‘Then I will go; but circumstances are altered since I last saw thee. You have been transformed from the poor potter’s girl. Once you had scruples in matching with one out of your own station. Do you still keep them? Will you now stoop to a poor Pretorian?’ ‘You took great labour to remove the scruples I had then—would you now bring them back again?’ she said. ‘Yes, if I might plant them in myself for you to charm away—it would be a task I could never weary of.’ ‘But I should—so let us not begin,’ she replied, with a divine smile. ‘What is all this muttering between you?’ cried Fabricius, growing impatient. ‘I am asking her if she thinks as kindly of me now that she is changed from the potter’s child into the granddaughter of Fabricius,’ replied Martialis. ‘Well, and what says she to that? Come, child, let us hear your sweet notes,’ said Fabricius; ‘he that bearded Caesar in his own hall for your sake is worthy of some reward.’ ‘I have already given him all I have to give,’ she said, smiling and blushing upon her lover. ‘What in the world can better it, my sweet Neæra?’ responded Lucius with a fervent kiss. ‘Neæra no longer, but Aurelia,’ cried Fabricius. ‘Neæra she must ever be to me,’ said Lucius. * * * * * * * Here we will leave Martialis in his prime, with the crown of his life in the person of a beloved wife and noble offspring. One of his sons, named after himself, was a man of learning and taste, and is immortalised in the letters of his friend and namesake, the great Roman epigrammist. We cannot refrain from concluding with that epistle of the latter which relates to the mansion of old Fabricius, and we present it in a well‐known translation:——