'The last would be indeed a miracle!' said Sallust, gravely.

'How mean you, Sallust?' returned the gamester, with a flushed brow.

'I mean, what you would leave me if I played often with you; and that
is--nothing.'

Clodius answered only by a smile of disdain.

'If Arbaces were not so rich,' said Pansa, with a stately air, 'I should
stretch my authority a little, and inquire into the truth of the report
which calls him an astrologer and a sorcerer. Agrippa, when aedile of
Rome, banished all such terrible citizens. But a rich man--it is the
duty of an aedile to protect the rich!'

'What think you of this new sect, which I am told has even a few
proselytes in Pompeii, these followers of the Hebrew God--Christus?'

'Oh, mere speculative visionaries,' said Clodius; 'they have not a
single gentleman amongst them; their proselytes are poor, insignificant,
ignorant people!'

'Who ought, however, to be crucified for their blasphemy,' said Pansa,
with vehemence; 'they deny Venus and Jove! Nazarene is but another name
for atheist. Let me catch them--that's all.'

The second course was gone--the feasters fell back on their
couches--there was a pause while they listened to the soft voices of the
South, and the music of the Arcadian reed. Glaucus was the most rapt
and the least inclined to break the silence, but Clodius began already