hear the conditions of peace declared,
very unexpectedly, and amidst their mutual salutations, they were obliged
to stand to their arms. Immediately upon this he determined to put an
end to his life, more, as many think, and not without reason, out of
shame, at persisting in a struggle for the empire to the hazard of the
public interest and so many lives, than from despair, or distrust of his
troops. For he had still in reserve, and in full force, those whom he
had kept about him for a second trial of his fortune, and others were
coming up from Dalmatia, Pannonia, and Moesia; nor were the troops lately
defeated so far discouraged as not to be ready, even of themselves, to
run all risks in order to wipe off their recent disgrace.

X. My father, Suetonius Lenis [686], was in this battle, being at (424)
that time an angusticlavian tribune in the thirteenth legion. He used
frequently to say, that Otho, before his advancement to the empire, had
such an abhorrence of civil war, that once, upon hearing an account given
at table of the death of Cassius and Brutus, he fell into a trembling,
and that he never would have interfered with Galba, but that he was
confident of succeeding in his enterprise without a war. Moreover, that
he was then encouraged to despise life by the example of a common
soldier, who bringing news of the defeat of the army, and finding that he
met with no credit, but was railed at for a liar and a coward, as if he
had run away from the field of battle, fell upon his sword at the
emperor's feet; upon the sight of which, my father said that Otho cried
out, "that he would expose to no farther danger such brave men, who had
deserved so well at his hands." Advising therefore his brother, his
brother's son, and the rest of his friends, to provide for their security
in the best manner they could, after he had embraced and kissed them, he
sent them away; and then withdrawing into a private room by himself, he
wrote a letter of consolation to his sister, containing two sheets. He
likewise sent another to Messalina, Nero's widow, whom he had intended to
marry, committing to her the care of his relics and memory. He then
burnt all the letters which he had by him, to prevent the danger and
mischief that might otherwise befall the writers from the conqueror.
What ready money he had, he distributed among his domestics.

XI. And now being prepared, and just upon the point of dispatching
himself, he was induced to