who had risen from low estate to the senate; let us see how, through the mere contagion of example, he entertained his guests. First, they are invited to enter the bath, where, after being "sluiced" with perfumes, they are dried in blankets of the softest and finest wool. At the door of the house stands the porter, dressed in green, with a cherry-coloured sash, and on the lintel a magpie in a golden cage, trained to salute the guests as they enter. The walls are covered with inscriptions, illustrating various stages in the life of the proprietor, amongst which is one recording in gilt letters, the first day he dined abroad. The servants are most strictly desired to see that each guest, on crossing the threshold of the banquetting-room, puts the right leg forward, for it is an unlucky omen when one enters otherwise. As they are seated, the chamber is invaded by a number of Egyptian boys, who pour snow-water on their hands and pick their nails, singing all the time. The first course is served up; Trimalchio does not appear, but the place of honor, on the middle couch of the triclinium is reserved for him. Whilst the first course is being served, let us glance at the table. In the centre is the figure of an ass in Corinthian metal, supporting panniers filled with black and white olives. Close to him are two enormous dishes of silver; and a number of salvers also of silver, bearing dormice furnished with poppy seed and honey, are laid at regular intervals along the board; besides which, sausages heaped on silver gridirons smoke at either end. A burst of music resounds through the hall, and Trimalchio enters. He is dressed in a scarlet mantle, and under his chin is a napkin, bordered with fringes and the broad purple of the senate. Rings of immense value ornament bis fingers, and his arms are clasped with bracelets of ivory and gold. He says he has only come to apologise for his absence; and when he has satisfied his conscience in this respect leaves the room, followed by a boy bearing a draught-board of juniperwood and crystal dice. He has scarcely disappeared when a wooden hen with extended wings is placed upon the table, and the servants, searching in the straw upon which she broods, discover a number of peafowls' eggs, and distribute them among the guests. Again the host enters, and at the desire of the company two Ethiopians pour wine from leathern bottles on the hands of the guests. An unhappy servant, happening to let fall a dish, has his ears boxed by his master, at whose command the groom of the chamber enters and sweeps off the silver utensils with a broom. The guests are now placed at separate tables; and Trimalchio, who reclines upon his couch, propped up with a number of small pillows, gives a signal, at which glass jars, labelled "OPIMIAN FALERNIAN, A HUNDRED YEARS OLD," are brought in, and placed before the guests, "O dear, O dear,” cried the host, "to think that wine should be longer lived than we poor manikins I did not put so good on my table yesterday, and I had much more respectable men than you to dine with me." The courtesy and candour of his last observation are above all praise, Douglas Jerrold could not exceed it for open-mindedness. And now comes the second course. It consists of a large tray, ornamented with the twelve signs of the zodiac, on each of which the structor had placed some emblematic dish: on Aries, ram's-head pies; on Taurus, a piece of roast

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beef; on Gemini, kidneys and a lamb's fry; on Cancer, a crown; on Leo, African figs; on Virgo, a young sow's paslet; on Libra, a pair of scales, in one of which were tarts, in the other cheese-cakes; on Scorpio, a little sea-fish of the same name; on Sagittarius, a hare; on Capricorn, a lobster; on Aquarius, a goose; on Pisces, two mullets, and on the middle there is a green turf, on which lay a honeycomb. Hardly has this rare invention been placed before the guests, then an Egyptian slave, chaunting a hymn, the subject of which is wine, flavored with Laserpitium, a plant of great value with the ancients, but unknown to modern botany; and when he has set down a portable oven of bread on the table, the host cries out, "Pray, gentlemen, fall to; you see your dinner." The company are amazed at being invited to partake of so sorry a dish, and grumblings are beginning to circulate, when four attendants lift the cover of the oven and reveal beneath it a delicious spread of crammed fowls, sow's paps, and a hare, ingeniously modelled after the conventional figure of Pegasus. At the corners of the tray are placed statuettes of Marsyas, squirting in the viands the garum piperatum, which Pliny calls "an exquisite liquor,” and Seneca " a precious sanies." "Cut," exclaims Trimalchio, and the order is obeyed by a fellow who carves with a rythmical movement, and a variety of gestures, with which all present are delighted and amused. Conversation becomes general, and the host gravely tells the schoolmen and wranglers that they were born under the sign of the Ram, himself under the Crab, and women, run-aways, and jail-birds, under Virgo. He is stopped by the entrance of servants, who spread tapestry, representing hunting scenes, before the couches. Suddenly the chamber re-echoes with the deep bayings of dogs, and a pack of Spartan hounds rush into the room, gallop around the tables, and disappear. Now, for a fresh wonder. A wild boar, capped, and garnished with sweetmeats, with baskets of Syrian and Theban dates hanging from its tusks, is borne in; the carver plunges his long knife into its side, liberating a swarm of field-fares, which flutter about the room until caught on reeds anointed with bird lime. Trimalchio seizes the moment to deliver some moral reflections on the shortness of life, the instability of fortune, "We," he says, "are mere blown bladders on two legs, less than flies; they are good for something, and we are no better than bubbles." Crysanthus, a friend of his, is being buried, and the survivor consoles himself by remembering that the dead was "carried out on the bed he used to lie on, covered with good blankets." The conduct of Chrysanthus' wife was not all he could wish, and thereupon he falls to moralizing on her sex, in a strain of most fastidious compliment. "Woman," he observes, "is a sort of kite, a man ought never waste the least kindness on one of the sex; it is the same as throwing it into a well." After a pause, which gives him time to wash his forehead with perfume, there are carried in three white hogs, with bells about their necks, and one being chosen by the guests, is sent to the kitchen to be cooked. It would be a pity to omit the last remark of Trimalchio, intended for a comment on the story told now by his neighbour Agamemnon. "If the fact is so," said he, "it

