“Too bad indeed,” Brinnaria pursued; “it would be bad enough from anybody in his position, from him it is ten times worse than from anyone else. You know how individual Almo is, how almost peculiar he looks, how no one would mistake him for anyone else or forget him or fail to recognize him. I have often tried to analyze the factors that go to make him look so striking, but I cannot. He is perfectly proportioned in every measurement, yet, somehow, he has a long-armed and long-legged appearance different from that of any young man in Rome, he gives almost the effect of reminding one of a spider or of a grasshopper or of a daddy-long-legs. It makes him the most conspicuous, the most recognizable man in all Rome. Why, if your son were to mingle in a crowd, habited like any other boy in that crowd and Almo did the same, and nobody in the crowd had any reason to expect to see either, Almo would most likely be noticed sooner than Antoninus, recognized more generally, more readily, further off and quicker.” “You are right,” Aurelius mused, “I never thought of that, but Almo is unforgettable, striking and arresting to the eye beyond any lad in our nobility.” “And being what he is,” Brinnaria raged, “he must needs arrange that nearly every crowd I am in should see him at the same time as me. Already thousands of reputable Romans must remember seeing us at the same glance. Before long the majority will be ready to recall, if the subject is broached, that they have habitually seen him wherever they saw me. Some one will start the talk and presently all Rome will buzz with the gossip that we are continually seen together. A charming state of affairs for me if some busybody or some enemy of mine raises the question of my fitness for my holy duties! I have protested. I’ve had Vocco go to Almo and urge all these considerations on him, and the silly boy says he can’t live without seeing me, that he longs for the sight of me so he cannot control himself. How’s that for lover’s folly? One minute he can’t live away from Rome, he loves Rome more than he loves me; the next minute I’m the one object on earth which he must behold or die. I’ve no patience with such imbecility.” “And I have very little,” said the Emperor; “just enough to imagine a better way of disburdening you and of disposing of Almo than banishing him would be. The lad is far too good to be wasting his time with the horse-jockeys and charioteers and ostlers of the Greens, or brutalizing himself with the companionship of ruffianly prize-fighters, belonging to this or that speculator in the flesh of ferocious savages. He must find some outlet for his energies and interests and is carried away by the fashionable mania, which is corrupting our whole population, especially our young nobles, and which, even at his tender age, fills the thoughts of my son, to the despair of his tutors.