THE GOLDEN ASS, OR METAMORPHOSES

BOOK 7

Haemus appears and takes command -- revealed as Charite's lover Tlepolemus in disguise -- she is rescued and the robbers exterminated -- she makes much of Lucius -- he is sent out to grass -- yoked to the mill -- attacked by the stallions -- persecuted by a cruel boy --threatened with castration -- blamed for the boy's death

The darkness was just giving way to daylight and the sun's shining chariot was just beginning to brighten the world when another robber appeared on the scene -- at least so he must have been from the greetings that passed. He sat down at the entrance to the cave, and when he had got his breath back he made the following report to his colleagues:

'So far as the business of plundering Milo's house is concerned, we can dismiss our worries and relax. After you had bravely cleared the place out and returned to camp, I mingled with the crowd of townspeople, pretending to share their anger and indignation, so as to discover and report back to you, as you had ordered, what was going to be decided about investigating the affair and how far the search for the perpetrators was to be taken. The whole lot of them were agreed that the obvious culprit was some man called Lucius. This was not mere guesswork, the evidence was plain: within the last few days he had passed himself off to Milo as a respectable character by a forged letter of introduction, and had so successfully won his confidence that he was received into his house as a guest and treated as an intimate friend. In the course of a few days he had wormed his way into the affections of Milo's maid by pretending to fall in love with her. That enabled him to carry out a thorough inspection of the lock on the front door and to reconnoitre the part of the house where all the family property was stored. As a conclusive proof that he was the villain of the piece it was pointed out that he had disappeared that night at the very moment of the robbery and had not been seen since. To assist his escape and to enable him to foil his pursuers and hole up at a safe distance, he had the means at hand in the shape of the white horse that he had brought with him to aid his getaway. They had found his slave still in the house and had of course arrested him and imprisoned him on the order of the magistrates, expecting him to provide evidence of his master's nefarious plans. However, when next day he had been put to all kinds of tortures, though he nearly died in the process, he made no admission of any kind. Nevertheless several messengers had been dispatched to Lucius' hometown to find, him and bring him to justice.'

Listening to this story and comparing Lucius as he had been and his former happy condition with the woes of the wretched ass that he now was, I groaned within myself. The learned men of old, I reflected, knew what they were talking about when they envisaged and portrayed Fortune as totally blind; It is invariably on the wicked and undeserving, I thought, that she bestows her favours; her choices are never grounded on reason, indeed she goes out of her way to frequent the company of those she ought to avoid like the plague if she could see. And the worst of it is that she distributes reputation so capriciously, indeed downright perversely: the evildoer glories in the character of a man of virtue and the innocent is punished like a criminal. Here was I, cruelly attacked and transformed by her into the shape of a beast, and one of the lowest sort at that, reduced to a condition which might inspire grief and pity in my worst enemy, accused of robbing a dear friend and host -- indeed parricide would be a more accurate name for it than robbery. And I was not in a position to defend myself or to utter a single word of denial. However, I thought that if I stayed silent when such a heinous charge was brought against me in my presence, it might seem that I assented to it because I had a guilty conscience. This I could not endure, and I tried at least to call out 'No, I didn't do it!' The 'No' I did utter again and again at the top of my voice, but the rest I couldn't manage; try as I might to round out the vigorous vibration of my hanging lips, I couldn't get beyond the first word and just went on braying 'No, no'. But what is the point of stringing out complaints against the perversity of Fortune? She even had no compunction about allowing me to become the fellow slave and yokemate of the horse who had formerly been my servant and mount.

Harassed by such thoughts as these, I was suddenly struck by a more pressing anxiety, when I recollected the robbers' decision to sacrifice me to Charite's ghost; and I kept looking down at my belly and imagining myself already pregnant with the wretched girl. Meanwhile the fellow who had just reported this false indictment against me produced a thousand gold pieces that he had hidden by sewing them into his clothing, which he said he had taken off various wayfarers, and by way of demonstrating his honesty paid them into the common treasury. Then he began to ask earnestly after the fate of his comrades. On learning that several of them, the bravest indeed, had been lost in various ways on active service, he proposed that they should for the time being call a halt to all expeditions and declare a truce in their campaigning in order to concentrate on recruiting, so as to restore their forces to full strength and fighting efficiency by a new intake of manpower. The reluctant could be terrified into enlisting, the willing would be attracted by the prospect of loot, and there would be many who would be happy to renounce a downtrodden and slavish existence for a life of almost princely power. He himself had just met a man who was tall, young, heftily built, muscular and vigorous, and after some urging had persuaded him to turn to more profitable employment powers which had for too long been idle and torpid, to make the most of the boon of good health while he could, and to use those strong hands of his for raking in riches rather than holding them out for charity.

