Cæsar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed." How little did Augustus know that this notice of him would be read in families and places of worship, and by individuals in all parts of the world, so many long years after he was buried, and that his name would thus be more frequently mentioned on account of one small family at Bethlehem, than because of all the great victories he had won!

Augustus had begun his life his life with much bloodshed, and ended by doing so much good, that some one very smartly remarked, "It would have been best for mankind if Augustus had never been born, or if he never had died."

"When Rome, degenerate Rome, for barb'rous shows Barter'd her virtue, glory, and repose,

Sold all that freemen prize as great and good,
For pomps of death, and theatres of blood!"

THE emperor Tiberius is, perhaps, the most striking example which the world has ever seen of the statement, that the greatest talents not only become of little or no use, but even lead people to greater evil, when joined to a bad heart. He came to the throne with an excellent genius for business, great skill and courage as a general, and an unequalled knowledge of mankind. What then was wanting to make him a great prince? Nothing but a good heart to direct his head. Being without that, he became the most gloomy, if not the most bloody, of all the tyrants that the world has ever seen.

Tiberius was above fifty when he became emperor of Rome, and not having till then appeared worse than other men, it was never expected that he would turn out so black and fierce a tyrant as he did. Perhaps he had no idea himself, that power and wealth, almost without limit,

would make him so wicked. At first he acted with the most wonderful dissimulation, pretending to be mild and kind; and no one knew the secret malignity of his nature except his old tutor, who to express the mingled meanness and cruelty of his pupil's disposition, once said of him, that "he was a lump of earth moistened with blood."

But this pretended mildness was only put on because Tiberius dreaded his nephew Germanicus, who was universally beloved by the Romans. He was brave, handsome, and amiable; the people's idol and the soldier's favourite, so that many had wished him to be elected emperor, rather than Tiberius, who became so jealous of him, that after a time he not only caused the amiable Germanicus to be poisoned, as the Romans believed, but afterwards starved two of his young sons to death. Drusus, one of these youths, lingered nine days in misery, by chewing for food the weeds which served for his bed.

From this time, Tiberius unmasked his own real character, and from the dark suspiciousness of his nature, became an enemy to the life of every man of eminence and worth, as well as the tormentor of his own. To make a wicked man miserable, there could be no surer plan than to give him, without any difficulty, all he should wish; for he would soon become wearied and satiated with all. Tiberius having tried every kind of enjoyment, and grown tired, endeavoured to occupy himself by making every one else as miserable as he was himself.

is fury he often destroyed men suddenly;

but he also delighted in prolonging their torment, and young Nero, a son of Germanicus, was so terrified at being shown the instruments with which Tiberius intended him to be killed, that, as usual, he put himself to death. Agrippina, the widow of Germanicus, an eminent woman, wished, according to Roman practice, to starve herself to death; but the emperor ordered her mouth to be forced open, and food to be thrust down her throat, though some time afterwards, when it pleased himself, he caused her to be killed.

A woman was put to death because she wept for the murder of her own son; and Tiberius delighted so much in witnessing executions, that when a prisoner, to avoid being tortured, put himself to death with his own hand, the emperor in a rage exclaimed, "How has that man been able to escape me?" When another victim begged earnestly that his death might be hastened, Tiberius replied, "Know that I am not sufficiently your friend to shorten your torments."

The emperor one day expected a friend to visit him, at the same time that a criminal was to be brought for execution. The guards by mistake seized the guest, and instead of sitting down to dinner, as the stranger expected, he was broken on the wheel. When Tiberius heard of the sad blunder, he merely said, with perfect composure, "Since you have begun, you may finish your work, and put the man out of his pain."

Another day, when a funeral passed, a person

called out in jest to the dead man, "Go and inform Augustus that his legacies to the common people have not yet been paid." The unhappy wit was immediately by the emperor's orders seized, and after being paid the share due to him, was ordered to be executed, Tiberius calling after him, as he was dragged away, "Go and tell Augustus that you have received your legacy."

Tiberius often consulted fortune-tellers, and on these occasions they were led along the summit of a precipice to a retired mansion, and on their way back he frequently ordered them to be thrown down and killed. One evening, Thrasyllus, an astrologer, had answered many questions in the most satisfactory manner, promising Tiberius extraordinary good fortune. The emperor at last desired Thrasyllus to tell, if he could, what would happen on that very day to himself.

The astrologer paused, considered, and suddenly fell into a tremor of fear, saying, “I perceive the crisis of my fate! this very moment may be my last!"

Tiberius, thinking that Thrasyllus really had discovered his own danger, now clasped him in his arms, and from that moment believed all that the astrologer chose to predict.

The emperors of Rome seemed born to show how wicked the heart of man naturally is, and certainly their reigns form one of the blackest periods in the world's history. Tiberius, surrounded by wealth, power, and magnificence, was little better than a wild beast, or perhaps worse; and all his grandeur could not make him really great, or really happy.