"A lobster! Mercy on us! How can you recall such a picture to my mind! I would give my immortal soul for one claw of a lobster, or even for the tail. And never to sleep one's fill! To be awakened, if not by hunger, by the trumpets of the patrol!" "Look at the Prefect! For the last fourteen days he has not slept fourteen hours. He lies upon his hard shield, and drinks rain-water out of his helmet." "The Prefect! He need not eat. He lives upon his pride, like the bear on his fat, and sucks his own gall. He is made of nothing but sinews and muscles, pride and hatred! But I--who had accumulated such soft white flesh, that the mice nibbled at me when I slept, thinking that I was a Spanish ham!--Do you know the latest news? A whole herd of fat oxen was driven into the Gothic camp this morning--all from Apulia; darlings of gods and men!" The next day early Piso, with Salvius Julianus, came to wake the Prefect, who had lain down on the wall by the Porta Portuensis, close to the most important point of defence, the bolt across the river. "Forgive me for disturbing your rare slumbers." "I was not asleep; I was awake. Tell me your news, tribune." "Last night Balbus deserted his post with twenty citizens. They let themselves down from the Porta Latina by ropes. Outside there had been heard all night long the lowing of Apulian herds. It seems that their bellowing was irresistible." But the smile of the satirist faded away when he looked at the Prefect's face. "Let a cross thirty feet high be erected before the house of Balbus in the Via Sacra. Every deserter who falls into our hands shall be crucified thereon." "General--Constantinus abolished the punishment of crucifixion in the name of our Saviour," said Salvius Julianus reprovingly. "Then I re-introduce the practice in honour of Rome. That Emperor no doubt held it to be impossible that a Roman noble and tribune could desert his post for the sake of roast meat." "I have other news. I can no longer set the watch on the tower of the Porta Pinciana. Of the sixteen mercenaries nine are either dead or sick." "Almost the same thing is reported by Marcus Licinius, at the Porta Tiburtina," said Julianus. "Who can ward off the danger which threatens us on all sides?" "I! and the courage of the Romans. Go! Let the heralds summon all the citizens, who may yet be in the houses, to the Forum Romanum." "Sir, there are only women, children, and sick people----" "Obey, tribune!"