whole lives, both in power and wealth, in the
highest ranks of their several orders, notwithstanding some occasional
lapses. For, to say nothing of others, he sometimes complained that
Agrippa was hasty, and Mecaenas a tattler; the former having thrown up
all his employments and retired to Mitylene, on suspicion of some slight
coolness, and from jealousy that Marcellus received greater marks of
favour; and the latter having confidentially imparted to his wife
Terentia the discovery of Muraena's conspiracy.

He likewise expected from his friends, at their deaths as well as during
their lives, some proofs of their reciprocal attachment. For though he
was far from coveting their property, and indeed would never accept of
any legacy left him by a stranger, yet he pondered in a melancholy mood
over their last words; not being able to conceal his chagrin, if in their
wills they made but a slight, or no very honourable mention of him, nor
his joy, on the other hand, if they expressed a grateful sense of his
favours, and a hearty affection for him. And whatever legacies or shares
of their property were left him by such as were parents, he used to
restore to their children, either immediately, or if they were under age,
upon the day of their assuming the manly dress, or of their marriage;
with interest.

LXVII. As a patron and master, his behaviour in general was mild and
conciliating; but when occasion required it, he (121) could be severe.
He advanced many of his freedmen to posts of honour and great importance,
as Licinus, Enceladus, and others; and when his slave, Cosmus, had
reflected bitterly upon him, he resented the injury no further than by
putting him in fetters. When his steward, Diomedes, left him to the
mercy of a wild boar, which suddenly attacked them while they were
walking together, he considered it rather a cowardice than a breach of
duty; and turned an occurrence of no small hazard into a jest, because
there was no knavery in his steward's conduct. He put to death Proculus,
one of his most favourite freedmen, for maintaining a criminal commerce
with other men's wives. He broke the legs of his secretary, Thallus, for
taking a bribe of five hundred denarii to discover the contents of one of
his letters. And the tutor and other attendants of his son Caius, having
taken advantage of his sickness and death, to give loose to their
insolence and rapacity in the province he governed, he caused heavy
weights