Roman house-slaves have their sorrows but they need not ordinarily fear two mortal evils--hunger, or overwork. They have, of course, their own dining quarters and are kept on sufficient, if simple rations of meal cakes, salt, oil, common wine, and a little fruit. Butcher’s meat they seldom touch, except as the kitchen staff get the leavings from the banquets, although the upper servants naturally fare more sumptuously. As for slaves’ working hours, they are absurdly short. Every servant has some limited appointed task. When that is finished nothing else is expected of him, and to require other duties would not merely make the master unpopular with his servants, it would stamp him before his equals as an extremely mean and sordid man. Thus, on very many days, Calvus’s six litter bearers have absolutely nothing to do. On the many nights that he and Gratia dine out the great kitchen staff is concerned mainly with the dice-box. The boudoir maids are usually idle from the time their mistress is dressed until she must dress again for dinner. All this makes for gossiping, gaming, and for the worst kinds of busy idleness. =112. Inevitable Degradation Caused by Slavery. Evil Effect upon Masters.=--Are these “speaking tools” very miserable? Calvus’s familia is not exceptional in that a tolerably kindly relation often exists between owner and owned. The Stoic philosophy is making its impression, and there are plenty of theoretical arguments that “a slave is also a man” and entitled to humane treatment. A master or mistress who is habitually cruel is frowned on socially as might be a man accustomed to abuse his horses. Nevertheless, the status of a slave is always morally degrading. He feels himself a mere chattel. Whatever he enjoys, he enjoys merely on suffrance. Any sort of iniquity is condoned in his mind “if the master orders it,” and he is likely to be honest and faithful more through the fear of harsh punishment than because of any high ethical motives. On the other hand just because slavery has perforce its brutal, soul-destroying elements, it is almost equally evil for the master. It is seldom good for a man to have the lives often of hundreds of fellow beings in his power; or to be relieved of every possible kind of honest exertion by a swarm of officious menials. Furthermore, slavery being inevitably so brutal, masters often live in terror of a mutiny by the brutes themselves. “_So many slaves, so many enemies_,” is a standard maxim; not always true, but true enough to excuse many horrid practices.