the garden of the Caesareum he saw a light in the rooms of Balbilla, the
poetess, and he called up merrily:

"Good-night, fair Muse!"

"Good-night, sham Eros!" she retorted.

You are decking yourself in borrowed feathers, Poetess," replied he,
laughing. "It is not you but the ill-mannered Alexandrians who invented
that name!"

"Oh! and other and better ones," cried she. "What I have heard and seen
to-day passes all belief!"

"And you will celebrate it in your poems?"

"Only some of it, and that in a satire which I propose to aim at you."

"I tremble!"

"With delight, it is to be hoped; my poem will embalm your memory for
posterity."

"That is true, and the more spiteful your verses, the more certainly will
future generations believe that Verus was the Phaon of Balbilla's Sappho,
and that love scorned filled the fair singer with bitterness."

"I thank you for the caution. To-day at any rate you are safe from my
verse, for I am tired to death."