LIOXS AND TIGERS. 227 



Some 3'ears later, Mark Antony renewed the fancy 

 of the African monarch. He showed himself to the 

 Roman peojDle in a chariot drawn by Numidian lions. 

 Everything al^out this man Avas African, — his manners, 

 his table, his mistress, his death even. Once acclimated 

 in the Rome of the Ccesars, the king of the desert 

 was in con(2:enial smToundinfi:s, well lodored and well 

 fed. It was in the arena of the Circus Maximus, less 

 hot but more deadly than the African sands, that his 

 strength was in future to be employed. Pompey was 

 just made consul for the second time, and, in celebra- 

 tion of the event, he held a Venatio in that monster circus, 

 where four hundred thousand spectators could be com- 

 fortably accommodated. Pompey himself presides in his 

 private box, and at a signal from him, the gladiators, 

 in national costume, wearing simply a glaive, and carry- 

 ing a long spear, are introduced, to the sound of music. 

 With them come a crowd of augurs, extemporizing 

 on the good or evil fortunes in store for the warriors. 

 Meanwhile the long procession is moving around the 

 podium in honor of the twelve protecting deities. This 

 first ceremony having been duly accomplished, and the 

 customary salutes given the consul, as master of the 

 games, the cages are opened. Then, to the applause and 

 shouts of the people, fiercer, as Varro says, than the 

 animals themselves, six hundred lions rush from the ten 

 dens. They come with a confident air, sure of them- 

 selves and their reception, and divide, on opposite sides 