This was unanimously carried, and they agreed to enrol this man, as he seemed to have the right qualifications, and to beat up for more recruits to bring the company up to strength. His proposer went out and shortly returned bringing with him a young man of immense size, just as he had promised; nobody else there could hold a candle to him, for he was not only massively built but taller by a head than anybody present -- this though his beard was only just beginning to sprout. He was dressed in a motley collection of rags, precariously stitched together, which only half covered him, so that his midriff with its thick layer of muscle could be seen peeping through.

That was how he looked as he stood there. 'Votaries of mighty Mars and fellow soldiers, as I may already call you,' he said, 'I salute you. Receive me as readily as I come to you, a man of dash and daring, one who would rather take hard blows on his body than hard cash in his hand, one who defies the death that others dread. Don't think me a beggar or an outcast, or judge my worth from these rags. I was captain of a valiant company and I have laid waste all Macedonia; I am the famous bandit Haemus of Thrace, whose name is feared throughout the Empire. My father Theron was an equally renowned robber; I was nourished on human blood and brought up in the ranks of our band to be the heir and rival of my father's prowess. But I lost every one of my brave comrades and all my riches in a matter of moments. In an evil hour I had attacked as he passed by an Imperial commissioner (he had been a two-hundred- thousand man but had been dismissed in disgrace) -- but I had better make things clear by starting at the beginning.

'This man had held a number of offices at court, in which he had won distinction, and he was held in high regard by the Emperor himself. On false charges cunningly trumped up by certain individuals he was sent into exile, the victim of cruel Envy. However, his wife Plotina, a woman of altogether exceptional loyalty and chastity, who had given him ten children, rejecting in disdain the pleasures and luxuries of the city, went with him in his flight and shared his ruin. She cut her hair, dressed herself in men's clothes, and stowed in her girdle her most valuable jewellery and some gold money; then moving undismayed among armed guards and drawn swords she shared all her husband's dangers, watching over his life with sleepless vigilance and enduring countless hardships with the fortitude of a man.

'After undergoing many trials along the way and braving the terrors of the sea, they were making for Zacynthus, which had been assigned by the decree of destiny as their temporary residence. They had put in near Actium just when we, having come down from Macedonia, were operating in those parts, and had taken refuge from the sea in a little inn near where they had landed. Late that night we fell on the place and made a clean sweep of the contents, but it was only by the skin of our teeth that we escaped. The moment Plotina heard the first sounds of our entry, she rushed into the outer room and filled the whole place with cries of alarm, calling on the soldiers and servants by name and summoning the whole blessed neighbourhood to the rescue. It was only because of the general panic, each man skulking to save his own skin, that we were able to get away unscathed.

'But this most noble lady, for so I must call her, this paragon of loyalty, lost no time in using the influence her exemplary behaviour had won her: she successfully petitioned the Emperor's divinity for an immediate pardon for her husband and condign punishment for his assailants. That was that: the Emperor willed that Haemus the robber's company should cease to exist, and cease to exist it did. Such is the power of a great prince's mere wish. Our entire band was hunted down, cut to pieces, and exterminated by detachments of soldiers; I alone just managed to escape from the very jaws of Orcus, which I did as follows. I put on a woman's dress, brightly coloured and hanging in loose folds, covered my head with a gauze turban, and slipped on my feet a pair of those thin white shoes that women wear. So disguised as a member of the weaker sex and riding an ass loaded with barley I made my getaway through the enemy ranks. They allowed free passage to what they thought was a mere donkey-woman -- and indeed at that time my complexion was still that of a boy and my cheeks were smooth and hairless.

