mulation and reticense, she sent her freedman Agerinus to tell her
son that by the mercy of heaven she had escaped from a terrible
accident, but to beg him not to be alarmed, and not to come to see her
because she needed rest.

The news filled Nero with the wildest terror, and the expectation of an
immediate revenge. In horrible agitation and uncertainty he instantly
required the presence of Burrus and Seneca. Tacitus doubts whether they
may not have been already aware of what he had attempted, and Dion, to
whose gross calumnies, however, we need pay no attention, declares that
Seneca had frequently urged Nero to the deed, either in the hope of
overshadowing his own guilt, or of involving Nero in a crime which
should hasten his most speedy destruction at the hands of gods and men.
In the absence of all evidence we may with perfect confidence acquit the
memory of these eminent men from having gone so far as this.

It must have been a strange and awful scene. The young man, for Nero was
but twenty-two years old, poured into the ears their tumult of his
agitation and alarm. White with fear, weak with dissipation, and
tormented by the furies of a guilty conscience, the wretched youth
looked from one to another of his aged ministers. A long and painful
pause ensued. If they dissuaded him in vain from the crime which he
meditated their lives would have been in danger; and perhaps they
sincerely thought that things had gone so far that, unless Agrippina
were anticipated, Nero would be destroyed. Seneca was the first to break
that silence of anguish by inquiring of Burrus whether the soldiery
could be entrusted to put her to death. His reply was that the
praetorians would do nothing against a daughter of Germanicus and that
Anicetus should accomplish what he had promised. Anicetus showed himself
prompt to crime, and Nero thanked him in a rapture of gratitude. While
the freedman Agerinus was delivering to Nero his mother's message,
Anicetus dropped a dagger at his feet, declared that he had caught him
in the very act of attempting the Emperor's assassination, and hurried
off with a band of soldiers to punish Agrippina as the author of
the crime.

The multitude meanwhile were roaming in wild excitement along the shore;
their torches were seen glimmering in evident commotion about the scene
of the calamity, where some were wading into the water in search of the
body, and others were shouting incoherent questions and replies. At