Edward Bulwer-Lytton: The Last Days of Pompeii

BOOK THE FOURTH 2. Chapter II (continued)

'Yet, I assure you, master, that they are men of most respectable character--the best cooks of the place; it is a great favor to get them. But for my sake...'

'Thy sake, unhappy Congrio!' interrupted Diomed; and by what purloined moneys of mine, by what reserved filchings from marketing, by what goodly meats converted into grease, and sold in the suburbs, by what false charges for bronzes marred, and earthenware broken--hast thou been enabled to make them serve thee for thy sake?'

'Nay, master, do not impeach my honesty! May the gods desert me if...'

'Swear not!' again interrupted the choleric Diomed, 'for then the gods will smite thee for a perjurer, and I shall lose my cook on the eve of dinner. But, enough of this at present: keep a sharp eye on thy ill-favored assistants, and tell me no tales to-morrow of vases broken, and cups miraculously vanished, or thy whole back shall be one pain. And hark thee! thou knowest thou hast made me pay for those Phrygian attagens enough, by Hercules, to have feasted a sober man for a year together--see that they be not one iota over-roasted. The last time, O Congrio, that I gave a banquet to my friends, when thy vanity did so boldly undertake the becoming appearance of a Melian crane--thou knowest it came up like a stone from AEtna--as if all the fires of Phlegethon had been scorching out its juices. Be modest this time, Congrio--wary and modest. Modesty is the nurse of great actions; and in all other things, as in this, if thou wilt not spare thy master's purse, at least consult thy master's glory.'

'There shall not be such a coena seen at Pompeii since the days of Hercules.'

'Softly, softly--thy cursed boasting again! But I say, Congrio, yon homunculus--yon pigmy assailant of my cranes--yon pert-tongued neophyte of the kitchen, was there aught but insolence on his tongue when he maligned the comeliness of my sweetmeat shapes? I would not be out of the fashion, Congrio.'