autiful princess, short as it was, for she died at a very early
age, was enough to make her name a proverb of everlasting infamy. For a
time she appeared irresistible. Her personal fascination had won for her
an unlimited sway over the facile mind of Claudius, and she had either
won over by her intrigues, or terrified by her pitiless severity, the
noblest of the Romans and the most powerful of the freedmen. But we see
in her fate, as we see on every page of history, that vice ever carries
with it the germ of its own ruin, and that a retribution, which is all
the more inevitable from being often slow, awaits every violation of the
moral law.

There is something almost incredible in the penal infatuation which
brought about her fall. During the absence of her husband at Ostia, she
wedded in open day with C. Silius, the most beautiful and the most
promising of the young Roman nobles. She had apparently persuaded
Claudius that this was merely a mock-marriage, intended to avert some
ominous auguries which threatened to destroy "the husband of Messalina;"
but, whatever Claudius may have imagined, all the rest of the world knew
the marriage to be real, and regarded it not only as a vile enormity,
but also as a direct attempt to bring about a usurpation of the
imperial power.

It was by this view of the case that the freedman Narcissus roused the
inert spirit and timid indignation of the injured Emperor. While the
wild revelry of the wedding ceremony was at its height, Vettius Valens,
a well-known physician of the day, had in the license of the festival
struggled up to the top of a lofty tree, and when they asked him what he
saw, he replied in words which, though meant for jest, were full of
dreadful significance, "I see a fierce storm approaching from Ostia." He
had scarcely uttered the words when first an uncertain rumour, and then
numerous messengers brought the news that Claudius knew all, and was
coming to take vengeance. The news fell like a thunderbolt on the
assembled guests. Silius, as though nothing had happened, went to
transact his public duties in the Forum; Messalina instantly sending for
her children, Octavia and Britannicus, that she might meet her husband
with them by her side, implored the protection of Vibidia, the eldest of
the chaste virgins of Vesta, and, deserted by all but three companions,
fled on foot and unpitied, through the whole breadth of the city, until
she reached the Ostian gate, and mounted t