d, but they were
required to be silent in respect to what had occurred, and to go on
with all their services and ministrations just as if their patient
were still alive. Visitors were excluded from the room, and
messengers were kept coming to and fro with baths, medicaments, and
other appliances, such as a desperate crisis in a sick chamber might
be supposed to require. The Senate was convened, too, in the course
of the morning, and Agrippina, as if in great distress, sent a
message to them, informing them of her husband's dangerous
condition, and entreating them to join with the chief civil
and religious functionaries of the city, in offering vows,
supplications, and sacrifices for his recovery. She herself, in the
mean time, went from room to room about the palace, overwhelmed to
all appearance, with anxiety and grief. She kept Britannicus and his
sisters all the time with her, folding the boy in her arms with an
appearance of the fondest affection, and telling him how
heart-broken she was at the dangerous condition of his father. She
kept Britannicus thus constantly near to her, in order to prevent
the possibility of his being seized and carried away to the camp by
any party that might be disposed to make him emperor rather than
Nero, when it should be known that Claudius had ceased to reign. As
an additional defense against this danger, Agrippina brought up a
cohort of the life-guards around the palace, and caused them to be
stationed in such a manner that every avenue of approach to the
edifice was completely secured. The cohort which she selected was
one that she thought she could most safely rely upon, not only
for guarding the palace while she remained within it, but for
proclaiming Nero as emperor when she should at last be ready to come
forth and announce the death of her husband.

At length, about noon, she deemed that the hour had arrived, and
after placing Britannicus and his sisters in some safe custody
within the palace, she ordered the gates to be thrown open, and
prepared to come forth to announce the death of Claudius, and to
present Nero to the army and to the people of Rome, as his rightful
successor. She was aided and supported in these preparations by a
number of officers and attendants, among whom were the two whom she
had determined upon as the two principal ministers of her son's
government. These were Seneca and Burrus. Seneca was to be minister
of state, and Burrus the chief military command