which is rendered probable by his retaining the consulate under Vitellius.

RUFUS L. VIRGINIUS a distinguished Roman citizen, and commander, whose merit raised him to the consulate, in the reign of Nero, A. D. 63. When the Gauls revolted under Vindex, A. D. 68, he marched to Besançon, in order to resist their designs. On this occasion the legions proclaimed him emperor, but he refused the title, alleging that the disposal of the empire belonged not to them, but to the senate and people. After the death of Nero, and the succession of Galba, he was again solicited by the army to become a candidate for the empire, and he was threatened with death by one of the tribunes, if he did not comply with the wishes of the soldiers. But he resolutely resisted, and prevailed with them to acknowledge the new emperor. When Otho acquired temporary dominion, he endeavoured to engage the attachment of the German legion, by conferring a second consulate, A. D. 69, on Virginius, their old commander; and after his death, he was a third time urged by the soldiery, to accept the empire, but he persisted in refusing the offer. Upon Vitellius's entrance into Rome, Virginius was very unjustly suspected of a design to assassinate him; and though Vitellius had no doubt of his innocence, it was not without great difficulty that he preserved his life. From this time till the reign of Nerva, he lived in retirement, calling the place of his retreat near Alaium, "the rest of his old age." To Pliny the younger, he was guardian, and was always regarded by him with filial veneration; and at Rome he was respected as one of the most excellent of its citizens. "He read," according to the account given of him, by Pliny, "verses and histories of which he was the subject, and lived, as it were, with his own posterity;" and Pliny relates the following instance of his love of historical fidelity. Cluvius Rufus, an eminent historian, said to him: "You are sensible, Virginius, of the fidelity required in a writer of history; if, therefore, you meet with any thing in my work, which is displeasing to you, I request that you will pardon it." He replied, "Are you ignorant, Cluvius, that my purpose, in doing what I have done, was that you writers might freely say, what you should think fit." In his eighty-third year, Nerva honoured him by advancing him to a third consulate, as his own colleague in that office. On this occasion he intended to deliver a discourse, and whilst he was preparing at home for the recitation of it, a large book fell from his hand upon the floor; and, in stooping for it, his foot slipped, and in the fall he broke his thigh. The fracture occasioned his death, A. D. 97. His remains were honoured with a public funeral, and his eulogy was pronounced by Cornelius Tacitus. The epitaph which he had written for himself

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was comprised in two lines, and merely recorded one of the principal actions of his life, with its motive.

"Here Rufus lies, who by the repulse of Vindex, secured the empire, not for himself, but for his country."

VATINIUS, a shoe-maker, ridiculed for his great deformities, and the eccentricity of his character. He was one of Nero's favourites, and he surpassed the rest of the courtiers in flattery, and in the commission of every impious deed. Large cups, of no value, are called Vatiniana from him, because he used one which was both ill-shaped and uncouth.

LOCUSTA, a celebrated woman, at Rome, in favour with Nero. She poisoned Claudius and Britannicus, and at last attempted to destroy Nero himself, for which she was executed. NYMPHIDIUS, a favourite of Nero, who said that he was descended from Caligula. He was raised to the consular dignity, and soon after disputed the empire with Galba. He was slain by the soldiers.

PLAUTUS LATERANUS, a Roman consul, elected A. D. 65. A conspiracy with Piso, against the emperor Nero, proved fatal to him. He was led to execution, where he refused to confess the associates of the conspiracy, and did not even frown at the executioner, who was as guilty as himself, but when a first blow could not sever his head from his body, he looked at the executioner, and shaking his head, he returned it to the hatchet, with the greatest composure, and it was cut off.

TIGELLINUS, a Roman courtier, infamous for his intrigues at the court of Nero, who promoted him to the highest honours; but being at last detected in a conspiracy against Nero, he was ordered to kill himself, A. D. 68.

