ouble pay and superior privileges; but, as their formidable aspect
would at once have alarmed and irritated the Roman people, three cohorts
only were stationed in the capital, whilst the remainder was dispersed
in the adjacent towns of Italy. [2] But after fifty years of peace
and servitude, Tiberius ventured on a decisive measure, which forever
rivetted the fetters of his country. Under the fair pretences of
relieving Italy from the heavy burden of military quarters, and of
introducing a stricter discipline among the guards, he assembled them at
Rome, in a permanent camp, [3] which was fortified with skilful care, [4]
and placed on a commanding situation. [5]

[Footnote 1: They were originally nine or ten thousand men, (for Tacitus
and son are not agreed upon the subject,) divided into as many cohorts.
Vitellius increased them to sixteen thousand, and as far as we can learn
from inscriptions, they never afterwards sunk much below that number.
See Lipsius de magnitudine Romana, i. 4.]

[Footnote 2: Sueton. in August. c. 49.]

[Footnote 3: Tacit. Annal. iv. 2. Sueton. in Tiber. c. 37. Dion Cassius,
l. lvii. p. 867.]

[Footnote 4: In the civil war between Vitellius and Vespasian, the
Praetorian camp was attacked and defended with all the machines used in
the siege of the best fortified cities. Tacit. Hist. iii. 84.]

[Footnote 5: Close to the walls of the city, on the broad summit of the
Quirinal and Viminal hills. See Nardini Roma Antica, p. 174. Donatus de
Roma Antiqua, p. 46. * Note: Not on both these hills: neither Donatus
nor Nardini justify this position. (Whitaker's Review. p. 13.) At the
northern extremity of this hill (the Viminal) are some considerable
remains of a walled enclosure which bears all the appearance of a Roman
camp, and therefore is generally thought to correspond with the Castra
Praetoria. Cramer's Italy 390.--M.]

Such formidable servants are always necessary, but often
fatal to the throne of despotism. By thus introducing the Praetorian
guards as it were into the palace and the senate, the emperors taught
them to perceive their own strength, and the weakness of the civil
government; to view the vices of their masters with familiar contempt,
and to lay aside that reverential awe, which distance only, and mystery,
can preserve towards an imaginary power. In the luxurious idleness of
an opulent city, their pride was nourished by the sense of their
irresistible weight; nor was it possible to co