by name Diodorus, wearing an Olympic crown on his head, and carrying a Pythic crown in his hand. Before him marched in great pomp, and richly dressed, eighteen hundred persons, each of them with a crown in his hand, and under it an inscription, signifying where it had been won, the name of the person whom the emperor had overcome, the subject and title of the song, and such like important circumstances. His chariot was followed by the whole rabble of the city, crying out, by way of derision, that they were the soldiers of Augustus, and claimed a share in the glory of the triumphant victor. From the sacred-way the procession turned to the circus, which Nero entered through a breach, having caused one of the arches to be thrown down. Thence they proceeded through the Velabrum and the forum to the palace, and from the palace to the temple of Apollo, where he displayed all his crowns, and ordered them to be carried from thence to his golden house, and there hung up round his bed, upon the many statues which he had erected to himself in the habit and attire of an harper."

Nero had the good fortune about this time to detect and suppress another conspiracy, of which no satisfactory account remains. Nevertheless, his end hastened on. All the provinces were prepared to devour the all-devouring monster. The Gauls had the honour of first defying his power. Their noble governor, Julius Vindex, was a descendant of the ancient kings of Aquitain, a true patriot and a brave soldier. He aspired not to the supreme government of the empire, nor to render himself independent. For, after raising an army of one hundred thousand men, he invited Galba, one of the governors in Spain, to place himself at the head of the army, and deliver the empire from the tyrant. Galba deliberated, and encouraged by his officers, and the fabulous prediction that Spain would one day give a prince to Rome, he publicly announced to the army at New Carthage, his design to renounce the authority of the emperor. He was immediately, with joyful acclamations, saluted Imperator and Augustus. He, however, was too wise to accept these titles in his circumstances, and avowed that he desired only to be regarded the lieutenant of the senate and people of Rome, devoted to the service of his country. He instantly "ordered levies to be made throughout the whole province; selected a certain number of persons of known prudence and experience, and with them formed a kind of senate; appointed a band of young knights, whom he called evocati, to be as a guard at the door of his chamber; and caused edicts to be fixed up in every city of the province, inviting all to join him, and lend what assistance they could towards the recovery of their liberty, and the success of an enterprize which so nearly concerned them. Otho, who still governed Lusitania, was the first of all the governors of provinces who declared for Galba, sending him all his gold and silver plate to turn it into money; and likewise his domestics, who were more accustomed to a court, and knew better than Galba's how to serve an emperor." The power of Galba rapidly increased; all the governors declaring for him, except Clodius Macer, who commanded in Africa, and L. Rufus Verginius or Virginius, governor of Upper Germany, where he had under his command some of the best legions in the whole empire. The latter even marched against Vindex with all his forces, and being joined by the inhabitants of Treves, the capital

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of Belgie Gaul, and powerfully assisted in Celtic Gaul itself by the gities of Langres and Lions, he advanced as far as the city of Besangon, which he besieged. Upon this intelligence, Vindex hastrued to the relief of the place; but upon his arrival, Virginius desir ing an interview with him, the two generals had a private confer ence, in which they agreed, as was commonly believed, to act against Nero, but Virginius could not by any means be prevailed upon to declare for Galba. After they had long conferred together, Vindex returned to his troops, and with them advanced to Besançon, in order to take possession of the place, pursuant to the private agreement of the two chefs. But Virginius' men, believing that Vindex designed to attack them, marched out without their general's orders, fell upon the Gauls, who suspecting nothing, were quite unprepared for an engagement, and with great slaughter put them to fight Vindex after the battle laid violent hands on himself, and after his death the victorious legions tore the images of Nero, and importuned Virginius to accept the empire. He not only rejected their offer, but resolutely declared, that he would neither take upon himself the sovereign power, nor suffer any one else to assume it, who was not named to it by the senate, to whom alone the disposal of the empire belonged.

