elsewhere mentions a visit to Hierapolis in Phrygia (de mundo 17). Returning from the East he came to Corinth, where—if we may accept his identification of himself with the Lucius of the Metamorphoses—he fell into the clutches of the priests of Isis, who played upon his emotional and superstitious temperament to their hearts' content. He was first initiated into the mysteries of Isis (Metamorph. xi. 23, 24). A few days after this auspicious event the goddess appeared to him in a vision and bade him set forth homewards. He therefore took ship for Rome, where for the space of a year he dwelt, a fervent worshipper at the temple of Isis on the Campus Martius. Once more visions of the night began to afflict him; he consulted the priests and discovered the cause; he required yet to be initiated into the mysteries of Osiris. The priests of Corinth had worked upon his credulity to such good effect, that he found himself in serious financial difficulties, but by practising as a lawyer he succeeded in making a sufficient income to provide more than adequately for the expenses of this fresh initiation (Metamorph. xi. 28, 30). While at Rome he made the acquaintance of Aemilianus Strabo and Scipio Orfitus, men of distinguished position, whom he was to meet again when their official career brought them to Africa as proconsuls of that province (Florida 16, 17).

At last he returned home, and it was probably at this period of his career that he wrote his famous novel, the Metamorphoses or Golden Ass.[1] It is based on the lost work of a certain Lucius of Patras, of which we have another version in the Λούκιος ἢ ὄνος, falsely attributed to Lucian. He enlarged the original by the free insertion of sensational or humorous stories of the kind popularized later by the Decameron of Boccaccio, above all by the insertion of the beautiful fairy-tale of Cupid and Psyche. And then at the end comes the curious personal note, where Lucius, a Greek at the outset of the romance, becomes strangely transformed into a native of Madaura.

But he did not settle down in his native town. After a time he visited Alexandria, and it was in the course of his return from the capital of Egypt that the crisis in his life occurred, to which we owe that remarkable human document, the Apologia. For on his homeward journey he fell sick at Oea, the modern Tripoli.[2] In this town there dwelt a wealthy lady, named Aemilia Pudentilla, the widow of Sicinius Amicus, by whom she had two sons, Sicinius Pontianus and his younger brother, Sicinius Pudens. Pontianus was already the friend of Apuleius; he had made his acquaintance at Athens; an intimacy had sprung up between them, and they had lived together in the same lodgings. Hearing, therefore, of Apuleius' sickness, he called on him at the house of their mutual friends the Appii, where he was lodging. The reasons for Pontianus' visit were somewhat remarkable. His grandfather had been anxious that Pudentilla should take a second husband in the person of his son and her brother-in-law, Sicinius Clarus, and with this end in view threatened to exclude her sons, whose guardian he was, from the possession of any of their father's property, if she married elsewhere. She therefore suffered herself to be betrothed to Sicinius Clarus, 'a boorish and decrepit old man,' but put off the marriage, until her father-in-law's death released her from all embarrassment. Pontianus and Pudens succeeded to the property, and Pudentilla felt herself free to take a husband of her own choice. She informed her sons of her intentions. Pontianus approved, but since the property left to himself and Pudens by their grandfather was small, and all his expectations of wealth depended on the ultimate inheritance of his mother's fortune (4,000,000 sesterces = £40,000), he was most anxious that his mother should marry an honest man who might reasonably be expected to treat his step-sons fairly. At this point, in the very nick of time, Apuleius was detained at Oea. Pontianus saw in him a heaven-sent step-father, and it was with this in his mind that he called upon Apuleius. He did not declare his intentions at once. He contented himself at first with dissuading Apuleius from pursuing his journey homeward till the next winter came round, and persuaded him to come and stay in his mother's house. Apuleius accepted his offer and their old intimacy revived. At last a suitable occasion offered for the declaration of Pontianus' wishes. Apuleius had given a public lecture at Oea. His audience broke into frenzied applause and begged Apuleius to become a citizen of their town.

When the audience were gone, Pontianus took Apuleius aside and, saying that the popular enthusiasm was a sign from heaven, begged Apuleius to marry Pudentilla. After much deliberation Apuleius consented, though the lady was neither fair to view nor young. She had been a widow for more than thirteen years, and was now over forty. Soon, however, he began to love Pudentilla for her own sake; her virtues and intelligence won his heart and overcame his desire for further travel. The marriage was duly solemnized. But it brought Apuleius no peace. Sicinius Aemilianus, another brother of her first husband, and Herennius Rufinus, the disreputable father-in-law of Pontianus, were both up in arms. Rufinus had hoped, through his son-in-law, to reap a rich harvest from Pudentilla's fortune; Aemilianus resented the treatment of his brother, Sicinius Clarus. They sought, therefore, how they might have their revenge. Their first step was to win Pontianus and Pudens to their side. This they succeeded in doing, in spite of the generous treatment accorded by Apuleius to his step-sons. Pontianus fell sick and died before they could carry out their designs. He had, moreover, repented of his baseness to his former friend, though death prevented him from showing what his repentance was worth. Pudens, however, was completely under the thumb of Aemilianus and Rufinus, and a number of more or less serious charges were brought against Apuleius in his name.

He was accused of having won the heart of Pudentilla by sorcery, of being a man of immoral life, and of having married his elderly bride solely for the sake of her money. The trial took place at Sabrata (Apol. 59), the modern Zowâra, lying on the coast some sixty miles west of Oea. The case was tried by the proconsul himself, Claudius Maximus. The date cannot be precisely fixed. But Claudius Maximus was probably proconsul at some time between the years 155-158 a.d. (see note on Apol. 1), at any rate not later than 161 a.d., since Antoninus Pius is mentioned as the reigning princeps (died March 161 a.d.). Apuleius had no difficulty in disposing of the charges brought against him, and