For him no prayers are poured, no pæans sung,
No blessings chanted from a nation's tongue.--_Brereton._
1. The impiety, however, of Calig'ula was but subordinate to his
cruelties. He slew many of the senate, and afterwards cited them to
appear. He cast great numbers of old and infirm men to the wild
beasts, to free the state from such unserviceable citizens. He usually
fed his wild beasts with the bodies of those wretches whom he
condemned; and every tenth day sent off numbers of them to be thus
devoured, which he jocosely called clearing his accounts. One of those
who was thus exposed, crying out that he was innocent,[17] Calig'ula
ordered him to be taken up, his tongue to be cut out, and then
thrown into the amphitheatre as before. 2. He took delight in killing
men with slow tortures, that, as he expressed it, they might feel
themselves dying, being always present at such executions himself,
directing the duration of the punishment, and mitigating the tortures
merely to prolong them. 3. In fact, he valued himself for no quality
more than his unrelenting temper, and inflexible severity, when he
presided at an execution. 4. Upon one occasion, being incensed with
the citizens, he wished that the Roman people had but one neck, that
he might dispatch them at one blow.
5. Such insupportable and capricious cruelties produced many secret
conspiracies against him; but they were for a while deferred upon
account of his intended expedition against the Germans and Britons.
[Sidenote: U.C. 793. A.D. 41]
6. For this purpose he caused numerous levies to be made, and talked
with so much resolution, that it was universally believed he would
conquer all before him. 7. His march perfectly indicated the
inequality of his temper; sometimes it was so rapid that the cohorts
were obliged to leave their standards behind them; at other times it
was so slow, that it more resembled a pompous procession than a
military expedition. 8. In this disposition he would cause himself to
be carried on a litter, on eight men's shoulders, and ordered all the
neighbouring cities to have their streets well swept and watered, that
he might not be annoyed with dust. 9 However, all these mighty
preparations ended in nothing. Instead of conquering Britain, he
merely gave refuge to one of its banished princes; and this he
described, in his letter to the senate, as taking possession of the
whole island. 10. Instead of conquering Germany, he only led his army
to the seashore in Gaul: there, disposing his engines and warlike
machines with great solemnity, and drawing up his men in order of
battle, he went on board his galley, with which coasting along, he
commanded his trumpets to sound, and the signal to be given as if for
an engagement. 11. His men, who had previous orders, immediately fell
to gathering the shells that lay upon the shore into their helmets, as
their spoils of the conquered ocean, worthy of the palace and the
capitol. 12. After this doughty expedition, calling his army together,
like a general after victory, he harangued them in a pompous manner,
and highly extolled their achievements; then, distributing money among
them, and congratulating them upon their riches, he dismissed them,
with orders to be joyful: and, that such exploits should not pass
without a memorial, he ordered a lofty tower to be erected by the
seaside.[18]
13. Cassius Cher'ea, a tribune of the Prætorian bands, was the person
who at last freed the world from this tyrant. Besides the motives
which he had in common with other men, he had received repeated
insults from Calig'ula, who took all occasions of turning him into
ridicule, and impeaching him with cowardice, merely because he
happened to have an effeminate voice. Whenever Cher'ea came to demand
the watch-word from the emperor, according to custom, he always gave
him either Venus, Adonis, or some such, implying softness and
effeminacy.
14. Cher'ea secretly imparted his design to several senators and
knights, whom he knew to have received personal injuries from
Calig'ula. While these were deliberating upon the most certain and
speedy method of destroying the tyrant, an unexpected incident gave
new strength to the conspiracy. 15. Pempe'dius, a senator of
distinction, being accused before the emperor of having spoken of him
with disrespect, the informer cited one Quintil'ia, an actress, to
confirm the accusation. 16. Quintil'ia, however, was possessed of a
degree of fortitude not frequently found even in the other sex. She
denied the fact with obstinacy; and, being put to the torture, bore
the severest tortures of the rack with unshaken constancy. 17. Indeed,
so remarkable was her resolution, that though acquainted with all the
particulars of the conspiracy, and although Cher'ea was the person
appointed to preside at her torture, she revealed nothing; on the
contrary, when she was led to the rack, she trod upon the toe of one
of the conspirators, intimating at once her knowledge of their
conspiracy, and her resolution not to divulge it. 18. Thus she
suffered, until all her limbs were dislocated; and, in that deplorable
state, was presented to the emperor, who ordered her a gratuity for
what she had endured.
