Ah! I am late this morning. I can feel in the air the vibration of the
third hour. Attius! Attius! I suppose he thinks that having lain so long,
I may as well wait till tomorrow. Ah! Attius, have you, too, overslept
yourself? No more dinners with Maecenas: we are getting too old for them.
It is the third hour; I will rise. But first request Livia Augusta to
favor me with her presence. Dear old Attius! that little trick of telling
him the hour never fails. Now for my daily bargain with the august.
Madam, good morning; leave us, Attius. And how is the irreproachable?
Judging from her roses, better than her lacy deputy. I spare you the
econium of Maecenas’ wine. I saw last night a girl named Candidia; do
you know who she is? Oh, the old senator’s daughter? Not much like him;
I should have said our late friend, Mark Antony, was a friend of the
family. You know that? I thought she had a trick of him, and I don’t
often make that sort of mistake. She’s a very fine young woman, the
white Cantonia. I suppose you know all about her; is she desirous
of influence at Court? H’m! Thanks; I trust you to awake her to the
legitimate ambition of a Roman beauty. I wish, Incomparable, you’d find a
Maecenas to renasce Roman women. When Candidia stands up you can see she
is standing on her legs, and, except a certain perennial of mine, I can’t
say as much for any woman else in Rome. Will you see about it? Thanks,
kindest of Junos.
Now, another matter. You must see by now, Livia, that it’s impossible for
me to let Tiberius go on any longer as he’s doing. You must let me send
him away. Yes, yes; I know all you’ve done for me, but it doesn’t justify
your son in studied insolence. After all I’m supposed to be Proconsul and
Pontiff and Augustus, and all that, and I can’t let him do it. Claudian
pride? Well, I can only say that there’s no vacancy for Claudian pride in
Rome just at present. Eh? What has Candidia to do with Tiberius? Oh, I
see; you want to bargain. Very well, Candidia for Tiberius—only on these
conditions. First, you must talk to him seriously about his demeanor—not
as coming from me, you understand. Secondly, I put him on the list for
foreign service. Oh, yes, you can make your mind easy. He shall have
a big war, and a triumph, and all the fandangles. Also, I’ll throw in
Agrippa; he shall go abroad and have no triumph, and I’ll try to keep
Julia quiet. I’m a generous Jove—eh, Junicula? Give me a kiss, old wench.
We’ve had some battering times together, eh? And if I’m not mistaken
you’ve still something to hold your back straight on, eh? Eh? Eh? Adieu,
my Empress. Send in Cleobulus, will you? And don’t forget Candidia—H’m.
My excellent spouse was pleased with my little attentions. Also she was
pleased with the idea of her Tiberius in high command; she doesn’t yet
understand the value of interior lines in politics, my Augusta. I suppose
she foresees her Tiberius crossing the Rubicon while we all sit tremulous
in East Aurora—ha, ha! And yet she’s seen the Praetorians at drill every
day these many years. Naturalists have greatly neglected women.
Now, Cleobulus, my wig and my eye-brightening stuff. I always assume you
don’t give away these secrets of the toilet, Cleobulus. If you do, the
next wig will be the scalp of one Cleobulus, mysteriously disappeared.
Now the gown. Not that, you nincompoop of genius. How often must I tell
you I’m only plain Proconsul? That will do: now announce me at the levee.
I wonder who’s here today. I’m glad the Roman Senators haven’t the
political insight of that hair-dresser.
Attius, precede me into the ante-chamber, while I have a look at the
company. Gods, what an air the rogue has with him, and how very right
he is, considering the way they grovel to him. A poor set of curs, I’m
afraid, these nobles at Rome; yet I’m afraid I like them.
Good day, gentlemen, I fear I have ill repaid this courteous attention by
keeping you so long awaiting. Ah, Isauricus, my dear old friend, this is
too kind. Too kind; it is I that should be calling on you; you must not
expose yourself to this morning air; all Rome is waiting for your speech
on this new Land Bill or Agrippa’s. By the way, Egnatius, I do not think
you have yet taken the public into confidence as to your attitude? You
reserve it? Ha! I am not sure you are right, if I may say so. One loses
a great part of one’s due influence, I always think, unless one gives an
opinion time to percolate, as one might say. I have told Agrippa frankly
all along that I shall oppose him on the municipal clauses. What says
Piso? Opposed to the whole scheme; you will speak, of course?
