The Romans in the infancy of their empire, paid as little attention to their dead as the Greeks had done. Acilius Aviola having fallen into a lethargic fit, was supposed to be dead; he was therefore carried to the funeral pile; the fire was lighted up; and though he cried out that he was still alive, he perished for want of speedy assistance. The Praetor Lamiæ met with the same fate. Tubero, who had been Praetor was also saved from the funeral pile. Asclepiades a physician, who lived in the time of Pompey the Great, about one hundred and twenty years before the Christian æra, returning from his country house, observed near the walls of Rome, a grand convoy and a crowd of people, who were in mourning assisting at a funeral, and shewing every exterior sign of the deepest grief. Having asked what was the occasion of this concourse, no one made any reply. He therefore approached the pretended dead body, and imagining that he perceived signs of life in it, he ordered the by-standers to take away the flambeaux, to extinguish the fire, and to pull down the funeral pile. A kind of murmur on this arose throughout the whole company. Some said that they ought to believe the physician, while others turned both him and his profession into ridicule. The relations however yielded at length to the remonstrances of Asclepiades; they consented to defer the obsequies for a little, and the consequence was the restoration of the pretended dead person to life. It appears that these examples, and several others of the like nature, induced the Romans to delay funerals longer, and to enact laws to prevent precipitate interments.