DOMITIUS CORBULO, a Roman general, who took several places from the Armenians, destroyed Artaxata their capital, and set Tigranes on the throne of Armenia. He also subdued the Parthians. Nero, jealous of his reputation, directed him to be murdered; Corbulo hearing of it, fell upon his own sword, A.D. 67.

CAIUS PISO, a Roman, who was at the head of a celebrated conspiracy against the emperor Nero. He had rendered himself a favourite of the people by his private, as well as public virtues, by the generosity of his behaviour, his fondness of pleasure with the voluptuous, and his austerity with the grave and the reserved. He had been marked by some as a proper person to succeed the emperor; but the discovery of the plot by a freedman, who was among the conspirators, soon cut him off, with all his partizans. He refused to court the affections of the people, and of the army, when the whole had been made public, and instead of taking proper measures for his preservation, either by proclaiming himself emperor, as his

friends advised, or by seeking a retreat in the distant provinces of the empire, he retired to his own house, where he opened the veins of both his arms, and bled to death.

VULCATIUS, a Roman knight, who conspired with Piso, against Nero.

JULIUS VINDEX, a governor of Gaul, who revolted against Nero, and determined to deliver the Roman empire from his tyranny. He was followed by a numerous army, but was at last defeated by one of the emperor's generals. When he perceived all was lost, he laid violent hands upon himself.

LUCIUS CLAUDIUS MACER, proprætor of Africa, in the reign of Nero, on whose death he assumed the imperial dignity, and committed many cruelties. By order of Galba he was arrested and put to death.

AULIUS ATTICUS, a captain of a Roman cohort under Julius Agricola, who was killed in a battle with Galgacus, at the foot of the Grampians. Two urns were dug up in the parish of Redgorton, in Scotland, containing human ashes; one of which Mr. Moncrieff supposes to have contained those of this officer, and the other, those of Agricola's son.

MESSALINA, called also STATILIA, was descended of a consular family, and married the consul Atticus Visticus, whom Nero murdered. She received with tokens of tenderness her husband's murderer, and married four husbands before she came to the imperial throne; and after the death of Nero retired to literary pursuits and peaceful occupations. Otho, after this, paid his addresses to her, but before the consummation of the marriage he destroyed himself. In his dying moments he wrote her a pathetic and consolatory letter.

M. SALVIUS OTHO, the eighth emperor of Rome, born A.D. 32, of a family descended from the ancient kings of Etruria. He was among the number of Nero's favourites, was raised to the highest offices of the state, and made governor of Pannonia, by the interest of Seneca, who wished to remove him from Rome, lest Nero's love for Poppea should prove his ruin. After Nero's death Otho conciliated the favour of Galba, the new emperor; but when Galba refused to adopt him as his successor, he procured his assassination, and made himself emperor. He was acknowledged by the senate, but the sudden revolt of Vitellius, in Germany, rendered his situation very precarious. Otho obtained three victories, but in a general engagement, near Brixellum, his forces were defeated, and he stabbed himself when all hopes of success had vanished, in the thirty-seventh year of his age, after a reign of about three months. The last moments of Otho's life were those of a philosopher. He comforted his soldiers, who lamented his fortune, and expressed his concern for their safety, when they solicited to pay him the last friendly offices, before he stabbed

himself; and he observed, that it was better that one man should die, than that all should be involved in ruin on account of his obstinacy. His nephew was much affected, and feared the anger of the conqueror; but Otho observed, that Vitellius would be kind to the relations of Otho, since, in the time of their greatest enmity, the mother of Vitellius had received every friendly treatment from his hands. He also burnt the letters which, by falling into the hands of Vitellius, might provoke his resentment against those who had favoured the cause of an unfortunate general. These noble and humane sentiments in a man who was the associate of Nero's shameful pleasures, and who had stained his hand in the blood of his master, have appeared surprising, and have passed for policy, and not the result of a virtuous and benevolent heart. His father was a favourite of Claudius.

