cut themselves and scourged themselves until they were covered with
blood. The master of the mansion was so impressed with this savage and
degrading spectacle that he gave the priests a good sum of money, and
invited them into his house. They took the goddess with them, and I
scampered out into the fields searching for some roses.

But I was quickly brought back by the cook. His master had given him a
fat haunch from an enormous stag to roast for the priests' dinner, and a
dog had run off with it. In order to avoid being whipped for his
carelessness, the slave resolved to let the priests dine off a haunch of
their own ass. He locked the door of the kitchen, so that I could not
escape, and then took a long knife and came to kill me. But I had no
mind to perish in this way; and I dashed upstairs into the room where
the master was busy worshipping the goddess in the company of the
priests, and knocked the table over, and the goddess and many of the
worshippers.

"Kill the wretched thing," said the master. "It has gone mad."

But the priests did not care to lose their salable property, and they
locked me in their bedroom, and sold me to the first man they met the
next morning. It was a poor gardener who needed an ass to cart his stuff
to market. But as the gardener was taking me home a soldier came
tramping along the road. He, too, wanted an ass to carry his heavy kit.
So he struck the gardener down with his sword and seized me by right of
conquest; then, loading me with his armour and shield and baggage, he
took me to the town to which he was travelling. There he was ordered by
his tribune to take some letters to Rome, so he disposed of me for a
small sum to two confectioners.