"If you draw blood from me, I'll pay you one hundred thousand sesterces: if I fail to lay you out on the pavement, totally insensible, in three bouts, I'll pay you two hundred thousand sesterces. You can pick any _lanista_ here to judge the fight and tell us when to separate and rest." Capito, cool enough, indicated Murmex as referee. "He's not a _lanista_," Commodus objected. "He's Frugi's pupil," Capito maintained, "and therefore the best _lanista_ here." "I agree," said Commodus, and he called: "Who's the physician on duty?" When the official came forward he said truculently: "Get your plasters ready and your revivers. You'll have to attend a man flat on the pavement, insensible and with a bad scalp wound, before much time has passed." And actually, though Capito fenced well, he was no match for Commodus. The bout was worth watching. The adversaries were just the same height and differed little in weight. Capito seemed more compact and steady; Commodus more lithe and agile. Capito was a handsome man and made a fine figure in his scanty, leek-green fencing tunic. Commodus, always vain, of his good looks, delighted in exhibiting himself totally nude, not only because he loved to shock elderly noblemen imbued with old-fashioned ideas of propriety, but also because he rightly thought himself one of the best formed men alive. He was fond of being told that he was like Hercules but, except in the paintings of Zeuxis, Hercules has always been depicted as brawnier and more mature than Commodus was then or ever became, to his last hour. To me he suggested Mercury, especially as he appears in the paintings of Polygnotus, or Apollo, as Apelles depicted him. Besides the grace and good looks of the two, they fenced very well, Capito correctly and with good judgment, Commodus with amazing dash and originality. Capito, though bold, was wholly unable to touch Commodus, while Commodus slashed him, even through his tunic, till his blood ran from a dozen scratches. Before the second bout was well joined Capito was felled by a blow on the head, which laid him flat and insensible, bleeding from a terrible scalp wound. After Capito had been carried off by the attendants, the Emperor, wrapped in an athlete's blanket, talked a while to Murmex and then went off to bathe, for he bathed many times a day. Set free, I went out and was helped into my litter. The two dogs were still by it, took their places under it as if they had belonged to me since puppyhood and under it trotted as I returned home. Once home I ate the lunch permitted me and had an hour's sound, dreamless sleep. I woke feeling so well that I sent for Agathemer, bade him have my litter ready and told him I was going to the Baths of Titus. Inevitably Agathemer protested that I was not well enough; naturally I insisted and, of course, I had my way.