SABINA POPPAA, a celebrated Roman matron, daughter of Titus Ollius. She married a Roman knight called Rufus Crispinus, by whom she had a son. Her personal charms, and the elegance of her figure, captivated Otho, who was then one of Nero's favourites. He carried her away, and married her, but Nero, who had seen her, and often heard her accomplishments extolled, soon deprived him of her company, and sent him out of Italy, on pretence of presiding over one of the Roman provinces. After he had taken this step, Nero repudiated his wife Octavia, on pretence of barrenness, and married Poppaa. The cruelty and avarice of the emperor did not long permit Poppaa to share the imperial dignity, and though she had already made him father of a son, he began to despise her, and even to use her with barbarity. She died of a blow which she received from his foot, when many months advanced in her pregnancy, about the year A. D. 65. Her funeral was performed with great pomp and solemnity, and statues raised to her memory. It is said that she was so anxious to preserve her beauty, and the elegance of her person, that five hundred asses were kept on purpose to afford her milk, in which she used daily to bathe. Even in her banishment she was attended by fifty of these animals, for the same purpose, and from their milk she invented a kind of ointment, or pomatum, to preserve beauty, called poppæanum, from her.

AULUS VITELLIUS, the ninth Roman emperor, rose by his vices. He was born of an illustrious family, and introduced himself into the favour of Tiberius, by administering to his pleasures, He also gained the esteem of Caligula, Claudius, and Nero, by flattering their passions. Thus he possessed himself of the highest offices of the state; and by his lavishing presents, became a favourite with the soldiers. He was proclaimed in Germany, by his army, at the same time that Otho was invested with the purple. Three battles were fought beVOL. II.

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tween the rivals, which Vitellius lost; but in a fourth he was victor. Rome was now governed by a stupid brutal tyrant, who was always either immersed in wine or blood; whose gluttony swallowed millions; whose palace was daily filled with bacchanalian riots; and whose soldiers, following the example of their master, indulged in every species of licentiousness, and spread terror and confusion all around them. At length the people revolted, and placed Vespasian on the throne. Vitellius, afer suffering all manner of indignities from the populace, was put to death, and his body thrown into the Tiber, A. D. 69.

GALERIA, wife of Vitellius, emperor of Rome, distinguished herself in a vicious age, by exemplary wisdom and modesty. After the tragical death of her husband she passed her days in mourning and retirement.

CAIUS SUETONIUS PAULINUS, governor of Numidia, A. D. 45, conquered the Mauri, as far as Mount Atlas, and was the first of the Roman generals who went beyond that mountain. He wrote an account of the war. He was one of the most able warriors of his time, and men did not scruple to say, that he could contend with Corbulo for the military glory. He performed very noble actions in Britain, where he commanded the army, in the years A.D. 65 and 66. But having vanquished the rebels, he punished them too severely for the devastations and slaughters they had committed, for which reason the Romans appointed a successor, who was of a milder and more indulgent temper. It is thought he was consul in the year A. D. 70. He was one of the chief generals of the emperor Otho's armies; but he did not keep up, in that war, the reputation he had gained. The soldiers murmured against his conduct; and it is certain that his maxims, which were never to leave any thing to chance, and to take his measures with the utmost circumspection, prevented him from improving the favourable opportunities he met with, whereby he gave the enemy's army time to provide for their security. The worst part of his conduct was, that he ran away on the day of a general and decisive battle, and that he pretended Vitellius was obliged to him for betraying Otho, which probably he had not done, but he was believed on his own word, and his life was spared. It has been asserted, that the hopes of being chosen emperor, made him protract the war between Otho and Vitellius. But Tacitus thinks he was too wise to indulge such a thought.

TITUS FLAVIUS VESPASIANUS VESPASIAN, a Roman emperor, was born near Reate, in the country of the Sabines, A. D. 7, and was brought up by his paternal grandmother, near Cosa, in Tuscany. In the year A. D. 38 he was ædile, and disgraced himself by his adulation of the tyrant Ca