CHAP. 31.—ENORMOUS PRICES OF SOME FISH.
Asinius Celer,2422 a man of consular rank, and remarkable for his prodigal expenditure on this fish, bought one at Rome, during the reign of Caius,2423 at the price of eight thousand sesterces.2424 A reflection upon such a fact as this will at once lead us to turn our thoughts to those who, making loud complaints against luxury, have lamented that a single cook cost more money to buy than a horse; while at the present day a cook is only to be obtained for the same sum that a triumph would cost, and a fish is only to be purchased at what was formerly the price for a cook! indeed, there is hardly any living being held in higher esteem than the man who understands how, in the most scientific fashion, to get rid of his master’s property.
(18.) Licinius Mucianus relates, that in the Red Sea there was caught a mullet eighty2425 pounds in weight. What a price would have been paid for it by our epicures, if it had only been found off the shores in the vicinity of our city!