Festivals and holidays he celebrated lavishly as a rule, but sometimes only in a spirit of fun. On the Saturnalia, and at any other time when he took it into his head, he would now give gifts of clothing or gold and silver; again coins of every device, including old pieces of the kings and foreign money; another time nothing but hair cloth, sponges, pokers and tongs, and other such things under misleading names of double meaning. He used also at a dinner party to put up for auction lottery-tickets for articles of most unequal value, and paintings of which only the back was shown, thus by the caprice of fortune disappointing or filling to the full the expectations of the purchasers, requiring however that all the guests should take part in the bidding and share the loss or ain.
The Greek stands ready in the workroom; the English is served. Both faces will read together.
The Deified Augustus, Suetonius — translated by J. C. Rolfe, 1913
Apparatus shelf — Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars (J. C. Rolfe translation; Dover republication) · J. C. Rolfe, 1913 (preface dated Philadelphia, April 1913); Dover Publications republication, 2018
license: public-domain (US: the served text is Rolfe's 1913 translation, pre-1930 — verified from the scan's own copyright and preface pages; Dover-era apparatus [2018 arrangement, introductions, endnotes, index, the Lives of Illustrious Men part] is not extracted and not served)