In virtue of this second office he sat in the centumviral court;[67] and he also acted as an arbitrator. Tr. ii. 93,
‘Nec male commissa est nobis fortuna reorum
lisque decem deciens inspicienda viris.
Res quoque privatas statui sine crimine iudex.’
He sought no higher office, having neither strength nor inclination for the Senate; he assumed the narrow stripe of the eques, and devoted himself to poetry and pleasure. Tr. iv. 10, 35,
‘Curia restabat: clavi mensura coacta est:
maius erat nostris viribus illud onus.
Nec patiens corpus, nec mens fuit apta labori,
sollicitaeque fugax ambitionis eram.
Et petere Aoniae suadebant tuta sorores
otia, iudicio semper amata meo.’
He made a tour in Asia (including Troy) and Sicily in the company of the poet Pompeius Macer: the date of this journey is unknown, but he was almost a year in Sicily. Pont. ii. 10, 21-29 (to Macer),
‘Te duce magnificas Asiae perspeximus urbes,
Trinacris est oculis te duce nota meis, ...
Hic mihi labentis pars anni magna peracta est.’
Fast. vi. 423,
‘Cura videre fuit: vidi templumque locumque,’
(of the temple of Pallas at Troy).
Towards the end of A.D. 8, Ovid was banished by imperial edict to Tomi, on the Black Sea, near the mouth of the Danube, the cause alleged being the publication of the Ars Amatoria. Ovid mentions this edict, but also hints at another reason, connected with the imperial family. Tr. ii. 207,