XV. It is also said that he avoided a crowd with great care, so that he used to sit at the end of a bench, in order at all events to avoid being incommoded on one side. And he never used to walk with more than two or three companions. And he used at times to exact a piece of money from all who came to hear him, with a view of not being distressed by numbers; and this story is told by Cleanthes, in his treatise on Brazen Money. And when he was surrounded by any great crowd, he would point to a balustrade of wood at the end of the colonnade which surrounded an altar, and say, “That was once in the middle of this place, but it was placed apart because it was in people’s way; and now, if you will only withdraw from the middle here, you too will incommode me much less.” XVI. And when Demochares, the son of Laches, embraced him once, and said that he would tell Antigonus, or write to him of everything which he wanted, as he always did everything for him, Zeno, when he had heard him say this, avoided his company for the future. And it is said, that after the death of Zeno, Antigonus said, “What a spectacle have I lost.” On which account he employed Thrason, their ambassador, to entreat of the Athenians to allow him to be buried in the Ceramicus. And when he was asked why he had such an admiration for him, he replied, “Because, though I gave him a great many important presents, he was never elated, and never humbled.” XVII. He was a man of a very investigating spirit, and one who inquired very minutely into everything; in reference to which, Timon, in his Silli, speaks thus:— I saw an aged woman of Phœnicia, Hungry and covetous, in a proud obscurity, Longing for everything. She had a basket So full of holes that it retained nothing. Likewise her mind was less than a skindapsus.[81] He used to study very carefully with Philo, the dialectician, and to argue with him at their mutual leisure; on which account he excited the wonder of the younger Zeno, no less than Diodorus his master. XVIII. There were also a lot of dirty beggars always about him, as Timon tells us, where he says:— Till he collected a vast cloud of beggars, Who were of all men in the world the poorest, And the most worthless citizens of Athens. And he himself was a man of a morose and bitter countenance, with a constantly frowning expression. He was very economical, and descended even to the meanness of the barbarians, under the pretence of economy.