the faces without turning her head or appearing to stare.

For a long time there was merely desultory conversation while the feast,
restricted within moderate proportions by request of Pertinax, was
brought on.

There were eels, for which Daphne was famous; alphests and callichthys;
pompilos, a purple fish, said to have been born from sea-foam at the
birth of Aphrodite; boops and bedradones; gray mullet; cuttle-fish;
tunny-fish and mussels. Followed in their order pheasants, grouse,
swan, peacock and a large pig stuffed with larks and mincemeat. Then
there were sweetmeats of various kinds, and a pudding invented in
Persia, made with honey and dates, with a sauce of frozen cream and
strawberries. By Galen's order only seven sorts of wine were served, so
when the meal was done the guests were neither drunk nor too well fed to
carry on a conference.

No entertainers were provided. Normally the space between the table and
the front of the pavilion would have been occupied by acrobats, dancers
and jugglers; but Pertinax dismissed even the impudent women who came
to lean elbows on the marble railing and sing snatches of suggestive
song. He sent slaves to stand outside and keep the crowd away, his
lictor and his personal official bodyguard being kept out of sight in a
small stone house near the pavilion kitchen at the rear among the trees,
in order not to arouse unwelcome comment. It was known he was in
Daphne; there was even a subdued expectation in Antioch that his
unannounced visit portended the extortion of extra tribute. The Emperor
Commodus was known to be in his usual straits for money. Given a
sufficient flow of wine, the sight of bodyguard and lictor might have
been enough to start a riot, the Antiochenes being prone to outbreak