[Sidenote:--25--] Nor was Macrinus destined to survive for long,--a fact of which he doubtless had previous indications. A mule bore a mule in Rome and a sow had a little pig with four ears and two tongues and eight feet. A great earthquake occurred, blood flowed from a pipe, and bees formed honeycombs in the Forum Boarium. The hunting-theatre was smitten with thunderbolts on the very day of the Vulcanalia [Footnote: August twenty-third.] and such a blaze ensued that all its upper circumference and the whole circuit of construction and the ground-level were burned and thereupon the rest of it caught fire and fell in ruins. No human aid availed against the conflagration, though every possible stream of water was directed upon the blaze, nor could the downpour from the sky, which came in great amount and violence, accomplish anything. The force of both kinds of water was exhausted by the power of the thunderbolts, and to a certain extent, at least, the building only received additional injury; [Footnote: Reading [Greek: prosesineto](Bekker).] wherefore the gladiatorial spectacle was held in the stadium for many years. This naturally seemed to foreshow what was to be. There were other fires besides and imperial possessions were burned especially often during his reign,--a thing which in itself has always been regarded as of ill omen; but the fact that it seemed to have overthrown the horse-race of Vulcan had a direct bearing upon the emperor. This accordingly gave rise to a feeling that something out of the ordinary was in process of consummation, and the idea was strengthened by the behavior on that same day of the Tiber, which rose until it invaded the Forum and the roads leading to it with such impetus as to sweep away even human beings. And a woman, as I have heard, grim and gigantic, was seen by some persons and declared that these disasters were insignificant as compared with what was destined to befall them.