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into open hostility by the rancour of their wives. If Gerraanicus was 

 generous, noble-minded, and gentle, his wife Agrippina supplied those 

 haughtier passions which of a great man make a dangerous one. She 

 looked vipon herself as the only true descendeut of Augustus. Tiberius 

 in her eyes was an intruder ; she hated Livia, and was cordially hated 

 by her in return. Plaucina, the wife of Piso, a woman of the same 

 temper, was a favourite of Livia, and it is quite possible that in annoy- 

 ing and humiliating Agrippina in eveiy possible manner, she followed 

 the explicit orders, or at least the secret wishes, of Livia. Yet all 

 that is related of the bickerings and heart-burnings caused by the 

 hostilities of these two women is of such a character as openly to dis- 

 prove the supposition, freelj' entertained at the time by the sympathis- 

 ing multitude, that Plancina or Piso wer,e guilty of Germanicus' death, 

 and that in bringing it about they executed the secret injunctions of 

 Tiberius or Livia ; for, had the crafty old intriguer really been desirous 

 of encompassing the death of her own grandson, from motives which 

 we fail to discover, would she have been so silly as to select for her 

 agent an avowed enemy of her victim ? If poison is employed as the 

 instrument of death it is administered in the loving cup, at the hospit- 

 able board, or at the altar with the vows of eternal love and friendship. 

 The hired assassin does not provoke the hostility, but tries to insinuate 

 himself into the confidence of his victim. The just liisiorian will, 

 therefore, pause before he joins in the outcry of the vulgar, who are 

 ever ready to condemn before they have fairly listened to evidence. 

 We shall w^ant satisfactory proof, in the first place, that Germanicus 

 really died of poison ; secondly, that this was administered by Piso or 

 Plancina : and, thirdly, that this was done by order of Tiberius. 



The case as it stands breaks down at the first stage of our investiga- 

 tion. There is not even any evidence that the death of Germanicus 

 was caused by poison. At the formal trial of Piso and Plancina, which 

 took place before the Roman senate, it was alleged that in the house 

 which Germanicus had occupied there were found, under the floor and 

 hidden in the walls, fragments of human bones, pieces of lead inscribed 

 with the name of Gerraanicus, and magic formulae, which the super- 

 stitious vulgar of the age invested with supernatural power over life 

 and death. Shall we be satisfied with such evidence as this, which 

 was rejected with deserved scoru even by a tribunal of men not free 

 from a leaning towards similar superstitious practices ? 



The body of Germanicus was publicly exhibited at Antioch. Suetonius 

 (Cai. I. ] .) avers, that a livid colour spreading over the whole body, and 

 foam flowing from the mouth, indicated that poison was the cause of death. 

 Tacitus, more guarded in his statements, acknowledges tliat it was not 