'Since then I have been true to my father's renown and my own prowess. Surrounded as I was by hostile swords, I felt somewhat nervous; but in solitary raids on farmhouses and villages under the cover of my disguise I have scraped together a little journey-money' -- and with that he opened his rags and poured out a couple of thousand gold pieces. 'There,' he said, 'is my contribution -- my dowry if you like; I freely offer it to your company, and along with it myself, if you will agree, as your trusty commander, one who will very soon transform this house of stone into a house of gold.

Without a moment's hesitation the robbers unanimously voted to confer the leadership on him, and produced a rather more elegant robe for him to put on in place of the rags which had turned out to be so rich. In this guise he embraced every man individually; then he took the seat of honour at the table and was formally installed with great feasting and carousing. In the course of conversation he heard about Charite's escape, how I had carried her, and the horrible death they planned for us. He asked where she was and was taken to see her. At the sight of her loaded with chains he came back wrinkling his nose in disapproval. 'It would be stupid and rash of me,' he said, 'to veto your decision, but I shall not be able to face the accusations of my conscience if I don't tell you what I really think. First of all, please believe me when I say that it is for your interests that I am concerned; and after all, if you don't like my proposition, you can always revert to your original plan. My own view is that robbers, at least those who know their business, should count nothing more important than their own profit, not even revenge, which has a habit of rebounding on its author. If you dispose of this girl inside the ass, you will have achieved nothing except to give vent to your resentment. What I would suggest is that we take her to some city or other and sell her there. A pretty young girl like that will fetch a good price. It so happens that I have a number of friends who are pimps, and one or other of them, I've no doubt, can well afford to pay a hefty sum for her, one in keeping with her high birth. She will then be consigned to a brothel (and she won't be allowed to escape a second time), and you will have your revenge into the bargain, and a hugely satisfactory one, when she is serving her sentence there. That I honestly hold to be the most expedient course; but the decision and the conduct of your affairs must rest with you.'

In this manner did our Treasury Pleader, this admirable protector of both girl and ass, present our case. The others, however, debated for a long time, putting my heart to the torture by their protracted discussions; indeed I all but expired in my agony. Finally they agreed to the newcomer's proposal, and at once released the girl from her fetters. As soon as she saw Haemus and heard what they were saying about pimps and brothels, she became elated and began laughing merrily. That, I felt, justified me in condemning the entire female sex, when I saw this girl who had pretended to be in love with her betrothed and to be pining for a chaste marriage, now suddenly delighted by the mention of a filthy sordid brothel. At that moment the whole race of women and their morals hung in the balance, with an ass holding the scales.

However, the young man now went on: 'Should we not,' he asked, 'at once propitiate Mars the Comrade in Arms, before we set out to sell the girl and find recruits? But so far as I can see we haven't any animals for sacrifice or even enough wine to drink, let alone a surplus. Choose ten men to go with me; they will be all I shall need to attack the nearest village and bring back a real Salian banquet for you.' He then set out, while the rest of them built up a huge fire and made an altar to Mars from green turf.

The foraging party soon returned carrying skins full of wine and driving before them a herd of animals. From these they chose a large he-goat, old and hairy, to sacrifice to Mars, Helper and Comrade. They then prepared a sumptuous supper. The new arrival spoke up again. 'You must look to me,' he said, 'to give you a vigorous lead, not only in your expeditions and plunderings but also in your pleasures'; and he set to work energetically, attending to every detail with extraordinary efficiency. He swept the floor, laid the table, cooked, arranged the various dishes, served them dextrously, and above all plied every man with bumper after bumper until they were all awash. Meanwhile, on the pretext of fetching and carrying fresh supplies, he was constantly at the girl's side, smilingly offering her filched titbits and sips of wine from his own cup. She for her part eagerly accepted these attentions, and when he several times offered to kiss her she kissed him back with ardour. This emphatically displeased me. 'So, young lady,' I said to myself 'you've forgotten your marriage and the lover whom you love, and you prefer this stranger, this bloodstained assassin, to that new husband, whoever he is, to whom your parents wed you? Doesn't your conscience prick you, or are you happy to trample true love under foot and play the whore here among spears and swords? Suppose the other robbers notice what's happening? It'll be back again to death by donkey for you, and you'll take me to perdition along with you. It's somebody else's hide you're gambling with.'

