One is surprised so see so large an amphitheatre in so small a city. But, let us not forget that Pompeii attracted the inhabitants of the neighboring towns to her festivals; history even tells us an anecdote on this subject that is not without its moral. The Senator Liveneius Regulus, who had been driven from Rome and found an asylum in Pompeii, offered a gladiator show to the hospitable little city. A number of people from Nocera had gone to the pageant, and a quarrel arose, probably owing to municipal rivalries, that eternal curse of Italy; from words they came to blows and volleys of stones, and even to slashing with swords. There were dead and wounded on both sides. The Nocera visitors, being less numerous, were beaten, and made complaint to Rome. The affair was submitted to the Emperor, who sent it to the Senate, who referred it to the Consuls, who referred it back again to the Senate. Then came the sentence, and public shows were prohibited in Pompeii for the space of ten years. A caricature which recalls this punishment has been found in the Street of Mercury. It represented an armed gladiator descending, with a palm in his hand, into the amphitheatre: on the left, a second personage is drawing a third toward him on a seat; the third one had his arms bound, and was, no doubt, a prisoner. This inscription accompanies the entire piece: "Campanians, your victory has been as fatal to you as it was to the people of Nocera."[K] The hand of Rome, ever the hand of Rome! For that matter, the ordinances relating to the amphitheatre applied to the whole empire. One of the Pompeian inscriptions announces that the duumvir C. Cuspius Pansa had been appointed to superintend the public shows and see to the observance of the Petronian law. This law prohibited Senators from fighting in the arena, and even from sending slaves thither who had not been condemned for crime. Such things, then, required to be prohibited! I have described the arena and the seats; let me now pass on to the show itself. Would yon like to have a hunt or a gladiatorial combat? Here I invent nothing. I have data, found at Pompeii (the paintings in the amphitheatre and the bas-reliefs on the tomb of Scaurus), that reproduce scenes which I have but to transfer to prose. Let us, then, suppose the twenty thousand spectators to be in their places on thirty-four ranges of seats, one above the other, around the arena; then, let us take our seats among them and look on. First we have a hunt. A panther, secured by a long rope to the neck of a bull let loose, is set on against a young _bestiarius_, who holds two javelins in his hands. A man, armed with a long lance, irritates the bull so that it may move and second the rush of the panther fastened to it. The lad who has the javelins, and is a novice in his business, is but making his first attempt; should the bull not move, he runs no risk, yet I should not like to be in his place.