‘He told me,’ said Lucan, ‘that he had read by the stars that, before ten years are over, you, my uncles, and you, my father, and I, and’—here the young poet shuddered—‘my mother, Atilla—and all of you through my fault—would die deaths of violence. Oh, ye gods, if there be gods, avert this hideous prophecy!’
‘Come, Lucan,’ said Seneca, ‘this is superstition worthy of a Jew, almost of a Christian. The Chaldæans are arrant quacks. Each man makes his own omens. I am Nero’s tutor; you, his friend; our whole family is in the full blaze of favour and prosperity.—But, hark! I hear a soldier’s footstep in the hall. Burrus is coming to see me on important state business. Farewell, now, but sup with me this evening, if you will share my simplicity.’
‘Simplicity!’ answered Mela, with a touch of envy, ‘your humble couches are inlaid with tortoise-shell; and your table shines with crystal and myrrhine vases embossed with gems.’
‘What does it matter whether the goblets of a philosopher be of crystal or of clay?’ answered Seneca gaily; ‘and as for my poor Thyine tables with ivory feet, which every one talks of, Cicero was a student, and he was not rich, yet he had one table which cost 500,000 sesterces. One may surely admire the tigrine stripes and panther-like spots of the citron-wood without being a Lucullus or an Apicius.’
‘But you have five hundred such tables,’ said Mela, ‘worth—I am afraid to say how many million sesterces.’
Seneca smiled a little uneasily. ‘Accepimus peritura perituri; we and our possessions are but for a day,’ he said, ‘and even calumny will bear witness that on those citron tables nothing more sumptuous is usually served to me personally than water and vegetables and fruit.’
Then with a whispered caution to Lucan to control his vehement impulses and act with care, the ‘austere intriguer’ said farewell to his kinsmen, and rose to greet his colleague Burrus.
CHAPTER VIII
SENECA AND HIS VISITORS
‘Videtur mihi cadere in sapientem ægritudo.’—Cic. Tusc. Disp. iii. 4.
Burrus was a man in the prime of life, whose whole bearing was that of an honest and fearless Roman; but his look was gloomy, and those who had seen him when he escorted Nero to the camp and the senate house, noticed how fast the wrinkles seemed to be gathering on his open brow.