However, while I was silently rehearsing these slanderous charges in high indignation, I became aware from some words that passed between them -- ambiguous but clear enough to an intelligent ass -- that this was not in fact Haemus the notorious robber but her husband Tlepolemus. For as they went on talking, ignoring me as if I were really dead, he raised his voice a little. 'Cheer up, sweetest Charite,' he said. 'Very soon these enemies will be your prisoners', and drunk as they already were and full to overflowing, he reapplied himself even more insistently to thrusting wine on them, now serving it neat and slightly mulled. He himself didn't touch a drop. I really couldn't help suspecting that he was adding some soporific drug to their cups, for finally the whole lot of them, every man jack, lay overcome with wine as if dead. Then it was the easiest thing in the world for him to tie them all up and completely immobilize them; after which he mounted the girl on my back and set off for home.

On our arrival the whole city turned out to see this longed-for sight. There were parents, relatives, dependants, children, servants, all with happiness in their faces and joy in their hearts. There was to be seen a crowd of both sexes and all ages escorting this novel and never-to-be-forgotten spectacle, a virgin riding in triumph on an ass. I myself played my part manfully in the rejoicing, and not to seem out of place or out of harmony with the proceedings, I pricked up my ears, inflated my nostrils, and brayed vigorously -- or indeed a better word would be thunderously. Charite was taken straight to her room, where her parents made much of her, while Tlepolemus took me and a large number of other pack-animals and townspeople back again at a great pace. I was by no means unwilling to go, for my usual curiosity was whetted by my desire to see the robbers taken prisoner. We found them still immobilized, more by the wine than by their bonds. All their plunder was unearthed and carried outside; and the gold and silver and the rest of the loot was loaded on to us. Some of the robbers, tied up as they were, they dragged to the edge of a nearby ravine and threw over; the others they dispatched with their own swords and left them where they lay.

Delighted with our vengeance we returned joyfully to the city. The treasure was consigned to public safekeeping, and Tlepolemus was restored to the legitimate possession of his bride. The new wife at once proclaimed me her saviour and took generous care of me; on her wedding day she ordered my manger to be filled to overflowing with barley, and had enough hay served out to me to feed a Bactrian camel. You can imagine how horribly I cursed Photis for having turned me into an ass and not a dog, when I saw the whole canine population gorged and bloated with the leavings and filched morsels of that lavish marriage-feast. The unique night and her first experience of love came and went, and the new bride never stopped talking to her parents and husband of her thankfulness to me, until they promised to invest me with Supreme honours. Finally a group of solid citizens was convened to decide on the most suitable way of rewarding me. One of them suggested that I should be kept in the house to lead a life of leisure, fed richly on choice barley and beans and vetch. However, another was concerned for my liberty, and his opinion carried the day: he proposed that I should be allowed to run loose in the fields to take my pleasure with the horses, so that I could mount the mares and from these superior matings produce many mules for my masters to rear.

Accordingly the head stableman was summoned, and after a long recommendation I was handed over to him to be taken off. I was indeed happy and carefree as I trotted ahead of him: I could, I thought, now say goodbye to carrying baggage and other burdens, and having gained my freedom I should be sure when spring came and the fields were in bloom to find roses somehow or other. And then another thought struck me: if all these thanks and honours had been bestowed on me when I was an ass, how much more lavishly should I be feted and rewarded when I regained my human shape! However, once that herdsman had got me well away from the city, there were no comforts awaiting me; I wasn't even set free. His wife, an odious grasping creature, yoked me to a rotary mill, and by repeatedly beating me with a leafy branch she proceeded to get bread for herself and her family at the expense of my hide. Moreover, she was not satisfied with overtasking me like this merely for her own needs; she hired out my circumambulations to the neighbours to grind their grain for them as well. To make matters worse, I wasn't allowed even the usual ration of food for these hard labours. My barley, crushed and ground by the selfsame mill that I was turning, she sold to the farmers roundabout; I, for a whole day of hard work fastened to that machine, was not fed until the evening, and then what she served out to me was just the husks, unsifted and full of dirt and grit.

