performance; nor would he allow him to desist until he came off
conqueror, and after many entreaties. Another, who had vowed to give his
life for the same cause, having shrunk from the sacrifice, he delivered,
adorned as a victim, with garlands and fillets, to boys, who were to
drive him through the streets, calling on him to fulfil his vow, until he
was thrown headlong from the ramparts. After disfiguring many persons of
honourable rank, by branding them in the face with hot irons, he
condemned them to the mines, to work in repairing the high-ways, or to
fight with wild beasts; or tying them by the neck and heels, in the
manner of beasts carried to slaughter, would shut them up in cages, or
saw them asunder. Nor were these severities merely inflicted for crimes
of great enormity, but for making remarks on his public games, or for not
having sworn by the Genius of the emperor. He compelled parents to be
present at the execution of their sons; and to one who excused himself on
account of indisposition, he sent his own litter. Another he invited to
his table immediately after he had witnessed the spectacle, and coolly
challenged him to jest and be merry. He ordered the overseer of the
spectacles and wild beasts to be scourged in fetters, during several days
successively, in his own presence, and did not put him to death until he
was disgusted with the stench of his putrefied brain. He burned alive,
in the centre of the arena of the amphitheatre, the writer of a farce,
for some witty verse, which had a double meaning. A Roman knight, who
had been exposed to the wild beasts, crying out that he was innocent, he
called him back, and having had his tongue cut out, remanded him to the
arena.

XXVIII. Asking a certain person, whom he recalled after a long exile,
how he used to spend his time, he replied, with flattery, "I was always
praying the gods for what has happened, that Tiberius might die, and you
be emperor." Concluding, therefore, that those he had himself banished