“It is he, it is he....” he stammered, sitting up again. “I see him, barefoot, his mantle torn, riding towards Phaon’s house.[37]--I hear the shouts of the soldiers in the camp close by.--They are cursing him.--His horse has shied--he is looking round--the Praetorians know his pale face.--Now he has leaped from his saddle, and is hiding in the bushes.--How he gasps! How thirsty he is--he is stooping over a puddle to drink!--They have reached the villa; there--he is trembling, his knees give way.--Here is a messenger from Rome bringing Phaon the news--the decision of the Senate. Traitors! Treason! Death by the hand of the executioner.--Hark! Horses!--the soldiers are coming out to take him.--Come, more merciful steel, and pierce this throbbing heart. Kill him, murder him, tear him limb from limb!--It is over, there he lies, stiff on his cloak, his eyes starting out of their sockets. His face is as pale as ashes.--Thus dies Nero!--Alas! and woe is me! Thus dies Domitian!” A loud and piercing shriek; then the silence of the grave. “Help, help!” cried the boy, who was on guard in the cubiculum. “Help--quick!” It was Phaeton, Caesar’s favorite slave; he rushed forward to lift up the Emperor, who lay like one dead. His left arm hung helplessly over the edge of the bed; he had pushed aside his pillows, and with them, his wooden tablet which, as Phaeton pulled the cushions into place, fell with a clatter on to the floor. The lad stooped and picked it up, only just in time to save it from being trodden on by the other slaves, who came rushing in from all sides. He instinctively hid the piece of wood in his tunic. A moment later and the physician came in, who at once dismissed all unnecessary attendants, among them Phaeton, who was still trembling from the shock. Caesar, he said, must have absolute rest. Phaeton, however, lingered; he wanted to know whether Caesar’s life was in danger, and it was not till the leech had reassured him on that point, that he was persuaded to quit the room and remain in the cavaedium close at hand. There he went to the south-western entrance, where two of the praetorian guard were keeping watch in shining armor. He sat down, squatting on the mosaic pavement, near a door which commanded a view over the Aventine. For a time he stared vacantly at the tall, stiff figures with their dazzling helmets and their calm, stern, weather-beaten faces. Then, with a yawn, he idly drew forth the wooden tablet. He could not read, and his eye wandered curiously down the close rows of curling or angular letters, which to him were signs far more mystical than the old Hebrew rolls of manuscripts, which he had seen his mother read. Then he fell to balancing the little board on his fingers, trying to support it on one corner, as he had seen Masthlion, the famous juggler do, out on the Field of Mars.