orm of a youth who held a censer, that, before the
religious rites were well over, he took him aside and abused him; as also
a brother of his who had been playing the flute; and soon afterwards
broke the legs of both of them, for upbraiding one another with their
shame.
XLV. How much he was guilty of a most foul intercourse with women even
of the first quality [348], appeared very plainly by the death of one
Mallonia, who, being brought to his bed, but resolutely refusing to
comply with his lust, he gave her up to the common informers. Even when
she was upon her trial, he frequently called out to her, and asked her,
"Do you repent?" until she, quitting the court, went home, and stabbed
herself; openly upbraiding the vile old lecher for his gross obscenity
[349]. Hence there was an allusion to him in a farce, which was acted at
the next public sports, and was received with great applause, and became
a common topic of ridicule [350]: that the old goat--------
XLVI. He was so niggardly and covetous, that he never allowed to his
attendants, in his travels and expeditions, any salary, but their diet
only. Once, indeed, he treated them liberally, at the instigation of his
step-father, when, dividing them into three classes, according to their
rank, he gave the (221) first six, the second four, and the third two,
hundred thousand sesterces, which last class he called not friends, but
Greeks.
XLVII. During the whole time of his government, he never erected any
noble edifice; for the only things he did undertake, namely, building the
temple of Augustus, and restoring Pompey's Theatre, he left at last,
after many years, unfinished. Nor did he ever entertain the people with
public spectacles; and he was seldom present at those which were given by
others, lest any thing of that kind should be requested of him;
especially after he was obliged to give freedom to the comedian Actius.
Having relieved the poverty of a few senators, to avoid further demands,
he declared that he should for the future assist none, but those who gave
the senate full satisfaction as to the cause of their necessity. Upon
this, most of the needy senators, from modesty and shame, declined
troubling him. Amongst these was Hortalus, grandson to the celebrated
orator Quintus Hortensius, who [marrying], by the persuasion of Augustus,
had brought up four children upon a very small estate.
XLVIII. He displayed only two instances of public munificence.
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