'The women of Palmyra,' replied the Emperor, 'as I have good reason to know, are more than the men of other climes. She who reads Plato and the last essays of Plotinus, of a morning, seated idly beneath the shadow of some spreading beech, just as a Roman girl would the last child's story of Spurius about father Tiber and the Milvian Bridge, is not to be received in this question as but a woman, with a woman's powers of judgment. When the women of Rome receive their faith as easily as you do, then may it be held as an argument for its simplicity. But let us now break off the thread of this discourse, too severe for the occasion, and mingle with our other friends, who by this must be arrived.' So, with these words, we left the apartment where we had been sitting, the Emperor having upon one side Portia, and on the other Livia, and moved toward the great central rooms of the palace, where guests are entertained, and the imperial banquets held. The company was not numerous; it was rather remarkable for its selectness. Among others not less distinguished, there were the venerable Tacitus, the consul Capitolinus, Marcellinus the senator, the prefect Varus, the priest Fronto, the generals Probus and Mucapor, and a few others of the military favorites of Aurelian. Of the conversation at supper, I remember little or nothing, only that it was free and light, each seeming to enjoy himself and the companion who reclined next to him. Aurelian, with a condescending grace, which no one knows how better to assume than he, urged the wine upon his friends, as they appeared occasionally to forget it, offering frequently some new and unheard of kind, brought from Asia, Greece, or Africa, and which he would exalt to the skies for its flavor. More than once did he, as he is wont to do in his sportive mood, deceive us; for, calling upon us to fill our goblets with what he described as a liquor surpassing all of Italy, and which might serve for Hebe to pour out for the gods, and requiring us to drink it off in honor of Bacchus, Pan, or Ceres, we found, upon lifting our cups to drain them, that they had been charged with some colored and perfumed medicament more sour or bitter than the worst compound of the apothecary, or than massican overheated in the vats. These sallies, coming from the master of the world, were sure to be well received; his satellites, of whom not a few, even on this occasion, were near him, being ready to die with excess of laughter,--the attendant slaves catching the jest, and enjoying it with noisy vociferation. I laughed with the rest, for it seems wise to propitiate, by any act not absolutely base, one, whose ambitious and cruel nature, unless soothed and appeased by such offerings, is so prone to reveal itself in deeds of darkness.