saw that the succession to the inheritance and the
family was sure to provoke jealousy and censure: yet he started in
pursuit of objects that had led to Caesar's murder, and no punishment
befell him, and he feared neither the assassins nor Lepidus and Antony.
Yet he was not thought to have planned poorly, because he became
successful. Heaven, however, indicated not obscurely all the upheaval
that would result from it. As he was entering Rome a great variegated
iris surrounded the whole sun.

[-5-] In this way he that was formerly called Octavius, but already at
this time Caesar, and subsequently Augustus, took charge of affairs and
settled them and brought them to a successful close more vigourously than
any mature man, more prudently than any graybeard. First he entered the
city as if for the sole purpose of succeeding to the inheritance, and as
a private citizen with only a few attendants, without any ostentation.
Still later he did not utter any threat against any one nor show that he
was displeased at what had occurred and would take vengeance for it. So
far from demanding of Antony any of the money that he had previously
plundered, he actually paid court to him although he was insulted and
wronged by him. Among the other injuries that Antony did him by both word
and deed was his action when the lex curiata was proposed, according to
which the transfer of Octavius into Caesar's family was to take place:
Antony himself, of course, was active to have it passed, but through some
tribunes he secured its postponement in order that the young man being
not yet Caesar's child according to law might not meddle with the property
and might be weaker in all other ways. [-6-] Caesar was restive under this
treatment, but as he was unable to speak his mind freely he bore it until
he had won over the crowd, by whose members he understood his father had
been raised to honor. He knew that they were angry at the latter's death
and hoped they would be enthusiastic over him as his son and perceived
that they hated Antony on account of his having been master of the horse
and also for his failure to punish the murderers. Hence he undertook to
become tribune as a starting point for popular leadership and to secure
the power that would result from it; and he accordingly became a
candidate for the place of Cinna, which was vacant. Though hindered
by Antony's clique he did not desist and after using persuasion upon
Tiberius Cannutius, a tribu