'Our miracle of beauty and boy-god of melody has departed before us to
the Elysian fields!' muttered the hunchback Reburrus, in harsh,
sarcastic accents.
Then, during the short silence that ensued, the voices from the street,
joined on this occasion to a noise of approaching footsteps on the
pavement, became again distinctly audible in the banqueting-hall.
'News! news!' cried these fresh auxiliaries of the horde already
assembled before the palace. 'Keep together, you who still care for your
lives! Solitary citizens have been lured by strange men into desolate
streets, and never seen again! Jars of newly salted flesh, which there
were no beasts left in the city to supply, have been found in a
butcher's shop! Keep together! Keep together!'
'No cannibals among the mob shall pollute the body of my poor boy!'
cried Vetranio, rousing himself from his short lethargy of grief. 'Ho!
Thascius! Marcus! you who can yet stand! let us bear him to the funeral
pile! He has died first--his ashes shall be first consumed!'
The two patricians arose as the senator spoke, and aided him in carrying
the body to the lower end of the room, where it was laid across the
table, beneath the black curtain, and between the heaps of drapery and
furniture piled up against each of the walls.
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