the offences, and not to
permit any senator to be exposed to the torture in an unprecedented and
unlawful manner.

25. But when these envoys were admitted into the council chamber,
Valentinian denied that he had ever given such orders, and insisted that
the charges made against him were calumnies. He was, however, refuted
with great moderation by the praetor Eupraxius; and in consequence of
this freedom, the cruel injunction that had been issued, and which had
surpassed all previous examples of cruelty, was amended.

26. About the same time, Lollianus, a youth of tender age, the son of
Lampadius, who had been prefect, being accused before Maximin, who
investigated his case with great care, and being convicted of having
copied out a book on the subject of the unlawful acts (though, as his
age made it likely, without any definite plan of using it), was, it
seemed, on the point of being sentenced to banishment, when, at the
suggestion of his father, he appealed to the emperor; and being by his
order brought to court, it appeared that he had, as the proverb has it,
gone from the frying-pan into the fire, as he was now handed over to
Phalangius, the consular governor of Baetica, and put to death by the
hand of the executioner.

27. There were also Tarratius Bassus, who afterwards became prefect of
the city, his brother Camenius, a man of the name of Marcian, and
Eusapius, all men of great eminence, who were prosecuted on the ground
of having protected the charioteer Auchenius, and being his accomplices
in the act of poisoning. The evidence was very doubtful, and they were
acquitted by the decision of Victorinus, as general report asserted;
Victorinus being a most intimate friend of Maximin.

28. Women too were equally exposed to similar treatment. For many of
this sex also, and of noble birth, were put to death on being convicted
of adultery or unchastity. The most notorious cases were those of
Claritas and Flaviana; the first of whom, when conducted to death, was
stripped of the clothes which she wore, not even being permitted to
retain enough to cover her with bare decency; and for this the
executioner also was convicted of having committed a great crime, and
burnt to death.

29. Paphius and Cornelius, both senators, confessed that they had
polluted themselves by the wicked practice of poisoning, and were put to
death by the sentence of Maximin; and by a similar sentence the master
of the mint was executed. He also