‘Witness thou, Attis! thou, whose lovely eyes Could e’en surprise the mother of the skies! Witness the dolphin, too, who cleaves the tides, And flouncing rides on Nereus’ sea-green sides; Witness thou likewise, Hannibal divine, Thou who didst chine the long ribb’d Apennine!’[7] What assonance! What realism! What dainty euphuistic audacity! As Persius says, ‘It all seems to swim and melt in the mouth!’ ‘Well, well,’ replied the philosopher, ‘at least you will admit that he might be worse employed than in singing and versifying?’ ‘An Emperor might be better employed,’ said the young man; ‘and with him I live on tenter-hooks. I heartily wish that he had never summoned me from Athens, or done me the honour of calling me his intimate friend. Frankly, I do not like him. Much as he tries to conceal it, he is horribly jealous of me. He does all he can to make me suppress my poems, though he affects to praise them; and though, of course, when he reads me his verses, I cry “_Euge!_” and “Σοφῶς!” at every line, as needs must when the master of thirty legions writes, yet he sees through my praise. And I really cannot always suppress my smiles. The other day he told me that the people called his voice “divine.” A minute after, as though meaning to express admiration for his verses, I repeated his phrase-- ‘“Thou d’st think it thundered under th’ earth.”[8] He was furious! He took it for a twofold reflection, on his voice and on his alliteration; and I was desperately alarmed. It was hard work to pacify him with a deluge of adulation.’ Seneca sighed. ‘Be careful, Lucan,’ he said, ‘be careful! The character of Nero is rapidly altering. At present I have kept back the tiger in him from tasting blood; but when he does he will bathe his jaws pretty deeply. It is ill jesting when one’s head is in a wild beast’s mouth.’ ‘And yet,’ said Gallio, ‘I have heard you say that no one could compare the mansuetude even of the aged Augustus with that of the youthful Nero.’ Seneca thought it disagreeable to be reminded of his politic inconsistencies. ‘I wish to lead him to clemency,’ he said, ‘even if he be cruel. But he is his father’s son. You know what Lucius Domitius was. He struck out the eye of a Roman knight, and he purposely ran over and trampled on a poor child in the Appian road. Have I ever told you that the night after I was appointed his tutor I dreamt that my pupil was _Caligula_?’ There was an awkward pause, and to turn the conversation, Lucan suddenly asked, ‘Uncle, do you believe in Babylonians and their horoscopes?’ ‘No,’ said the philosopher. ‘The star of each man’s destiny is in his heart.’ ‘Do you not? Well, I will not say that I do. And yet--would you like to hear what a friend told me? He said that he had been a _mathematicus_ under Apollonius of Tyana.’ ‘Tell us,’ said his father, Mela. ‘I am not so wise as our Seneca, and I feel certain that there is something in the predictions of the astrologers.’