Читать книгу The Empresses of Rome онлайн

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With this reserve we may follow, in fair chronological order, the career of this young girl of nineteen, who is dazed by the sudden attainment of Imperial wealth and power, until, in her twenty-fifth year, her childish efforts to pierce her bosom with a dagger are ended by the manly thrust of a soldier’s sword. She had borne a daughter, Octavia, before the accession of her husband, and she was far advanced in child-bearing when Caligula was assassinated. Claudius, unable to believe his good fortune, expecting daily that some fresh movement would dislodge him from the throne, kept in the palace with her. A month after his accession she bore a son, Tiberius Claudius Germanicus (later known as Britannicus), and Claudius ventured out, to exhibit his heir to the people and express his joy. He never entirely lost his fear. Soldiers served him at table, and all who approached him were searched. But his clement and comparatively enlightened rule won him some popularity, his gluttony and weak wit were genially overlooked, and he gave promise of a prosperous reign.