ispleasure, she commenced the most
severe and angry invectives against her son, for listening for a
moment to calumnies against her so wild and improbable. That Silana,
who was, as she said, a dissolute and unprincipled woman, and who,
consequently, could have no idea of the strength and the fidelity of
maternal affection, should think it possible that a mother could
form plots and conspiracies against an only son, was not strange;
but that Nero himself, for whom she had made such exertions and
incurred such dangers, and to whose interests she had surrendered
and sacrificed every thing that could be dear to the heart of a
woman--could believe such tales, and actually conceive the design
of murdering his mother on the faith of them, was not to be endured.
"Does not he know well," said she, in a voice almost inarticulate
with excitement and indignation, "that, if by any means,
Britannicus, or Plautus, or any other man were to be raised to
power, my life would be immediately forfeited in consequence of what
I have already done for him? Can he imagine, after the deep and
desperate crimes which I have committed for his sake, in order that
I might raise him to his present power, that I could seal my own
destruction by bringing forward any one of his rivals and enemies to
his place? Go back and tell him this, and say, moreover, that I
demand an audience of him. I am his mother; and I have a right to
expect that he shall see me himself, and hear what I have to say."

The commissioners whom Nero had sent with the accusations, were
somewhat astonished at receiving these angry denunciations and
invectives in reply, instead of the meek and faltering defense which
they had expected. They were overawed, too, by the lofty and
passionate energy with which Agrippina had spoken. They answered her
with soothing and conciliatory words, and then went back to Nero,
and reported the result of their interview.

Nero consented to see his mother. In his presence she assumed the
same tone of proud and injured innocence, that had characterized her
interview with the messengers. She scorned to enter into any
vindication of herself; but _assumed_ that she was innocent, and
demanded that her accusers should be punished as persons guilty of
the most atrocious calumny. Nero was convinced of her innocence, and
yielded to her demands. Silana and two others of her accusers, were
banished from Rome. Another still was punished with death.

Thus a sort o