Rhodes is the most beautiful place in the world. Above its gemlike harbor the houses and public buildings ascend the encircling hills in blinding whiteness and the flowers bloom the year round. The whole city is adorned with the most fabulous works of art, for, unlike mainland Greece and the other islands, Rhodes has remained unplundered by foreigners since the days of its greatest glory, and the citizens have made every effort to prevent great works of art from leaving the island, no matter how high the bids and bribes of collectors.

The populace are as civilized as the island is beautiful, the Rhodians having cultivated good manners the way others cultivate war, and their legal and governmental institutions are models for others to follow, the laws extending even to the protection of slaves and foreigners. For centuries artists, authors, philosophers and rhetoricians have chosen Rhodes as their home and the noble youth from the whole world are sent there for the final polish on their education.

It is, in short, an unutterably boring place. When a nation, however small and insignificant, has no better claim to prominence than beauty, scholarship, education, art and culture, it is in the terminal stages of decadence. Where would we Romans be if we'd sat around making pretty pictures and being polite to one another? We'd all be hauling plows for Gauls and polishing chamberpots for Carthaginians, that's where.

Actually, I was about ready for a little boredom the day I was thrown off the ship onto the mole at Rhodes. My last port of call, Alexandria, had furnished an overabundance of excitement, culminating in my being carried, bound and gagged, from the palace of Ptolemy and hurled aboard the first departing Roman warship. Thus, when the immense, spike-bristling harbor chain was lowered to let the galleys Swan, Neptune and Triton pass, I was not entirely displeased to see the place, even if it wasn't Rome.

The captain of the Swan, one Lichas, directed his men to toss my chests and bags ashore. Last of all came my slave, Hermes. The boy dropped to all fours and dry-heaved, an activity he had been pursuing nonstop since we had struck open water upon passing Pharos.

'You are a sore loser, Captain,' I said, standing and gathering up the shreds of my dignity. I had whiled away the voyage winning most of the money on the ship at dice.

A little delegation of town dignitaries had hurried down to the harbor to greet the three-ship flotilla. They seemed puzzled upon beholding my convict treatment. Rogues, persons of bad character and those who draw bad luck are often cast unceremoniously ashore by mariners, but such persons rarely wear the red-striped tunic of a Roman senator. An important-looking fellow stepped forward, looking back and forth between me and the captain, his expression more than a little bemused.

'Welcome, Captain Lichas. How comes it about that you thus manhandle a Roman senator?' The man spoke beautifully cultured Greek.

Lichas hopped ashore and handed the man a scroll. 'King Ptolemy and Metellus Creticus, Roman ambassador to his court, would esteem it a great favor if you will keep this troublemaker confined to the island until he is sent for.'

The man scanned the scroll and raised his eyebrows. 'My, my. Senator, you do seem to have earned yourself some enemies.'

'I saved the Republic and Egypt from a disastrous war and this is the thanks I get.'

Lichas snorted. 'Alexandria was in a state of riot when we left. You could see the smoke for miles out at sea.' Like most mariners in the Roman service, Lichas was actually a Greek. We don't take to the water naturally.

'Then, Senator,' said an older fellow, 'I extend to you the hospitality of our island. I am Dionysus, president of the city council. This,' he gestured gracefully toward the one who had spoken first, 'is Cleomenes, the harbormaster.' That worthy bowed, and the others were introduced. These Greeks knew how to treat a senator, however irregular his arrival. They also knew that today's rebel, exile or reprobate could well be tomorrow's proconsul.

For a while they chattered on and on about the city's many cultural attractions. Having just come from Alexandria, whose Museum held the greatest collection of books and scholars in the world, my interest in such matters was less than minimal. I was nonetheless extravagant in my praise of their beautiful city and their distinguished selves. If I was to be stuck here for a while, I wanted as much local good will as possible.

After accepting a number of invitations to dinner, Hermes and I made our way up the slope into the city in search of an inn. Until I could find a congenial resident Roman bound to me by hospitium, I preferred public lodgings. Many of the local Greeks would have readily extended me hospitality, thrilled to entertain a genuine senator, but then I would run the risk of having to listen to a lot of talk about philosophy.

'This could turn out to be a pleasant stay, Hermes,' I said, fondling the merrily clicking purse tucked into my tunic.

'Anything's better than a ship,' he said, already much recovered from having his feet on dry land. 'Still, we're in exile among foreigners.'

'But the natives are civilized, the city is famous, we're flush with money and, for the first time in years, I've no official duties. It's vacation time, Hermes. From now until I'm summoned to Rome, we can take it easy and live as we please.'

It is with such statements as these that we furnish the gods with endless amusement.

The first days passed exactly as I had anticipated. I dined with local dignitaries, attended some athletic contests, saw the sights and generally lived a life of pleasant dissipation. My hosts were attentive, but when they weren't talking about cultural matters the subject was always the petty politics of their little republic. In Rome, men of my station lived and breathed genuine power politics, played on a world stage. Compared to the life-and-death stakes of games played for rule of provinces and command of armies, the little political feuds of Rhodes seemed piddling affairs. Nonetheless, these were matters of import to the locals and I paid diligent attention. After all, I might someday be given the task of conquering Rhodes, and a knowledge of regional affairs could come in handy.

'It's the Populars behind all this, no doubt of it,' said Eudemus, whose hospitality I was enjoying that afternoon. Some seven or eight of us reclined upon the spacious terrace of his beautiful villa overlooking the harbor.

'Populars, eh?' I said, listening with only half an ear while I held out my cup for more wine. Greek drinking cups are almost as shallow as saucers, and it takes a steady hand to avoid spillage. I was most accomplished at this art. 'We've had them in Rome for generations. I didn't know they were expanding their operations.' This was an alarming prospect. Leave it to Clodius to export Roman street politics to the foreigners.

Dionysus set my fears at ease. 'This is not your party, Senator. They've been here for centuries, too: malcontents and rogues always demanding privileges to which they are not entitled by birth. I suppose they are an inevitable consequence of a republican form of government.' I had learned that, like Rome, Rhodes had a severely limited democracy, in which real power was restricted to a handful of noble families.

'No doubt,' I mumbled around a mouthful of olives. I spat the pits over my shoulder. 'What are they up to here?'

'In the old wars between the Greek states,' said Gylippus, a prominent shipping magnate, 'the Populars were always trying to set one or another of the allies or visiting navies against the best people. Fortunately, Sparta had a wise policy of intervening in such cases.'