Hic promens teretes pilas, trochosque, hic talos crepitantibus fritillis.[326] The home influence of the Gallic nobleman in creating a literary interest in his son was probably considerable, in view of the general honour in which letters were held. Sidonius taught his son comic metres from Terence and Menander, and apparently the resulting enjoyment was mutual.[327] When Paulinus of Pella expresses his debt to his parents for their skill and zeal in educating him, his references are touched with genuine emotion.[328] The eager love of parents dear, who knew To temper study ever with delights Of relaxation, care that understood To make me good without severity, And give advancement to my untrained thought.[329] The constant discussion of literary topics such as we find in Ausonius and Sidonius must have made the homes of their class as much of a _ludus litterarum_ as the schoolroom, just as among the Christians of lower social standing the lively interest in theological discussion must have given an impetus in many cases to the thought of the child. Heredity, too, must have played a part. Families in which the rhetorical education had become traditional produced children whose minds were naturally inclined to take an interest in study. For the sons, therefore, of these noblemen (and in dealing with the Gallic schools it is with the nobility, chiefly, that we have to do) home circumstances were an incentive to the activities of the school. But what, precisely, were these activities? Paulinus of Pella gives a general description.[330] From his earliest years (_ipsius alphabeti inter prope prima elementa_[331]) he was taught the meaning and the value of culture, the ten special marks which distinguish the uneducated, and all the faults of unsocial or uncultured boorishness (_vitia_ ἀκοινονόητα).[332] He was trained in the classic education of Rome (_Roma_ ... _servata vetustas_) and found pleasure in it as an old man, though his age witnessed its decline.[333] He went to school (the school of Bordeaux made famous by Ausonius) in his sixth year, and was made to read ‘dogmata Socratus (Σωκράτους) et bellica plasmata Homeri’ together with the wanderings of Ulysses. Then he passed on to Vergil, which he found difficult because he had been accustomed to speak his native Greek to the servants of the house. Unde labor puero, fateor, fuit hic mihi maior eloquium librorum ignotae apprehendere linguae.[334] At fifteen[335] we find him still at the school of the grammarian: Argolico pariter Latioque instante magistro.[336] It was just about the age at which he should have passed on to the rhetorical school, but a fever laid him low, and left him so weak that the doctor ordered a complete rest.