Mithridates having seized upon Asia, and the Marian party [Sidenote: B] being again masters of Rome. It happened, however, that a number of old men were talking at a barber’s, to the effect that no watch was kept upon the Heptachalcon and that the town was in danger of capture at that point. They were overheard by spies, who gave information to Sulla; and he promptly brought up his forces at midnight, led in his army, and almost razed the city to the ground, filling it with carnage till the Cerameicus flowed with blood. His anger with the Athenians was, however, due more to their words than to their deeds. They would leap on to the walls, and abuse him and Metella, and by jeering at him with [Sidenote: C] _A mulberry is Sulla, sprinkled o’er with barley-meal_, and a number of similar scurrilities, they brought upon themselves—to use a phrase of Plato—‘_a very heavy penalty_’ for that ‘_very light_’ thing, their words. It was, again, the talkativeness of one man that prevented Rome from obtaining its freedom by the removal of Nero. All preparations had been made, and only a single night was left before the despot was to perish. It happened, however, that the man who was to perform the assassination, when on his way to the theatre, saw a prisoner at the palace doors on the point of being brought before Nero. As he was bewailing his fate, our friend came up close and whispered to him, ‘My good [Sidenote: D] man, only pray that to-day may pass, and to-morrow you will be offering me thanks.’ The prisoner grasped the meaning of the hint, and reflecting, I suppose, that _’Tis a fool who forgoes what he holds, to pursue what is out of his keeping_, chose the surer rather than the more righteous way of saving himself. That is to say, he informed Nero of the expression used. The man was thereupon promptly seized, and underwent rack, fire, and lash while denying, in the face of constraint, what he had betrayed without any constraint.