WIVES OF THE CESAKS. 141 



age was so advanced as to render useless the treacherous anticipation 

 of his death, is but a feeble refutation of suspicions, founded on the 

 motives of a first mistrust, on the impatience of ambition and the 

 well-attested guilt of a cruel and remorseless nature. Livia had dis- 

 covered, for the only time in her career, that Caesar entertained a 

 project to which she was a stranger. Posthumus Agrippa, hitherto 

 neglected and disowned, had recently become the object of his 

 anxious care ; the splendid hope of her existence was abruptly 

 darkened ; and Caesar's health began to languish visibly from the date 

 of that discovery. Dion Cassius mentions the report, that Livia had 

 impregnated some figs- with poison while upon the tree ; and that, 

 in plucking and presenting them (his favourite fruit) to Csesar, she 

 ensured, with her accustomed subtlety, his gradual but certain dis- 

 solution. Augustus was attacked while on his route to Beneventum 

 with Tiberius, and the symptoms of his illness favoured the suspicion 

 of his wife's iniquity. In a state of weakness rapidly increasing/ he 

 moved by easy journies along the beautiful Campanian coast, and 

 visited the islands in its neighbourhood. He sojourned four whole 

 days in Capreae, where he enjoyed an intermission of his sufferings. 

 From Capreae he passed to Naples, and eventually to Beneventum, 

 where he parted with Tiberius, who was destined for Illyricum. At 

 Nola, on his road to Rome, his malady assumed its fatal character, 

 when Livia instantly despatched a courier to her son. Tiberius 

 hastened to obey the surnnfons ; and, to shew the strong discrepancy 

 in statements of events, the most momentous even, it may be ob- 

 served, that Suetonius and Paterculus affirm the coming of Tiberius 

 in sufficient time to hold a long and serious conversation with the 

 emperor while on his death-bed ; and Tacitus, upon the other hand 

 remarks, it was uncertain whether Caesar was alive on his arrival. 

 Livia gave positive directions that all the roads to Nola should be 

 strictly guarded ; and access to the emperor was interdicted to all 

 persons of whatever rank, unless supplied with the permission of the 

 empress, who fed the popular anxiety, from time to time, with qua- 

 lified intelligence, directing its dispersion in the neighbouring towns, 

 and transmitting it to Rome by periodical despatches. Augustus on 

 the last day of his life was sensible of his approaching end ; his suf- 

 ferings had subsided. To such friends as were permitted to behold 

 his dissolution, he addressed the question, " had he well sustained the 

 part allotted to him in the play of human life ?" The apartment 

 where he lay was that in which his father died ; he surveyed it with 

 serene remembrance, and having ordered every one but Livia to de- 

 part, he suddenly expired with the pathetic valediction, " Livia, 

 conjugii, nostri memor, vive et vale !" 



The death of Augustus was for some short time concealed by 

 Livia's policy ; and when the calamity (for such in truth it was) was 

 published to the people, his will declared Tiberius his successor to 

 the sovereignty. The memory of Caesar was glorified with all ima- 

 ginable pomp ; Livia conferred on him the honours of apotheosis ; 

 and Atticus, the senator, affirmed that he had seen his soul ascend to 

 the celestial realms. Temples, altars, and a priesthood were conse- 

 crated to the new divinity ; Livia was herself among the number of 



