ained a
long time, says Suetonius, seeing no one, the prey to profound grief.

It seems that Julia's fall was a surprise to the public. In a day
it learned that the highly popular daughter of Augustus had been
condemned to exile by her father. This unexpected revelation let
a storm loose in the metropolis. Even though there were not then
published in Rome those vile newspapers, the pests of modern
civilisation, that hunt their _soldi_ in the mud and slime of the
basest human passions, the taste for scandalous revelations, the
envy of genius and fortune, the pleasure of wreaking cruelty upon
the unarmed, the low delight in pouring the basest feelings upon the
honour of a woman abandoned by all--these passions animated minds
then, as they do to-day; nor were there then wanting, more than
now, wretches that profited by them, to gather money or satisfy bad
instincts, without being able to dispose of a single, miserable
sheet of paper. On every side delators sprang up, and an epidemic of
slanders embittered Rome; every man who had name or wealth or some
relation with the family of Augustus, ran the risk of being accused as
a lover of Julia. Several youths of high society, frightened by these
charges, committed suicide; others were condemned. About Julia
were invented and spread the most atrocious calumnies, which formed
thereafter the basis for the infamous legends that have remained
in history attached to her name. The traditionalist party naturally
abetted this furor of accusations and inventions, made to persuade the
public that a fearful corruption was hidden among the upper classes
and that to cure it fire and sword must be used without pity.

The friends of Julia, the party of the young nobility, disconcerted at
first by the explosion, did not delay to collect themselves and react;
the populace of Rome made some great demonstrations in favour of Julia
and demanded her pardon of Augustus. Many indeed, recognising that her
punishment was legal, protested against the ferocity of her enemies,
who had not hesitated to embitter with so terrible a scandal the old
age of Augustus; protested against the mad folly of incrimination with
which every part of Rome was possessed. Most people turned, the more
envenomed, against Tiberius, attacking him with renewed fury as the
cause of all the evil. He it was, they insisted, who had conceived the
abominable scandal, willed it, imposed it upon Rome and the Empire!

If Livia and the f