One day, as Nero sat, with Tigellinus by his side, looking on at a sham sea-fight, for the purpose of which the arena had been flooded, they were struck with one of the novelties which Arruntius Stella, the president of the games, had devised for the amusement of the populace. During the fight one of the vessels had been so constructed as to go to pieces, to pour a number of armed men out of its hold, and then to be reunited into a trireme as before. Tigellinus touched the arm of Nero, and Nero, filled with the same thought, turned to him a glance of intelligence. ‘The sea is a treacherous element,’ said Tigellinus. ‘All sorts of strange and unaccountable accidents happen at sea.’ ‘I wonder who could make me a ship of that kind,’ said the Emperor. ‘Your old tutor, Anicetus. He is at this moment admiral of the fleet at Misenum. Stella would put at his disposal the artist who contrived this vessel. One like it could be made in a few weeks, and magnificently adorned for the use of the Empress.’ ‘How could she be induced to go on board?’ ‘She is at Antium; you are going to Baiæ. The Feast of Minerva is coming on. You must be reconciled to her publicly, must invite her to your villa, and must place the galley at her disposal.’ The sea-fight went on, but it was observed that after the new contrivance of the mechanical ship, Nero did not pay much attention to it. He was apparently lost in thought. He was impatiently revolving in his mind the intolerable conditions by which he was surrounded. On the one side was his mother, haughty, menacing, powerful in spite of her dethronement; and, on the other, Poppæa entangling him in her sorceries, worrying him with importunities, goading him to matricide with envenomed taunts. And behind them both stood the spectre of his tormenting conscience, with thrilling whisper and outstretched hand. And thus it was that the world went on. In that age morality had well-nigh vanished because faith was well-nigh dead. Man cannot live without a conscience or without God. Guilty pleasure is brief-lived, and afterwards it stingeth like a serpent. It is self-slain by the Nemesis of satiety. The wickedest age the world has ever seen was also the most incurably sad.