jumped overboard and escaped by swimming, while, during the confusion
on the boat, the hired murderers killed one of Agrippina's freedwomen,
mistaking her for Agrippina herself. The ship finally sank; the
murderers also took to the water; everything returned to its wonted
calm; the starry night still diffused its silent shadows; the sea
still cradled with subdued murmur the homes along the coast--all men
slept except one.

Within this one, Anxiety watched: a son was awaiting the news that
his mother was dead, and that he was free to celebrate a criminal
marriage. The escaped murderers soon brought the news so impatiently
expected--but Nero's joy was short. At dawn, a freedman of Agrippina
arrived at the Emperor's villa. Agrippina, picked up by a boat, had
succeeded in reaching one of her villas near by; she sent the freedman
to tell the Emperor about the accident and to assure him of her
safety. Agrippina alive! It was like a thunderbolt to Nero, and he
lost his head: he saw his mother hurrying on to Rome, denouncing
the abominable attempt to Senate and people, rousing against him the
Praetorian guard and the legions. Thoroughly frightened, he summoned
Seneca and Burrhus and laid before them the terrible situation. It
is easy to imagine the shock of the old preceptors. How could he
risk such a grave imprudence? And yet there was no time to lose in
reproaches. Nero begged for advice: Seneca and Burrhus were silent,
but they, also frightened, asked of themselves what Agrippina would
do. Would she not provoke a colossal scandal, which would ruin
everything? An expedient, the same one, occurred to both of them:
but so sinister was the idea that they dared not speak it. This time,
however, both the philosopher and the general were deceived as well as
Nero: Agrippina had guessed the truth and given up the struggle. What
could she, a lone woman do against an Emperor who did not stop even
at the plan of murdering his mother? She realised, during that awful
night, that only one chance of safety was left to her--to ignore what
had taken place; and she sent her freedman with the message that
meant forgiveness. But fear kept Nero and his counsellors from
understanding; and when they could easily have remedied the preceding
mistake, they compromised all by a supreme error. Finally Seneca, the
pacificator and humanitarian philosopher, thought he had found the way
of making half-openly the only suggestion which seemed wise to him: he