.

"There! now go, slaves." He waved his hand to those who had again
entered. "Look after yourselves--as we are doing. Go, too, my faithful
Prosper: take for yourself--and give to the others--the better wine
from Rhodanus; you know it. I saw how hard it was to drag the skins up
the steep hill. Go: we will serve ourselves." He stretched himself
comfortably on the lectus, thrusting under his head a soft downy pillow
filled with the feathers of German geese. "Give yonder amethyst goblet
to the Tribune, my dear nephew, for our Illyrian Hercules must drink
deeply! No, Saturninus, don't take the mixing vessel! The first
cup--unmixed. To the genius of the Emperor Gratianus!"

"It's lucky that the Emperor himself doesn't hear you," cried the
Tribune, laughing, as he put down the empty goblet. "I am neither
Christian nor pagan, only a soldier, and nobody asks about my faith.
But you! Gratianus's teacher! The Emperor is zealous in the true
religion. And you drink to his genius, as though we were living in the
reign of Diocletian! Are you a pagan, Prefect of Gaul?"

Aus