How many modern poets have uttered the same exclamation! They little dreamed that a Pompeian, a slave no doubt, had, eighteen centuries before their time, scratched, it with a nail upon the wall of a basilica. Here is a sentence that mentions gold. It has been carried out by the English poet, Wordsworth: "Minimum malum fit contemnendo maximum, Quod, crede mi, non contemnendo, erit minus." Let us copy also this singular truth thrown into rhyme by some gourmand who had counted without his host: "Quoi perna cocta est, si convivæ adponitur, Non gustat pernam, lingit ollam aut caccabum." This _quoi_ is for _cui_; the caccabus was the kettle in which the fowl was cooked. Here follows some wholesome advice for the health of lovers: "Quisquis amat calidis noil debet fontibus uti: Nam nemo flammis ustus amare potest." I should never get through were I to quote them all. But how many short phrases there are that, scratched here and there, cause this old monument to spring up again, by revealing the thoughts and fancies of the loungers and passers-by who peopled it so many years ago. A lover had written this: "Nemo est bellus nisi qui amavit." A friend: "Vale, Messala, fac me ames." A superlative wag, but incorrect withal: "Cosmus nequitiae est magnussimae." A learned man, or a philosopher: "Non est exsilium ex patria sapientibus." A complaining suitor: "Sara non belle facis. Solum me relinquis, Debilis...." A wrangler and disputant threatening the other party with a law-suit: "Somius _Corneilio_ (Cornelio) jus _pendre_ (perendie?)" A sceptic who cherishes no illusions as to the mode of administering justice: "Quod pretium legi?" A censor, perhaps a Christian, who knew the words addressed by the Jews to the blind man who was cured: "Pyrrhus Getae conlegae salutem. Moleste fero quod audivi te mortuom (sic). Itaque vale." A jovial wine bibber: "Suavis vinari sitit, rogo vas valde sitit."[B] A wit: "Zetema mulier ferebat filium simulem sui nec meus erat, nec mi simulat; sed vellem esset meus, et ego volebam ut meus esset." Tennis-players scribble: "Amianthus, Epaphra, Tertius ludant cum Hedysio, Incundus Nolanus petat, numeret Citus et Stacus Amianthus." Wordsworth remarks that these two names, Tertius and Epaphras, are found in the epistles of St. Paul. Epaphras (in Latin, Epaphra; the suppressed letter _s_ shows that this Pompeian was merely a slave) is very often named on the walls of the little city; he is accused, moreover, of being beardless or destitute of hair (_Epaphra glaber est_), and of knowing nothing about tennis. (_Epaphra pilicrepus non es_). This inscription was found all scratched over, probably by the hand of Epaphras himself, who had his own feelings of pride as a fine player.