Domitian had been accorded by his brother a portion of the palace of Tiberius on the Palatine Hill, that was crowded with imperial residences; and Domitia had been brought there from Albanum.
She was one day on the terrace. The hilltop was too much encumbered with buildings to afford much space for gardens, but there were platforms on which grew cypresses, and about the balustrades roses twined and poured over in curtains of flower. Citrons and oleanders also stood in tubs, and against the walls glistened the burnished leaves of the pomegranate; the scarlet flowers bloomed in spring and the warm fruit ripened till it burst in the hot autumn.
Domitia, seated beside the balustrade, looked over mighty Rome, the teeming forum, roofs with gilded tiles of bronze, lay below her, flashing in the sun, and beyond on the Capitol, white as snow, but glinting with gold, was the newly completed temple of Jupiter, rebuilt in greater splendor than before since the disastrous fire.
The hum of the city came up to her as the murmur of a sea, not a troubled one, but a sea of a thousand wavelets trifling with the pebbles of a beach, and dancing in and out among the teeth of a reef; a hum not unlike that of the bees—but somewhat louder, and pitched on a lower note.
Domitia paid no attention to the scene, nor to the sounds, she was engaged with her jewel-box, that she had brought forth into the sun, in order that she might count over her treasures.
At a respectful distance sat Euphrosyne spinning.
Domitia had some Syrian filagree gold work in her hand—it formed a decoration for the head, to be fastened by two pins; the heads were those of owls with opals for eyes.
She laid it aside and looked at her rings and brooches. There was one of the latter, a cameo given her by her mother, of coral of two hues, a Medusa’s head, a beautiful work of art. Then she took up a necklace of British pearls from the Severn, she twisted it about her arm and lovely were the pure pearls against her delicate flesh,—like the dainty tints on the rose and white coral of the brooch she had laid aside.
She replaced the chain, and took up a cornelian fish.
“Euphrosyne,” said Domitia, “come hither! observe this fish. Thy sister gave it me the day I was married, but alack! it brought me no luck. Think you it is an omen of ill? But Glyceria would not have given me one such.”