Ground down as I was by these troubles, cruel Fortune then delivered me over to fresh torments -- to enable me, I suppose, to boast of glory earned for deeds of valour at home and abroad. Rather late in the day the worthy herdsman finally recollected his masters' orders and turned me loose among the horses. Free at last, ass that I was, I rejoiced and kicked up my heels; and parading around with dainty steps I began to choose out the mares that I thought would make the best concubines. However, these agreeable prospects ended in disaster. It was the breeding season, and the stallions had for weeks been thoroughly fattened up and fed to bursting. Formidable at the best of times and stronger than any ass, they regarded me in the light of a threat, and to prevent what they saw as an adulterous debasement of the breed, and setting the divine law of hospitality at naught, they fell on me in a fury of hatred. One reared his great chest in the air, and with his head and crest towering above me battered me with his front hooves; another turned his rump on me, bulging with muscles, and attacked me with his heels; a third, whinnying spitefully, threatened me with ears laid back, and baring his gleaming teeth like so many hatchets nipped me all over. It was just like the story I had once read of the king of Thrace who consigned unfortunate strangers to his wild horses to rend and devour; that powerful tyrant was so sparing of his barley that he assuaged the hunger of his voracious stud by largesse of human flesh.

Finding myself similarly attacked and savaged by all these horses, I began hankering for my old round in the mill. However, Fortune's appetite for tormenting me was unappeased, and she now visited me with a fresh plague. I was told off to carry wood down from the mountain, and the boy who was put in charge of me was without question the most objectionable specimen of boyhood there ever was. Not only did I exhaust myself climbing the steep slopes of the mountain and wear out my hooves traversing its sharp-edged rocks; I was so incessantly thrashed by blow after blow from his stick that the pain of the cuts penetrated the marrow of my bones. By perpetually aiming his blows at one particular place on my right flank he split the skin and opened up a gaping sore -- a pit, a crevasse; and still went on beating the wound until it ran with blood. He piled such a weight of faggots on my back that you'd have thought it a load for an elephant rather than an ass. And whenever the load became unbalanced and slipped sideways, instead of relieving me by removing some faggots from the heavier side and so taking off some of the pressure, as he should have done, or at least evening up the load by transferring them to the other side, his remedy for the imbalance was to pile stones on top. As if these tribulations were not enough, the size of my load still did not satisfy him; huge though it was, when we had to cross the stream which ran alongside the road, to save his boots from a wetting he would jump up and perch on my back -- a trivial addition, I suppose he thought, to my enormous burden. The river bank was muddy and slippery, and from time to time I would overbalance under my load and go down in the mire. A good driver would have lent a hand, would have held me up by the bridle or hauled me up by the tail, or at least taken off some of my vast load until I could get to my feet again. Not he: so far from offering to help me in my exhaustion, he would beat every inch of me with his great stick, starting at my head and not forgetting my ears, until his blows acted as a kind of medical treatment to get me up again.

Yet another torture did he devise for me. He made up a bunch of thorns with formidably sharp and poisonous prickles and fastened it to my tail to hang there and torment me, so that as I walked it would swing about and hurt me cruelly with its deadly spikes. So either way I was in trouble. If I put on speed to escape his savage blows, the thorns pricked me harder than ever; and if I slowed down for a moment to ease the pain, I was thrashed into a gallop once more. This detestable boy seemed to have no other object in life but to finish me off one way or another, and indeed he more than once threatened and swore to do just that. Then something happened to goad his abominable malice to fresh lengths. One day he was behaving so outrageously that my patience gave way and I let fly at him with a vigorous kick. This was what he then planned to do to me. He loaded me with a large bundle of tow which he roped tightly to my back, and then drove me on to the road. He then helped himself to a burning coal from the first farm he came to and pushed it into the middle of my load. In a moment the loose mass had ignited and burst into flame, enveloping me in its lethal heat with no apparent hope of escaping from the fatal menace or of saving my life; a fire like that allows no delay or time to think things over. In this calamity Fortune for once smiled on me; no doubt she was saving me for future dangers, but now at least she delivered me from instant and certain death. Catching sight of a muddy pool of water from yesterday's rain by the roadside, without stopping to think I plunged into it head over ears. Then, when the flames were finally extinguished, I emerged, relieved of my load and delivered from destruction. But that dreadful boy had the effrontery to blame his vile deed on me, telling all his fellow herdsmen that I had stumbled on purpose when passing the neighbour's stove and had deliberately set myself on fire, adding with a laugh, 'So how long are we going to go on wasting fodder on this salamander of an ass?'

