You may talk about that misbehaved pair, who were anything but
harmonious and loving, if Homer tells truly. I prefer our own Juppiter
and our Juno of the Aventine. _They_ are a staid and home-keeping
couple, worth imitating, if we are to imitate any celestials. But
nothing Greek for me."

[73] Contemptuous diminutive for Greek.

"Intolerant, intolerant," retorted Drusus, "we are all Greek, we
Romans of to-day--what is left of old Latium but her half-discarded
language, her laws worse than discarded, perverted, her good pilum[74]
which has not quite lost its cunning, and her--"

[74] The heavy short javelin carried by the Roman legionary, only
about six feet long. In practised hands it was a terrible weapon,
and won many a Roman victory.

"Men," interrupted Cornelia, "such as you!"

"And women," continued Drusus, "such as you! Ah! There is something
left of Rome after all. We are not altogether fallen, unworthy of our
ancestors. Why shall we not be merry? A Greek would say that it was
always darkest before Eos leaves the couch of Tithonus,[75] and who
knows that our Helios is not soon to dawn and be a long, long time ere
his setting? I feel like throwing formality to the winds, crying
'Iacchos evoë,' and dancing like a bacchanal, and singing in tipsy
delight,--

[75] The "rosy-fingered Dawn" of Homer; Tithonos was her consort.