already prepared for my use.

'Here I have carefully placed your baggage,' said the slave as I entered
the room, 'and whatever else I thought you might need. Call Hannibal when
you wish for my services; I am now yours. This door leads to a small room
where will lodge your own slave Milo; the others are in the stables.' Thus
delivering himself, he departed.

The windows of my apartment opened upon the wide street by which we had
entered the city, not immediately, but first upon a border of trees and
flowers, then upon a low wall, here and there crowned with a statue or a
vase, which separated the house from the street, and last upon the street
itself, its busy throngs and noble structures. I stood for a moment
enjoying the scene, rendered more impressive by the dim but still glowing
light of the declining day. Sounds of languages which I knew not fell
upon my ear, sent forth by those who urged along through the crowds their
cattle, or by those who would draw attention to the articles which they
had to sell. All was new and strange, and tended, together with my
reflections upon the business which had borne me so far from my home and
you, to fill me with melancholy. I was roused from my reverie by the
voice of Milo.

'If,' said he, 'the people of these eastern regions understand better than
we of Rome the art of taking off heads, they certainly understand better,
as in reason they should, the art of making them comfortable while they
are on: already I have taken a longer draught at a wine skin than I have
been blessed with since I was in the service of the most noble Gallienus.
Ah, that was life! He was your true philosopher who thought life, made for
living. These Palmyrenes seem of his school.'