Only a few days later he played an even worse trick on me. Having sold the wood I was carrying at a nearby cottage he was leading me back unloaded when he started to proclaim that he could no longer cope with my wicked ways and that he had had enough of such a thankless task. This was the style of the complaint that he had concocted: 'Look at this ass -- lazy, idle, too asinine to be true. On top of all the other shocking things he's done, now he's getting me into fresh trouble and danger. Every time he sees a passer-by, whether it's a pretty woman, a young girl, or a handsome boy, in a second he's sent his load flying, and often his saddle as well, and makes a mad rush at them -- a lover like this in search of a human mate! Slavering with desire, he hurls them to the ground as he attempts to indulge his unlawful pleasures and unspeakable lusts, urging them to bestial unions while Venus looks away in horror. He even distorts his shameless mouth into a parody of a kiss as he butts and bites his victims. These goings-on are likely to involve us in serious lawsuits and quarrels, and probably criminal prosecutions as well. Only just now, catching sight of a respectable young woman, he threw off his load of wood and scattered it all over the place, went for her in a frenzy and had her down in the mud, did Our merry philanderer, and then and there in full view of everybody did his level best to mount her. It was only because some passers-by were alarmed by her screams and rushed to the rescue that she was freed and pulled out from right under his hooves; otherwise the unhappy woman would have been trampled and torn apart -- an agonizing end for her and the prospect of the death penalty as her legacy to us.'

These lies he interspersed with all sorts of other stories, all the more galling to me because I had to stay modestly silent. They aroused in the herdsmen a violent determination to do for me. 'Let's make a sacrifice of this public husband,' said one, 'this adulterer to the community; that's what his monstrous marriages deserve. Come on, young fellow,' he added, 'cut his throat here and now, throw his guts to the dogs, and keep the meat for the workforce's dinner. We'll sprinkle his skin with ash and dry it to take back to our masters; we can easily pretend that he was killed by a wolf.'

Without more ado my delinquent accuser constituted himself executioner of the herdsmen's sentence, and gleefully mocking my misfortunes and still resenting my kick -- how I regretted that it hadn't been more effective! -- started to whet a sword. But one of the rustics in the crowd intervened. 'It would be a shame,' he said, 'to kill such a fine ass and lose his labour and valuable services by passing this sentence on his amatory excesses. If we castrate him, that will put paid to his lovemaking for good and relieve you of all fear of danger, and he'll be much the stouter and stronger for it. I've known not merely many idle asses but lots of very unruly horses with an excessive sexual drive which made them wild and unmanageable, but after this operation they at once became tame and docile, quite suitable as pack-animals and submissive to any other kind of work. So, unless you strongly disagree, give me a day or two -- I've got to be at the next market meanwhile -- to fetch the instruments I need for the operation from home and come straight back to you; then I'll whip this nasty brute of a lover's thighs open and take out his manhood, and you'll find him as meek and mild as an old bell-wether.'

By this decision I was snatched from the hands of Orcus, but only to be reserved for a fate almost worse. I began to lament and mourn myself as dead -- for that was what I should be without my latter end. So I started to look round for ways of destroying myself, by a hunger-strike or jumping off a cliff -- I'd still be dead, but at least I'd be dead in one piece. I was still undecided about my choice of ending when the next morning that assassin of a boy once more led me up the mountain by the usual route. He tied me to a branch that hung down from a huge ilex, while he climbed a little way up above the path with a hatchet to cut the wood he had to fetch. At that moment there emerged from a nearby cave the huge towering head of a deadly she-bear. The instant I saw her I panicked; terrified by this sudden apparition I reared back with the whole weight of my body on my hind legs and my head high in the air, snapped my tether, and took off at top speed. Headlong and hell for leather downhill I went, hurling myself bodily through the air with my feet hardly touching the earth, until I reached the level ground below; all I wanted was to escape that monster of a bear and that even worse monster of a boy.