New and heavy impositions had incensed the people so highly that they openly opposed the collectors, telling them, that the best and most ready means of supplying Nero with money was to oblige the informers to relund the immense sums they had earned by their infamous practices. As a famine began to be felt in the city, the fury of the populace was heightened by the arrival of a ship from Bgypt, at that time the granary of Rome, not laden with corn as was expected, but with sand for the gladiators and wrestlers. Upon this occasion, the people rose in a tumultuous manner, overturned in the right most of the emperor's statues, broke his images, plun dered the houses of his friends and favourites, and committed innamerable disorders, no one offering to appease or restrain them. At the same time, news arrived of the revolt of the legions under Galba in Germany, which so affected Nero that he inclosed poison in a golden box, and went immediately into the Servilian gardens, whence he dispatched the freedmen, in whom he chiefly confided. to Ostia, to assemble his fleet, being resolved to sail to Egypt, whither he had already sent some German troops. However, before he left the palace, he sounded the tribunes and centurions of his guards, asking them whether they were disposed to accompany hem in his fight? Some evaded, others positively refused to attend him, and one crying out, Is it so dreadful a thing to die ?' he was quite distracted and confounded in his thoughts; resolving at one time to fly to the Parthians, at another to address Galba as a supplant, to appear in public clad in deep mourning, and with all pos sible humility and dejection implore the forgiveness of the people for his former conduct; and, if he found them inflexible, to beg the government of Egypt. He, however, put off the taking of any resolution till the next day. The emperor awoke about midnight and understanding, to his unspeakable surprise, that his guards; were retired, be leaped out of bed, sent in great haste for his friends, and none of thein obeying the summons, went at last in person, at tended by a few domestics, to their several houses; but finding the

doors everywhere shut, and no one deigning even to return an answer to his prayers and entreaties, he hastily returned to his chamber, which he found rifled and stripped of all the furniture. The golden box, in which he kept the poison prepared by the infamous Locusta, being likewise carried off, he sent for Spicillus, a celebrated gladiator, to dispatch him; but neither he nor any other being found to undertake that task, he exclaimed, in a fit of despair, "What! have I in this forlorn condition neither friends nor enemies?' which words he had scarce uttered, when he hurried out with a design to throw himself into the Tiber; but he suddenly stopped, and wished for some private place to recollect himself, and resume his courage. Phaon, one of his freedmen, offered him his country-house, about four miles from the city. He accepted the offer, and, without further delay, attended only by four persons, of whom Sporus was one, left Rome, meanly apparelled and worse mounted, concealing his face through fear of being discovered. Upon his setting out, he was terrified and dismayed by dreadful flashes of lightning and a violent earthquake, as if the ghosts of the many persons he had murdered were rising up, says Dion, against the unmerciful tyrant. As he passed the camp of the prætorian guards, he heard them cursing him, and wishing prosperity and success to Galba. A passenger whom he met on the road, perceiving him and his attendants, These (said he) are no doubt in pursuit of Nero:' another asked him, What news of Nero in the city?' His horse starting at the sight of a carcase that lay in the way, the covering of his face was shaken off, and he was known by a soldier of the prætorian guards, named Missicius, who saluted him with the title of emperor. This salutation so alarmed Nero and his attendants that at the first turning they quitted their horses, and betaking themselves to a narrow path, crept with much difficulty through bushes and briers to the wall which inclosed Phaon's grounds, who entreated the emperor to conceal himself in a sandpit, till he should find means to introduce him with more secrecy: but Nero answered, that he would not be buried till he was dead; and lay concealed among the briers, while Phaon examined the wall to see if he could be admitted undiscovered. In order to procure a more private access to the house, a hole was opened in the wall, through which he was dragged, and conveyed into a room very indifferently furnished, where he passed the remainder of the night and part of the following day, in such agonies as can hardly be expressed, alarmed at the least noise he heard, apprehensive that assassins were come to murder him, and not daring to speak through fear of being discovered. He now repented of the many crimes he had committed, wished he had pursued a virtuous conduct, was sensible that those who had advised the measures he had followed were his greatest enemies, and had constantly in his mouth the following words, from the tragedy in which he had last acted, My father, mother, and wife, doom me to destruction.' As those who attended him were constantly soliciting and importuning him to prevent, by a voluntary death, the dangers that threatened him, he at last ordered his grave to be dug, and wood and water to be provided for washing and burning his body. lamenting while he gave these orders in a manner altogether unmauly, and often repeating, with many sighs and tears, What an artist will the world 'lose.'

