[149] Habet! He is hit! was the usual acclamation from the audience, when a blow struck home.
[150] When the servants had strewn the arena with sand. See Mart. Ep. II, 75, 5.
“For while two boys did rake the sandy floor,
With savage rage he both in pieces tore.”
[151] Calenus, a wretch—one of the brood of traitors. The expression is similar to the well-known “sus de grege Epicuri.”
[152] "When, when is this vision to be fulfilled?" Perhaps it will not be superfluous to remark, that Barbillus here beholds in imagination the Flavian Amphitheatre, as it afterwards appeared in Catholic Rome—the mighty vine-grown ruins of the Coliseum with the solitary cross in the grass-grown oval of the arena. The Italian government has meantime somewhat changed the picture, by removing the vegetation, which seemed to endanger the venerable ruins by promoting the process of disintegration—certainly to the detriment of the artistic effect.
[153] Till supper-time puts an end to it for to-day. It is here supposed, that the games only lasted until the hour for the principal meal (doubtless delayed on these days). The amusements at the centennial festivals and similar occasions were, however, usually continued through the night.
[154] Her fine scented hair. The hair was anointed with costly essences, especially with an oil, made from the blossoms of the Indian spikenard (Nardus indica.)
[155] The underground cells of the amphitheatre. The greater part of what in our theatres we call “behind the scenes,” was underground in the Roman amphitheatre; especially the cages for wild beasts, and cells for condemned criminals. The subterranean rooms in the Flavian amphitheatre are still visible.
[156] The consul Flavius Clemens and his noble wife. The wife of the consul Flavius Clemens was a relative of Domitian. According to Dio Cassius (LXVII, 14) she was called Flavia Domitilla, According to this historian, she was not condemned to the wild beasts, but only to exile at Pandataria. How near Flavius Clemens originally stood to the emperor’s person, appears from the narrative of Suetonius (Dom. 15,) where it is said, that the emperor publicly designated the two sons of his cousin Flavius Clemens, then little boys, to be his successors, and therefore gave one the name of Vespasianus and the other that of Domitianus, in place of the one hitherto borne. Besides, according to Suetonius, the Christianity of Flavius Clemens is not so clearly shown as my story supposes. See also [note 137], Vol. I, and [note 131], Vol. II.