Slander: on not Being Quick to Put Faith in it (3)

Ptolemy, who in general was not particularly sound of judgment, but had been brought up in the midst of courtly flattery, was so inflamed and upset by this

surprising charge that he did not take into account any of the probabilities, not considering either that the accuser was a rival or that a painter was too insignificant a person for so great a piece of treason— a painter, too, who had been well treated by him and honoured above any of his fellow-craftsmen. Indeed, he did not even enquire whether Apelles had gone to Tyre at all. On the contrary, he at once began to rave and filled the palace with noise, shouting “The ingrate,” “The plotter,’ and “The conspirator.”’ And if one of his fellow-prisoners, who was indignant at the impudence of-Antiphilus and felt sorry for poor Apelles, had not said that the man had not taken any part whatever in the affair, he would have had his head cut off, and so would have shared the consequences of the troubles in Tyre without being himself to blame for them in any way.