sars."

All thought of dignity was dead in these descendants of the great people
who had made the Empire; they had long ago sold their birthright of
valour and of honour for the pottage of luxury and the favours of a
tyrannical madman. What cared they if after they had feasted and shouted
themselves hoarse in praise of a deified brute, the ruins of Rome came
crashing down over their graves? What cared they if in far-off barbaric
lands the Goths and Huns were already whetting their steel.

Only a few among the more dignified senators, a few among the more sober
praetorian tribunes, revolted in their heart at this insane exhibition
of egoism, these perpetual outrages on common sense and dignity; but
they were few and their influence small, and they were really too
indolent, too comfortable in their luxurious homes to do aught but
accept what they deemed inevitable.

The only men in Rome who cared were the ambitious and the self-seekers,
and they cared not because of Rome, not because of the glory of the
Empire, or the welfare of the land, but because they saw in the very
excess of the tyrant's misrule the best chance for their own supremacy
and power.

Foremost amongst these was Caius Nepos, the praetorian praefect,
all-powerful in the absence of the Caesar, well liked by the army, so
'twas said. Some influential friends clung around him and also some
malcontents, those who are ever on the spot when destruction is to be
accomplished, ever ready to overthrow any government which does not
happen to further their ambitions.

Most of these men were assembled this night beneath the gilded roof of
Caius Nepos' house. He had gathered all his friends round him, had
feasted them with good viands and costly wines, with roasted peacocks
from Gaul and mullets come straight from the sea; he had amused them
with oriental dancers and Egyptian acrobats, and when they had eaten and
drunk their fill he bade them good night and sent them home, laden with
gifts. But his intimates remained behind; pretending to leave with the
others, they lingered on in the atrium, chatting of indifferent topics
amongst themselves, until all had gone whose presence would not be
wanted in the conclave that was to take place.

There were now some forty of them in number, rich patricians all of
them, their ages ranging from that of young Escanes who was just twenty
years old to that of Marcus Ancyrus, the elder, who had turned sixty.
Their combined wealth