and his hands--the hands
which had written the Philippics, and the tongue which had spoken
them--and his order was obeyed to the letter. Cicero was nearly
sixty-four when he died, his birthday being on the 3d of January
following. It would be hardly worth our while to delay ourselves for a
moment with the horrors of Antony's conduct, and those of his wife
Fulvia--Fulvia the widow of Clodius and the wife of Antony--were it
not that we may see what were the manners to which a great Roman lady
had descended in those days in which the Republic was brought to an end.
On the rostra was stuck up the head and the hands as a spectacle to the
people, while Fulvia specially avenged herself by piercing the tongue
with her bodkin. That is the story of Cicero's death as it has been
generally told.

We are told also that Rome heard the news and saw the sight with
ill-suppressed lamentation. We can easily believe that it should have
been so. I have endeavored, as I have gone on with my work, to compare
him to an Englishman of the present day; but there is no comparing
English eloquence to his, or the ravished ears of a Roman audience to
the pleasure taken in listening to our great orators. The world has
become too impatient for oratory, and then our Northern senses cannot
appreciate the melody of sounds as did the finer organs of the Roman
people. We require truth, and justice, and common-sense from those who
address us, and get much more out of our public speeches than did the
old Italians. We have taught ourselves to speak so that we may be
believed--or have come near to it. A Roman audience did not much care,
I fancy, whether the words spoken were true. But it was indispensable
that they should be sweet--and sweet they always were. Sweet words were
spoken to them, with their cadences all measured, with their rhythm all
perfect; but no words had ever been so sweet as those of Cicero. I even,
with my obtuse ears, can find myself sometimes lifted by them into a
world of melody, little as I know of their pronunciation and their tone.
And with the upper classes--those who read--his literature had become
almost as divine as his speech. He had come to be the one man who could
express himself in perfect language. As in the next age the Eclogues of
Virgil and the Odes of Horace became dear to all the educated classes
because of the charm of their expression, so in their time, I fancy,
had become the language of Cicero. It is not surprising