admits of no controversy-if it is not so, there's an end of the matter." Admirable logician!

The laughter roused by this fine sally, had not wholly subsided when they were startled by a fresh surprise. This is the hog, which is laid upon the table, feet uppermost. Trimalchio springs to his feet and claps his hands in agony, calling to Hercules to witness that the rascally cook has not disembowelled the animal. The Roman soyer is called in, confesses that he forgot to open the boar, and is sentenced to be flogged for his neglect. Whilst the company are pleading for his pardon, the master of the house smiles, and turning to the culprit, "Come," he says, "you, with the short memory, let us see if you can bowel him before us!" At the word, the cook slashes the smoking sides, and out comes a wealth of sausages and puddings; his dexterity is rewarded with a crown of silver leaf, and a drinking cup on a Corinthian salver. A slave drops a cup, at which Trimalchio addresses him in these considerate words, “Go and kill yourself instantly, for you are careless." At the intercession of the guests, the man is pardoned, and he directly begins dancing and shouting, "Out of doors with the water and in with the wine." An obscene dance is proposed, but the suggestion is overruled. Acrobats are introduced, and one falls from the top of a ladder on the head of the host, by whom he is forgiven, and made a freeman, that it might not be said a man of such consequence had been made black and blue by a slave. In strange contrast with this piece of generosity, a slave is soundly thrashed for binding his master's arm in white instead of purple flannel. To this interlude succeeds a lottery, the tickets, all prizes, being drawn from a cup. The joke of the entertainment lies in the curious names, having still stranger significations, written on the slips of parchment. "A pillow" means a scrag of mutton; pears and peaches," a whip and a knife; "sparrows and a fly-trap," raisins and Attic honey; a lamprey and a letter," a mouse tied to a frog and a bundle of beet-root; and so ou until the devices exhausted all the ingenuity of the lottery-holder. One of the guests happening to laugh, is rebuked in terms of the lowest scurrility by a freed man of Trimalchio. "What are you laughing at, you sheep? is not my master's entertainment to your worshipful taste? brat, with the milk in your nose, you pipkin, you strip of soaked leather. What are you gaping at, like a buck-goat in a field of vetches?" Finally, Trimalcbio, delighted with the eloquence of his freed-man, interposes and commands silence, acutely observing that the vanquished in such strife is victor still. A company of actors known as Homerists are admitted; and in the course of a short performance, illustrating a passage from the Iliad, Ajax cuts up a calf, and presents the guests with a fragment apiece on the point of his sword. Suddenly, the beams of the ceiling divide, and from the dome above them, is let down a silver hoop, hung with gold crowns and perfumes in pots of alabaster. A glance at the table discovers a fresh supply of sweetmeats, and the statue of an impure deity bearing apples and grapes. The cakes have been hollowed and filled with saffron water, which exudes from them at the slightest pressure of the hand. The guests cram them into their bosoms and napkins, until they are interrupted by the

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entrance of three white-robed slaves, carrying the family lares, the bullæ, and the bust of Trimalchio, which latter is kissed by all present. At this stage of the banquet, a lictor, followed by a number of persons, appears at the table, and sits down without asking leave to the crammed fowls and chaperoned goose-eggs, with which the table has been newly provided. "This," says Trimalchio, "is Habinnas the Servir; he is a mason, and excels in making monuments." Habinnas, who has just returned from a funeral, is drunk, and his wife, Scintella, by whom he is accompanied, is rather put about by too much indulgence. At the request of Trimalchio, he gives a sketch of the funeral feast, tells how half the wine had to be poured upon the dead bones, of the hog crowned with a pudding, and garnished with fritters and giblets; cold tarts steeped in Spanish honey, with which latter he pleasantly besmeared himself; then there is a wilderness of fruits, including apples and lupines, a bear's ham, cream, cheese, grape jelly, a snail apiece, chitterlings, livers in paté pans, turnips, mustard, beans, and salted olives. When he has finished, Trimalchio looks at the slaves, and says, "If you have anything in the way of dessert bring it in." Thrushes in pastry stuffed with raisins and nuts are handed round. and then a disgusting dish made out of a hog. Oysters are next served up, with snails roasted upon silver gridirons, and to crown all, rich perfume is carried about by long-haired boys, who anoint the guests therewith, having first bound their heads, hands, and feet with flowers. Trimalchio discourses about his tomb with Habinnas, to whom he hands a laudatory inscription, which he wishes to have placed on his monument. A bath winds up a debauch, than which no stronger proof could be adduced of the depth of sensuality and coarseness to which the social life of Rome had been reduced by Paganism.

