y and put no one, either
obscure or prominent, to death.

[Sidenote:--28--] [The same man would not slay nor imprison nor did he put
under any guard any one of the senators associated with Cassius. He did
not so much as bring them before his own court, but merely sent them
before the senate, nominally under some other complaint, and appointed
them a fixed day on which to have their case heard. Of the rest he brought
to justice a very few, who had not only cooperated with Cassius to the
extent of some overt action but were personally guilty of some crime. A
proof of this is that he did not murder nor deprive of his property
Flavius Calvisius, the governor of Egypt, but merely confined him on an
island. The records made about his case Marcus caused to be burned, in
order that no reproach might attach to him from them. Furthermore he
released all his relatives.]

[Sidenote: A.D. 176 (a.u. 929)] [Sidenote:--29--] About this same time
Faustina died, either of the gout from which she had suffered or from less
natural causes and to avoid being convicted of her compact with
Cassius.--Moreover, Marcus destroyed the documents [found in the chests of
Pudens], [Footnote: Reimar suggested that perhaps Pudens was secretary of
the Greek letters of Cassius, as Manlius (Book Seventy-two, chapter 7) was
of his Latin letters.] not even reading them, in order that he might not
learn even a name of any of the conspirators who had written something
against him and that he might not [therefore] be reluctantly forced to
hate any one. Another account is that Verus, who was sent ahead into
Syria, of which he had secured the governorship, found them among the
effects of Cassius and put them out of the way, saying that this course
would most probably be agreeable to the emperor, but even if he should be
angry, it would be better that he [Verus] himself should perish than many
others. Marcus was so averse to slaughter that he saw to it that the
gladiators in Rome contended without danger, like athletes; for he never
permitted any of them to have any sharp iron, but they fought with blunt
weapons, rounded off at the ends. [And so far was he from countenancing
any slaughter that though at the request of the populace he ordered to be
brought in a lion trained to eat men, he would not look at the beast nor
emancipate its teacher, in spite of the long-continued and urgent demands
of the people. Instead, he commanded proclamation to be made that the man