Aha, good day, Iulus. What says Iulus on the question of the hour? An
excellent measure all around! So—well, it should be an interesting
debate, and personally I am still open to be convinced. And here is the
author of all the trouble, himself. How do you do, Agrippa? Eh? A word in
private; by all means, old man. Want to go away? No, no, dear fellow, we
want you here. Pannonia and Germany? Nonsense, you’re losing your nerve.
Why, we settled the Pannonians years ago. Well, we’ll think it over.
Good morning, Maecenas; survived your own wine, I see! Amusing fellow,
that little Horace of yours. Underbred? No, I didn’t notice it. I tell
you what, though, if I were that man I wouldn’t stand the way you treat
him for five minutes, good as your dinners are. However, that’s his
affair. Been here long? I’m beginning to agree with you about Iulus. See
me before dinner.
Well, gentlemen, I thank you once more for the high honor you have paid
me. I am afraid you spoil me with your indulgence, for I am now about to
ask to be excused. You have put me in an important public position, and I
am anxious not to disappoint you. Adieu, my friends.
H’m. To-day’s hypocrisy over. Not that it is, though, for I have to play
the hypocrite one way and another every minute of my life. I’m beginning
to think it’s a mistake to be a tyrant. It’s exciting enough when you
have to fight for it; but when you’ve got it, decidedly a bore. And
unluckily the posing isn’t the worst of it; the worst of it is that you
have to suppress so many good fellows. Now I know Egnatius is guilty of
the impiety of not seeing why he should do what I please any more than I
should do what he pleases. I must get rid of him; I can’t help myself.
Such a witty, astute fellow, too, and what a boxer! Iulus I must get rid
of, too. I fancy Maecenas has got his own reasons for wanting Iulus out
of the way; still he is his father’s son, and never quite safe. A man
I’ve known since they first put me into the long gown. No, I sha’n’t get
rid of Iulus; he can go to Gyarus if Maecenas likes. No, dam it, why
Gyarus? He won’t do any harm at Rhodes, and at least he can get a dinner
there. Poor old Iulus! And poor old Agrippa! I suppose he wants to go
away because, he can’t stand Julia any more. I should never mind that
sort of scandal myself, but some do. Perhaps I was to blame in giving him
Julia at all, knowing her character. But she had to marry somebody and
that somebody could be none else than Agrippa. Such is statesmanship!
Now the poor old boy wants to go back to his soldiers. But I can’t do
it. Once he gets to Pannonia, he’d forget his obedience—and he is most
astonishingly obedient—and go for the chiefs. His loyalty’s splendid, but
I can’t trust even it, when the old war-horse sees the enemy in front
of him. And the worst of it is that the chiefs ought to be smashed this
summer, and no man in the world could do it as well as Agrippa. It would
be all over in a month. But Pannonia’s got to be nursed, for Pannonia’s
to be a big thing, and Tiberius is to get his triumph for it, sulky dog.
Yet he’s got the stuff in him, too. I suppose I’d better make up some
reason to send Agrippa to Gaul again: Livia can’t object to him there.
After all, the real devil of it isn’t being a tyrant, but being a married
tyrant. There isn’t an easier or pleasanter thing in the whole world than
to go on as I’m doing now, and keep my place to the end, and my friends
into the bargain. It’s this cursed dynasty business, and that cursed
woman—though she’s behaved a deuced deal better to me than I deserved.
But why in the name of all the gods at once must I turn out my oldest
friend to die miserable in Gaul? Why, to make the way easy for a moody
young prig that I dislike—and who hates me. What do I get for it all?
Candidia! That’s what it comes to, when you work it out. I’m monarch of
the world, and the gain of it is that I have unequaled chances of making
a ridiculous goddam goat of myself. I wish to Heaven I’d had my uncle’s
pluck: then I should have been cut to pieces ten years ago. Still after
all, Agrippa’s going to Gaul would be away out of the Land Bill business,
and I begin to think I went too far in the matter. Yes: he had better go.