440 
Pliny's natural histoet. 
[Book IX. 
solve pearls. At this moment she was wearing in her ears 
those choicest and most rare and unique productions of I^ature ; 
and while Antony was waiting to see what she was going to 
do, taking one of them from out of her ear, she threw it into the 
vinegar, and directly it was melted, swallowed it. Lucius 
Plancus,^^ who had been named umpire in the wager, placed 
his hand upon the other at the very instant that she was 
making preparations to dissolve it in a similar manner, and 
declared that Antony had lost — an omen which, in the result, 
was fully confirmed. The fame of the second pearl is equal 
to that which attends its fellow. After the queen, who had 
thus come off victorious on so important a question, had been 
seized, it was cut asunder, in order that this, the other half of 
the entertainment, might serve as pendants for the ears of 
Yenus, in the Pantheon at Eome. 
CHAP. 59. HOW PEAELS FIKST CAME INTO USE AT EOME. 
Antony and Cleopatra, however, will not bear away the palm 
of prodigality in this respect, and will be stripped of even 
this boast in the annals of luxury. For before their time, 
Clodius, the son of the tragic actor JEsopus,^^ had done the 
ceptible to the tongue. That pearls are not peculiar to one kind of shell- 
fish, as many believe, was known to Pliny." Beckmann^s History of In- 
ventions^ vol. i. p. 258, note 1, Bohfis Ed. We may remark, however 
that as the story is told by Pliny, there is no appearance that Cleopatra 
pounded the pearl. It is more likely that she threw it into the vinegar, 
and immediately swallowed it, taking it for granted that it had melted. 
6^ Macrobius, Saturn. B. iii. says, ^'Monatius" Plancus. His name 
was in reality liucius Munatius Plancus. He afterwards deserted Antony, 
and took the side of Octavianus ; and it was on his proposal that Octa- 
vianus received the title of Augustus in b.c. 27. He built the temple of 
Saturn, in order to secure the emperor's favour. It is not known in what 
year he died. 
65 " Omine rato." He means, that in the result, it was only too true 
that Antony was " victus," conquered, and that by his enemy Octavianus. 
Claudius, or Clodius JEsopus, was the most celebrated tragic actor at 
Rome in the time of Cicero, and was probably a freedraan of the Clodian 
family. Horace and other authors put him on a level with Roscius, 
^ From Cicero we learn that his acting was characterized chiefly by strong 
emphasis and vehemence. Cicero characterizes him as a " summus arti- 
fex," a " consummate artist." He was a firm friend of Cicero, whose 
cause he advocated indirectly more than once during his banishment 
from Rome. It appears from Pliny, B. x. c. 72, that he was far from 
frugal, though he left a large fortune to his spendthrift son, Clodius 
