have heard (you seem to hear everything) that they come to me to declaim, and I go to them for dinners.  ’Tis all very well for you to swear that you cannot entertain me in such grand fashion as I am used to, but it is of use....  Better be victimised by your friend than by your debtors, as you have been.  After all, I don’t require such a banquet as leaves a great waste behind it; a little will do, only handsomely served and well cooked.  I remember your telling me about a dinner of Phamea’s—­well, it need not be such a late affair as that, nor so grand in other respects; nay, if you persist in giving me one of your mother’s old family dinners, I can stand even that.  My new reputation for good living has reached you, I find, before my arrival, and you are alarmed at it; but, pray, put no trust in your ante-courses—­I have given up that altogether.  I used to spoil my appetite, I remember, upon your oil and sliced sausages....  One expense I really shall put you to; I must have my warm bath.  My other habits, I assure you, are quite unaltered; all the rest is joke”.

Paetus seems to answer him with the same good-humoured badinage.  Balbus, the governor of Africa, had been to see him, he says, and he had been content with such humble fare as he feared Cicero might despise.  So much, at least, we may gather from Cicero’s answer.

“Satirical as ever, I see.  You say Balbus was content with very modest fare.  You seem to insinuate that when grandees are so moderate, much more ought a poor ex-consul like myself so to be.  You don’t know that I fished it all out of your visitor himself, for he came straight to my house on his landing.  The very first words I said to him were, ’How did you get on with our friend Paetus?’ He swore he had never been better entertained.  If this referred to the charms of your conversation, remember, I shall be quite as appreciative a listener as Balbus; but if it meant the good things on the table, I must beg you will not treat us men of eloquence worse than you do a ‘Lisper’".[1]

[Footnote 1:  One of Cicero’s puns.  Balbus means ’Lisper’.]

They carry on this banter through several letters.  Cicero regrets that he has been unable as yet to pay his threatened visit, when his friend would have seen what advances he had made in gastronomic science.  He was able now to eat through the whole bill of fare—­“from the eggs to the roti”.

“I [Stoic that used to be] have gone over with my whole forces into the camp of Epicurus.  You will have to do with a man who can eat, and who knows what’s what.  You know how conceited we late learners are, as the proverb says.  You will have to unlearn those little ‘plain dinners’ and makeshifts of yours.  We have made such advances in the art, that we have been venturing to invite, more than once, your friends Verrius and Camillus (what elegant and fastidious gentlemen they are!).  But see how audacious we are getting!  I have even given Hirtius a dinner—­but without a peacock.  My cook could imitate nothing in his entertainments except the hot soup”.