Do you feel an interest in a private house, in a Hippia's acts? Turn your eyes to the rivals of the gods! Hear what Claudius had to endure. As soon as his wife perceived he was asleep, this imperial harlot, that dared prefer a coarse mattress to the royal bed, took her hood she wore by nights, quitted the palace with but a single attendant, but with a yellow tire concealing her black hair; entered the brothel warm with the old patchwork quilt, and the cell vacant and appropriated to herself. Then took her stand with naked breasts and gilded nipples, assuming the name of Lycisca, and displayed the person of the mother of the princely Britannicus, received all comers with caresses and asked her compliment, and submitted to often-repeated embraces. Then when the owner dismissed his denizens, sadly she took her leave, and (all she could do) lingered to the last before she closed her cell; and still raging with unsatisfied desire, tired with the toil but yet unsated, she retired with sullied cheeks defiled, and, foul from the smoke of lamps, bore back the odor of the stews to the pillow of the emperor. Shall I speak of the love-philters, the incantations, the poison mingled with the food and given to the step-son? The acts which they commit, to which they are impelled by the imperative suggestions of their sex,[243] are still more atrocious: those they commit through lust are the least of their crimes. "Then, how can it be that even by her husband's showing Cesennia is the best of wives?" She brought him a thousand sestertia! that is the price at which he calls her chaste. It is not with Venus' quiver that he grows thin, or with her torch he burns; it is from that his fires are fed; from her dowry that the arrows emanate. She has purchased her liberty: therefore, even in her husband's presence, she may exchange signals, and answer her love-letters. A rich wife, with a covetous husband, has all a widow's privileges. "Why then does Sertorius burn with passion for Bibula?" If you sift the truth, it is not the wife he is in love with, but the face. Let a wrinkle or two make their appearance, and the shriveled skin grow flaccid, her teeth get black, or her eyes smaller--"Pack up your baggage," the freedman will say, "and march. You are become offensive. You blow your nose too frequently. March! and be quick about it! Another is coming whose nose is not so moist." Meanwhile she is hot and imperious, and demands of her husband shepherds and sheep from Canusium, and elms[244] from Falernum. What a trifle is this? Then every boy she fancies, whole droves of slaves, and whatever she has not in her house, and her neighbor has, must be bought.