ed according to her own directions. He likewise
annulled her will, and in a short time ruined all her friends and
acquaintance; not even sparing those to whom, on her death-bed, she had
recommended the care of her funeral, but condemning one of them, a man of
equestrian rank, to the treadmill. [352]

LII. He entertained no paternal affection either for his own son Drusus,
or his adopted son Germanicus. Offended at the vices of the former, who
was of a loose disposition and led a dissolute life, he was not much
affected at his death; but, almost immediately after the funeral, resumed
his attention to business, and prevented the courts from being longer
closed. The ambassadors from the people of Ilium coming rather late to
offer their condolence, he said to them by way of banter, as if the
affair had already faded from his memory, "And I heartily condole with
you on the loss of your renowned countryman, Hector." He so much
affected to depreciate Germanicus, that he spoke of his achievements as
utterly insignificant, and railed at his most glorious victories as
ruinous to the state; complaining of him also to the senate for going to
Alexandria without his knowledge, upon occasion of a great and sudden
famine at Rome. It was believed that he took care to have him dispatched
by Cneius Piso, his lieutenant in Syria. This person was afterwards
tried for the murder, and would, as was supposed, have produced his
orders, had they not been contained in a private and confidential
dispatch. The following words therefore were posted up in many places,
and frequently shouted in the night: "Give us back our Germanicus." This
suspicion was afterwards confirmed by the barbarous treatment of his wife
and children.

(225) LIII. His daughter-in-law Agrippina, after the death of her
husband, complaining upon some occasion with more than ordinary freedom,
he took her by the hand, and addressed her in a Greek verse to this
effect: "My dear child, do you think yourself injured, because you are
not empress?" Nor did he ever vouchsafe to speak to her again. Upon her
refusing once at supper to taste some fruit which he presented to her, he
declined inviting her to his table, pretending that she in effect charged
him with a design to poison her; whereas the whole was a contrivance of
his own. He was to offer the fruit, and she to be privately cautioned
against eating what would infallibly cause her death. At last, having
her accused