Greece was not so wholly debased. The intellect, at least, took precedence of the stomach; and when the money-holders sat down to a nagnificent spread, an attempt was made to give it an air of refinement. Plato dilates on the pleasures of a feast, where the guests are gentlemanly and well-educated, and no flute-playing women or dancing-women are admitted but decency is observed everywhere, even, he adds, "if they drink a great deal of wine." He appears to consider conversation capital sauce for a banquet, and describes those who reject it for dancing and mumming as living the life of mollusks. Excesses naturally prevailed in the absence of a controlling element; but the picture of Greek festive life is by far brighter than that sketched by the polite pen of Petronius. The story of the marriage feast which Caranus made in Macedonia will furnish a curious pendant to the banquet of Trimalchio. Twenty guests were invited, to each of whom when they were seated, and crowned with golden chaplets, valued at five pieces, the entertainer presented a silver bowl, a loaf in a Corinthian salver, poultry, and ducks, pigeons, a goose, which they gave to their slaves when they had satisfied themselves. Platters of silver holding bread, hares, kids, doves, partridges and "every other kind of bird imaginable," were next given them, which were disposed of in the same way as the salvers; and to these followed fresh chaplets of flowers, twisted around circlets of gold.

As the company were amusing themselves with clegant trifles there came in flute-playing women, sambula-players, and women having each a gold and silver phial of perfume, with which they severally presented the guests. For supper there was served up a silver platter, upon which enclosed in a golden egg of great thickness, lay a huge roast boar stuffed with roasted thrushes and paunches, fig-pickers, and oysters covered with the yolk of eggs; and to every one present was given a boar thus encased. Wine was then offered, and a hot kid and a golden spoon was laid before each of the invited. Carauus seeing that his guests were embarrassed from want of stowage, desired them to be furnished with baskets of twisted ivory, and second pairs of cruets, and clapping his hands there appeared dancers and jugglers, who amused the revellers by standing on their heads and vomiting fire from their mouths. Thasian, Mendæan, and Lesbean wines in golden goblets succeeded the exhibition, and to them glass goblets of great size stuffed with roasted fishes. Nor did the bounty of Caranus end here, for he presented his guests with triplicates of the phials of perfume, and silver baskets of Cappadocian bread; and when one of them swallowed a gallon of Thasian wine, exclaiming, "He who drinks most, will be the happiest," he told him to keep the "cup," and gave one of the same pattern and value to each of his friends. Fresh chaplets and golden circlets double the weight of the former he also bestowed, and when this part of the ceremony was over, a hundred men walked around the tables singing an epithalamium, with dancing girls costumed to represent the nymphs and bereids. The slaves being ordered to bring the wine round rapidly, Mandrogenis, the buffoon danced a measure with his wife, a woman more than eighty years of age, their gestures and contortions, causing unbounded laughter. The pair disappeared at a given signal, and sweetmeats in baskets of plaited ivory were handed round, and also Cretan cheesecakes. This wound up the entertainment, and the guests went home loaded with the treasures they had received during the evening. It was much the custom to ridicule the moderation which characterised the Attic banquets. Lynceus, in his "Centaur," represents them as chiefly consisting of garlic,, sea urchins, cockles, and caviare, with a chance of oysters. Mateon is more complimentary to the people of Attica, and in a description of one of their banquets, mentions white loaves, oysters, sea urchins, anchovies, pinnæ, fat cockles, turbots, mullets, cuttle fishes, congers, eels, perch, black tails, tunny, shark, (which he prizes,) a cestrea sargi, amias, chrysophrys, crabs, lampreys, soles, and sturgeons, sea-thrushes, a ham, (the division of which caused much uproar,) black broth, pig's feet, turkey; and furthermore, perfumes, garlands and wine! so that, after all, and despite the ridicule of the wits, Attica, appears to have known what a feast should be. It is related of a Lacedæmonian General, Pausanias, that on the capture of the Imperial tent of Xerxes, he ordered the slaves to prepare a feast, such as the fugitive monarch was accustomed to sit to; and at the same time desired his people to prepare one of their own fashion. And when both were ready he called in his generals, pointing to the luxury of the former, and saying it was impossible that a man who lived so sumptuously and

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