Whether “the naked simplicity” of the _Ephesiaca_ is to be attributed to an epitomizer, to its approach to the genre of a popular tale, or to the author’s own taste, the romance is certainly characterized throughout by brevity, restraint and sparcity of decoration. There are so few descriptions that those of the festival of Artemis and of the canopy over the marriage bed of Habrocomes and Anthia are notable.[93] The action is too rapid and varied to allow time for decorative passages. Instead of being set amid purple patches, it is advanced by a kind of documentary evidence: two oracles, two letters, one memorial and two votive inscriptions, all directly quoted,[94] and a reference to an inscription finally offered as a votive in the Artemesion by Habrocomes and Anthia giving an account of all their adventures. Inset narratives, those stories within stories which make pleasing digressions in other longer romances, are here very few. Hippothoos recounts his love for the beautiful Hyperanthes and the boy’s untimely drowning.[95] Aegialeus, the Spartan living with the mummy of his wife, tells how his love for her has outlasted death.[96] Both these narratives are colorful, dramatic and poignant from the very qualities which characterize all the romance. These are brevity, sincerity and restrained emotion. The influence of Chariton is clearly seen in Xenophon both in direct imitation and in qualities of style. When the Phoenician pirates had kidnapped Habrocomes and Anthia on their trireme and fired their captives’ vessel leaving many to perish in the sea, an old slave, as he swam, pitifully called to Habrocomes to save his aged paedagogue or at least kill him and bury him.[97] In view of the situation this is a ridiculous appeal, but it is a clear imitation of a passage in Chariton where, when Chaereas resolves to go to sea to search for Callirhoe, his father Ariston begs his son not to desert him, but to take him on his trireme,[98] or to wait a few days for his father’s death and burial. Anthia, when Manto, the daughter of the brigand chief, demands Habrocomes’ submission to her passion, begs her husband to save his life in this way and swears that she will leave him free by killing herself, only asking from him burial, one last kiss, and a place in his memory. This is in direct imitation of Chariton and of Chaereas’ words when he finds Callirhoe married to Dionysius.[99] Here Xenophon is simpler than his model, for he does not transfer the effective lines from Homer which Chariton quotes.[100] The burial of Anthia with its rich funeral gifts resembles the burial of Callirhoe and also the lavish equipment of the cenotaph for Chaereas.[101] The language of Chariton is adapted for the lament of Habrocomes in Italy at the failure of his quest and his renewed pledge of faithfulness unto death.[102]