62 On the Luxtiry of the Romans. 



to Pliny, agreed to lend him six thousand. Varro says only 

 two thousand. The object then was, who should be most 

 absurd about lampreys. Hortensius had some of which he 

 was more careful than of his slaves, and not for the purpose of 

 eating them. Those served on his table were bought in the 

 market. He is said to have wept on the death of one of these 

 fish. Crassus, the orator, in a like case, went farther, — ^he put 

 on mourning. His colleague Domitius chid him for it in the 

 senate ; but all this was nothing compared to the deeds of Ve- 

 dius PoUio. He more than once threw in living men to be de- 

 voured by his lampreys. 



Other fish were equally the objects of a prodigality of which 

 we can hardly form a conception. The accipenser was gene- 

 rally sold for more than a thousand drachmae. It was never 

 set on the table without a flourish of trumpets. The accipeiiser 

 was not, as it would seem, the ordinary sturgeon, but the ster- 

 let, a small species with a pointed snout, caught in the rivers 

 that fall into the Black Sea. The mullet, or roach of Pro- 

 vence, called in Paris the sun-mullet^ was also sold excessively 

 dear. A mullet weighing 4 pounds fetched £2ri ; another 

 £ 62. Three together, in the reign of Tiberius, were sold so 

 high as £ 250. These fish used even to be brought alive to 

 the dining-room, by canals filled with salt-water, which passed 

 under the table. The fact is undoubted, and is attested by the 

 invectives of Seneca. 



Snails and Oysters. — Singular attention was likewise paid to 

 snails. The same Fulvius Hirpinus, who had thought of parks 

 for quadrupeds, contrived parks for them too. As snails could 

 not be retained by inclosures, the places in which they were kept 

 were surrounded with water. Jars of earthen- ware were set for 

 them, to retire into, and they were fattened with mulled wine and 

 flour. Pliny says there were some of the weight of 25 lb. 

 Those that grew to this size were certainly not Italian snails. 

 But we know that snails were hkewise brought from foreign 

 countries, as Africa and Illyria. 



The man who first shewed the way of making oyster-beds 

 was Sergius Aurata. He, like Licinius, derived his surname 

 from a fish, the John Dory. The preserver of the Lucrine 

 1 



