nd
his ancestors (206) in all their commands. But, in the midst of victory,
he was very near being assassinated by some Bructerian, who mixing with
those about him, and being discovered by his trepidation, was put to the
torture, and confessed his intended crime.

XX. After two years, he returned from Germany to the city, and
celebrated the triumph which he had deferred, attended by his
lieutenants, for whom he had procured the honour of triumphal ornaments
[322]. Before he turned to ascend the Capitol, he alighted from his
chariot, and knelt before his father, who sat by, to superintend the
solemnity. Bato, the Pannonian chief, he sent to Ravenna, loaded with
rich presents, in gratitude for his having suffered him and his army to
retire from a position in which he had so enclosed them, that they were
entirely at his mercy. He afterwards gave the people a dinner at a
thousand tables, besides thirty sesterces to each man. He likewise
dedicated the temple of Concord [323], and that of Castor and Pollux,
which had been erected out of the spoils of the war, in his own and his
brother's name.

XXI. A law having been not long after carried by the consuls [324] for
his being appointed a colleague with Augustus in the administration of
the provinces, and in taking the census, when that was finished he went
into Illyricum [325]. But being hastily recalled during his journey, he
found Augustus alive indeed, but past all hopes of recovery, and was with
him in private a whole day. I know, it is generally believed, that upon
Tiberius's quitting the room, after their private conference, those who
were in waiting overheard Augustus say, "Ah! unhappy Roman people, to be
ground by the jaws of such a slow devourer!" Nor am I ignorant of its
being reported by some, that Augustus so openly and undisguisedly
condemned the sourness of his temper, that sometimes, upon his coming in,
he would break off any jocular conversation in which he was engaged; and
that he was only prevailed upon by the (207) importunity of his wife to
adopt him; or actuated by the ambitious view of recommending his own
memory from a comparison with such a successor. Yet I must hold to this
opinion, that a prince so extremely circumspect and prudent as he was,
did nothing rashly, especially in an affair of so great importance; but
that, upon weighing the vices and virtues of Tiberius with each other, he
judged the latter to preponderate; and this the rather s