But when I saw what was going to happen, I
made a strong resolve to save myself from the
knife; so, breaking the halter they led me by, I


 



leaped out and entered at a run the room where
the rascals were seated at table with the proprietor of the farm. Running in thither, I pranced
about and overturned everything, lamp and tables
together. I thought I had invented in this a
clever means of safety, and that the proprietor
would forthwith order me to be locked up where
I could be guarded safely as an unruly ass. But
this piece of cleverness brought me into the extremest danger. They thought I was mad, armed
themselves with plenty of swords and lances and
thick sticks, and got ready to kill me. When I
saw what great peril I was in, I ran past them into
the room where my masters were to sleep, and,
seeing this, they closed the doors carefully from
the outside.
 
As soon as day dawned I received the goddess
on my back again, and set out in company with
the begging priests, and we came to another village, large and populous, where they announced
something even more striking than usual in the
way of hocus-pocus-namely, that the goddess
would not stay in the house of a man, but would
occupy the temple of the most highly honored
local goddess they had. The people received the
foreign goddess very gladly, and lodged her with
their own.
To us they assigned lodgings with a
poor family. When my masters had made a long
stay here they desired to go on to the neighboring

 

city, and asked their goddess back from the
villagers. They entered the sacred precincts
themselves, brought her away, set her on my
back, and drove me off. But, as luck would have
it, the profane wretches had used the occasion of
entering this temple to steal a votive vessel of
gold, which they carried off hidden under the goddess. As soon as the villagers discovered what
had happened they gave chase; when they came
near they leaped down from their horses, arrested
them in the road, accused them of sacrilege and
temple-robbing, and demanded the stolen offering. Searching everywhere they found it in the
lap of the goddess. So they bound the wretches,
led them back, and cast them into prison. The
goddess whom I carried they took and placed in
another temple, and the golden vessel they restored to the local goddess.
 
The next day they decided to sell the prisoners' goods and me, and they disposed of me to a
stranger from a neighboring village, a baker by
trade. He took possession of me, bought ten
bushels of wheat, which he placed on my back,
and drove me home to his own house over a hard
road. When we arrived he led me into the mill,
where I beheld a great crowd of beasts, my fellow-slaves, and a great number of mills, all turned by them, and everything was covered with
flour. They left me there in idleness that day,


 



seeing that I was a new slave, and had come
over a hard road carrying a heavy burden. But
on the morrow they covered my eyes with a bandage, harnessed me to the shaft of the mill, and
then started me up. Although I knew how to
work a mill from much experience, I feigned ignorance; but my hopes were vain, for a number
of the millers seized clubs and surrounded me;
and when I was not expecting it—for I could not
see-they pounded me with one accord, and such
was the effect of their blows that I suddenly began to whirl round like a top. And I learned by
experiment that it will not do for a slave to wait
for the master's hand before he does his work.