The news of Nero's flight filled the city with joy; the senate assem. bled early in the morning, and proclaimed Galba emperor; and, having taken the usual oaths to him, declared Nero an enemy to the state, and sentenced him to be stript naked, his head to be fastened in a pillory, and he in that posture to be whipt to death. One of Phaon's friends immediately dispatched a messenger to him with a letter, acquainting him with the transactions of the senate. With tears in his eyes, he desired that some of his attendants would by their example encourage him to die with resolution and intrepidity. But none of them showed the least inclination to animate him at the expense of their own lives. At last, drawing one of his daggers, he put it to his throat; but his heart failing him, he begged Epaphroditus, his freedman and secretary, to lend him his assistance; which he did with great reluctance. Before he was quite dead, the centurion sent by the senate to apprehend him, entered the room; and pretending he was come to his relief, endeavoured to stop the blood. Nero gave him no other answer, but It is too late: Is this your fidelity and allegiance?' with which words he expired, his eyes staring in a frightful manner, and ready to start out of his head, to the great terror and amazement of all who were present. His death being certain, the joy of the Roman people was so great and universal, that they ran up and down the streets with such caps on their heads as were worn by the manumitted slaves, congratulating one another upon their deliverance from so hard a bondage; overturned and dashed in pieces most of Nero's statues," and put to death as many of his friends as fell into their hands. The only things which Nero, on dying, earnestly requested of his attendants, was, that his head might not be cut off, and that his body might be burnt entire. This last favour was granted by Icelus, one of Galba's freedmen; but his ashes were left to be gathered and deposited in the monument of his family by his concubine Aste, and two females who had taken care of him in his early days. Such was the end of" the enemy and fury of mankind," as Pliny calls Nero. He perished A.D. 68, in the thirty-first year of his age, after a dishonoured reign of nearly fourteen years; and in him was verified the maxim, "When the wicked die, there is shouting."

In no part of the empire, during the latter most hateful and wretched period of Nero's reign, was the Roman power, it would appear, remarkably opposed, except in Britain and Judea; in the former the resistance was most powerful, in the latter, most obstinate. The Roman governor Aulus Didius, the successor of Ostorius, in vain attempted to support the infamous female chief Cartismandua, who had betrayed her people, and occasioned the destruction of their admired leader Caractacus. His fall was revenged by Venusius, the Briton, who was his worthy successor in leading the army against the troops of Cartismandua and the Romans. The Britons were victorious, and expelled the treacherous queen from her kingdom; and the Romans, for several years, were scarcely able to maintain their conquests in Britain. But A.D. 61 was rendered memorable by at once a terrible proof to the inhabitants of the worthlessness of their religion, and of the tremendous strength of the Roman arms. The island of Mona or Anglesey was the residence of the arch-druid, and the asylum of all the principal enemies of the Romans. It was invaded by Paulinus Suetonius. He found

the native army prepared to receive him; and its dreadful aspect confounded his soldiers, who, for a short space, stood powerless, as marks to the arrows of their opponents. Among the latter, the Romans were astonished to see the women, in funeral apparel, running like furies along the ranks with lighted torches, while woods deemed sacred, altars burning, and multitudes of druids standing with uplifted hands denouncing the vengeance of Heaven on the invaders of their mysteries, exceedingly augmented the horrors of the scene. The Roman soldiers resumed their courage, rushed on the enemy, put to the sword or dispersed the terrific multitude, demolished the groves and altars, and burnt to death the druids in their own hallowed fires.

While Suetonius remained with his troops in Mona, the chiefs of the kingdoms of Britain cast off the Roman yoke, which had long dreadfully oppressed them. The various tribes were led by the celebrated Boadicea, widow of Prasutægus, late king of the Iconi, who had left the emperor joint-heir with his daughters of his kingdom. The Roman officers, instead of protecting his family, insulted them, and plundered their dominions. They answered the widow's remonstrances by beating her with rods, and violating her daughters in her presence. She sought revenge by attacking the Roman colony of Camolodum, the modern Malden, a town in Essex. Her army laid in ashes and destroyed all the infantry of the ninth legion. "Suetonius flew to the assistance of his countrymen, and soon suc ceeded in bringing the Britons to a general action on open ground, where their superiority in point of numbers was of little avail against discipline and science. They were defeated with prodigious slaughter, whilst the victors, by their own account, lost only five hundred men. The disproportion was doubtless great; but this is probably an exaggeration in both directions. The Britons seem to have fought gallantly, though not successfully; and hence the historian says, that the glory won on that day was equal to that of the most renowned victories of the ancient Romans,' a statement inconsistent with the notion that it had been either easily or cheaply purchased. Boadicea ended her miseries by taking poison." Suetonius thus re-established the power of the Romans in Britain. He was soon after recalled, and his successors for several years permitted the native princes to reign in peace. The Romans had to endure and overcome a much fiercer contest in Judea than even in Britain.

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE ROMAN EMPIRE TRIUMPHANT-CONTINUED.

DESTRUCTION OF THE JEWISH NATION BY THE ROMANS.

THE Jews were now a race of beasts of prey rather than the humble worshippers of the God of heaven. They had shed the blood of their Messiah, and everywhere thirsted for the blood of his followers; and under the Satanic influence, which they preferred to the wisdom of God announced by the Apostles, they hurried on to ruin,