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A banquet would sometimes cost the
price of an estate; shell-fish were brought from remote and unknown
shores, birds from Parthia and the banks of the Phasis; single dishes
were made of the brains of the peacocks and the tongues of nightingales
and flamingoes. Apicius, after squandering nearly a million of money in
the pleasures of the table, committed suicide, Seneca tells us, because
he found that he had only 80,000_l_. left. Cowley speaks of--
"Vitellius' table, which did hold
As many creatures as the ark of old."
"They eat," said Seneca, "and then they vomit; they vomit, and then
they eat." But even in this matter we cannot tell anything like the
worst facts about--
"Their sumptuous gluttonies and gorgeous feasts
On citron tables and Atlantic stone,
Their wines of Setia, Gales, and Falerne,
Chios, and Crete, and how they quaff in gold,
Crystal, and myrrhine cups, embossed with gems
And studs of pearl." [19]
Still less can we pretend to describe the unblushing and unutterable
degradation of this period as it is revealed to us by the poets and the
satirists.


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