19. Cher'ea could no longer contain his indignation, at being thus
made the instrument of a tyrant's cruelty. After several deliberations
of the conspirators, it was at last resolved to attack him during the
Palatine games, which lasted four days,[19] and to strike the
blow when his guards should not have the opportunity to defend him.
20. The first three days of the games passed. Cher'ea began to
apprehend that deferring the completion of the conspiracy might be the
means of divulging it; he even dreaded that the honour of killing the
tyrant might fall to the lot of some other person bolder than himself.
At last he resolved to defer the execution of his plot only to the day
following, when Calig'ula should pass through a private gallery, to
some baths near the palace.
21. The last day of the games was more splendid than the rest; and
Calig'ula seemed more sprightly and condescending than usual. He
enjoyed the amusement of seeing the people scramble for the fruits and
other rarities by his order thrown among them, being no way
apprehensive of the plot formed for his destruction. 22. In the mean
time the conspiracy began to transpire: and, had he any friends
remaining, it could not have failed of being discovered. A senator who
was present, asking one of his acquaintance if he had heard any thing
new, and the other replying in the negative, said "you must know, that
this day will be represented the death of a tyrant." The other
immediately understood him, but desired him to be cautious. 23. The
conspirators waited many hours with extreme anxiety; and Calig'ula
seemed resolved to spend the whole day without any refreshment. So
unexpected a delay exasperated Cher'ea; and, had he not been
restrained, he would suddenly have perpetrated his design in the midst
of all the people. 24. At that instant, while he was hesitating,
Aspore'nus,[20] one of the conspirators, persuaded Calig'ula to go to
the bath, and take some slight refreshment, that he might the better
enjoy the rest of the entertainment. 25. The emperor, rising up, the
conspirators used every precaution to keep off the throng, and to
surround him themselves, under pretence of great assiduity. Upon his
entering a little vaulted gallery that led to the bath, Cher'ea struck
him to the ground with his dagger, crying out, "Tyrant, think
upon this." The other conspirators closed in upon him; and while
the emperor was resisting, and crying out that he was not yet dead,
they dispatched him with thirty wounds.
26. Such was the merited death of Calig'ula, in the 29th year of his
age, after a short reign of not four years. His character may be
summed up in the words of Sen'eca; namely, "Nature seemed to have
brought him forth, to show what mischief could be effected by the
greatest vices supported by the greatest authority."
_Questions for Examination_.
1. Of what enormities was Caligula guilty?
2. How did he heighten his cruelties?
3. On what did he chiefly value himself?
4. What monstrous wish did he express?
5. What was the consequence of such atrocities?
6. What preparations did he make?
7. How did his disposition display itself on this occasion?
8. How did he sometimes travel?
9. What exploits did he perform?
10. Did he not make a show of some great enterprise?
11. How did it end?
12. Of what farther follies was he guilty?
13. By whom was he assassinated, and by what provocations was his fate
hastened?
14. Were others made privy to the design?
15. Relate this incident.
16. Did Quintilia confirm the accusation?
17. What rendered this resolution more remarkable?
18. What was the result?
19. Was the _crisis_ much longer deferred?
20. Was this resolution put in practice?
21. Was Caligula at all apprehensive of what was in agitation?
22. Was the secret inviolably kept?
23. How was the design nearly frustrated?
24. What induced Caligula to alter his intention?
25. Relate the manner of his death.
26. Repeat the summary of his character as given by Seneca.