At this point a passer-by, seeing me straying ownerless, grabbed hold of me, jumped on my back, and beating me with the stick he carried rode off with me along an unfamiliar side road. I was more than willing to cooperate in any course that would save me from the butchery of my virility; and the blows did not much bother me, used as I was to regular beatings. However, Fortune, determined as ever to persecute me, in her lamentable readiness to thwart my lucky escape now laid a fresh trap for me. My herdsmen had been scouring the countryside in search of a lost heifer, and now they happened to run into us and at once recognized me and seized my bridle in an attempt to take possession of me. My rider, however, boldly and stoutly resisted them, calling men and gods to witness and shouting: 'What's the meaning of this? Why this violence? Why are you attacking me?' 'Oh,' said they, 'so we're treating you uncivilly, when you've stolen our ass and are making off with him? It would be more to the point to confess where you've hidden the boy who was in charge of him obviously you've murdered him.' And with that they pulled him to the ground and beat and thumped him with fists and feet, while he swore that he'd seen no driver; he'd merely come across an ass that was wandering about loose and caught it for the sake of the reward, fully intending to restore it to the owner. 'If only the ass himself,' he said, 'and I wish I'd never set eyes on him) could speak and bear witness to my innocence: you'd be sorry for mistreating me like this.'

These protestations got him nowhere. Those vexatious herdsmen took him into custody and brought him to the wooded mountain side which was the boy's usual beat. He was nowhere to be seen, only fragments of a body, torn limb from limb and scattered all over the hillside. I knew perfectly well that it was the teeth of that she-bear that had done this, and I should certainly have told them what I knew had I had the power of speech. As it was, all I could do was silently to congratulate myself on my belated revenge. The boy's body was in pieces, all over the place, but in the end with some difficulty they found it all and reassembled it, and then buried it on the spot. My Bellerophon they declared clearly guilty of theft and bloody murder, tied him up, and took him to their village for the night, meaning, they said, to bring him before the magistrates early next day to pay the penalty for his crime. Meanwhile the boy's parents were mourning him with tears and lamentations, when the farmer turned up true to his promise and proposed to operate on me. 'Well,' said one of the herdsmen, 'our loss today was nothing to do with him; but tomorrow we can if we feel like it relieve this pestilent ass not just of his genitals but of his head. You won't lack for helpers.'

So it happened that my doom was postponed to the morning, and I thanked my friend for granting me at any rate one day's stay of execution by his death. However, I wasn't left in peace to congratulate myself for very long; the boy's mother burst into my stable, lamenting her son's untimely death with floods of tears. Dressed in black, ash on her head, tearing her grey hair with both hands, she wailed and protested endlessly, violently thumping and battering her breast. 'Look at him,' she screamed, 'lying there in his stall without a care in the world, indulging his gluttony and stuffing his insatiable bottomless belly -- eat, eat, eat, with no pity for me in my affliction, no thought of his dead master's horrible fate. Yes, he scorns and despises my feeble old age and thinks he'll get away with this monstrous crime and come off scot free. Of course he takes it for granted that he's not guilty; your really desperate villains always defy conscience and expect to get away with it. In God's name, you miserable animal, if you could speak for a moment or two, how could you persuade even a complete idiot that you weren't to blame for this atrocity? You could have defended the poor child with your hooves, you could have protected him with your teeth. Often and often you'd lashed out at him with your heels -- no trouble; why weren't you as eager to rescue him from death? You could at least have carried him off on your back and snatched him from the bloody clutches of that savage robber. How could you make off alone and desert and leave in the lurch your fellow slave, your master, your comrade, your good shepherd? Don't you know that anybody who refuses to help those in danger of death is guilty of antisocial behaviour and is liable to punishment on that score? But you aren't going to exult over my misfortunes much longer, murderer. I'll make you realize that nature lends strength to misery and grief.'

So saying, she pulled off her breastband and tied up my feet as tightly as she could with it, so that I should have no way of retaliating; then she seized the pole which was used to hold the stable door shut, and only stopped beating me with it when her strength gave out and the pole fell from her hands under its own weight. Then, complaining that her arms had tired so quickly, she rushed to the fire and took out a glowing brand, which she thrust right into my groin; whereat I resorted to the only defence that was left to me and ejected a stream of liquid filth which befouled her face and eyes. So, by blindness and stench, my doom was finally averted; otherwise, like another Meleager, an ass would have perished by the firebrand of an insane Althaea.

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