The exercises performed by the Romans comprehended feats in running, leaping, wrestling, swimming, sword-play, hurling the pilum--everything in short that could add strength to the body or tend to success in war. Here, Cretan archers, having set up their targets, were demonstrating the deadly accuracy of their aim. There, Balearic slingers were discharging their leaden bullets, which not infrequently melted with the heat engendered by the swift rush of the missile through the air; here, a body of soldiers was busily engaged in bridging within a given time a broad sheet of water; there, a group were vigorously occupied in storming a wooden fortress, whose defense was as vigorously maintained by a garrison of fellow-Romans. “Why, it is like war itself,” said Berenice, fascinated by the spectacle. “So like, that it is the fashion of the soldiers to call the exercise a bloodless battle, and the battle a bloody exercise.” “Where are these men going?” she asked as a certain cohort tramped past at full speed. “They are marching to Dora and back.” “That is not very hard work.” “You think so, princess. But mark that each soldier is carrying the full equipment customary in war time, consisting of various utensils, as well as victuals for fifteen days, the whole amounting to sixty pounds’ weight, not including arms, for the Roman soldier considers these, not as a burden, but as a part of himself. Weighted thus, he is to march in this burning sunlight to Dora and back, the double journey being a distance of twenty miles, and he is to do it within five hours. If this be not hard work, what is?” “And supposing they should take more than five hours?” “Terentius Rufus, who rides at their head, will see to that.” “But if they should fail?” “He will punish them.” “And what will the punishment be?” “It takes various shapes. Yon cohort, as is shown by the carrying of the eagle, is the First Cohort of the legion. They may be degraded by being compelled to resign the eagle, and to take the second place; or their diet for the week may be barley bread instead of wheaten; or they may be excluded from their tents, and made to sleep at a distance from the camp.” “How often do the troops practice these exercises?” “Every day of the year.” “But when a soldier has learned his work?” “He goes on practicing just the same. Let a man have been forty years in the army, that fact will not exempt him from the daily exercise. And mark this: every weapon you see in use now, every helmet, breastplate, and shield, is double the weight of those used in actual warfare.” Berenice opened her eyes in wonder. “Why, a battle must be an easier matter than the daily exercise!” Titus laughed. “The soldier would much prefer a battle,” said he. Berenice spoke no more for a long time; so long that Titus began to see from her rapt expression that some momentous thought was occupying her mind.