"But a particular attention to the art, and a greater ability in the practice of it, may be observed in Pisistratus. He was succeeded in the following century by Themistocles, who, according to the Roman date, was a person of the remotest antiquity; but, according to that of the Athenians, he was almost a modern. For he lived when Greece was in the height of her power, but when the city of Rome had but lately freed herself from the shackles of regal tyranny;--for the dangerous war with the Volsci, who were headed by Coriolanus (then a voluntary exile) happened nearly at the same time as the Persian war; and we may add, that the fate of both commanders was remarkably similar. Each of them, after distinguishing himself as an excellent citizen, being driven from his country by the wrongs of an ungrateful people, went over to the enemy: and each of them repressed the efforts of his resentment by a voluntary death. For though you, my Atticus, have represented the exit of Coriolanus in a different manner, you must give me leave to dispatch him in the way I have mentioned."--"You may use your pleasure," replied Atticus with a smile: "for it is the privilege of rhetoricians to exceed the truth of history, that they may have an opportunity of embellishing the fate of their heroes: and accordingly, Clitarchus and Stratocles have entertained us with the same pretty fiction about the death of Themistocles, which you have invented for Coriolanus. Thucydides, indeed, who was himself an Athenian of the highest rank and merit, and lived nearly at the same time, has only informed us that he died, and was privately buried in Attica, adding, that it was suspected by some that he had poisoned himself. But these ingenious writers have assured us, that, having slain a bull at the altar, he caught the blood in a large bowl, and, drinking it off, fell suddenly dead upon the ground. For this species of death had a tragical air, and might be described with all the pomp of rhetoric; whereas the ordinary way of dying afforded no opportunity for ornament. As it will, therefore, suit your purpose, that Coriolanus should resemble Themistocles in every thing, I give you leave to introduce the fatal bowl; and you may still farther heighten the catastrophe by a solemn sacrifice, that Coriolanus may appear in all respects to have been a second Themistocles."