in struggle and intrigue, all that Livia had been able to obtain
was the mere permission that Tiberius might return to Rome, under the
conditions, however, that he retire to private life, that he give
himself up to the education of his son, and that he in no wise mingle
in public affairs. The condition of the empire was growing worse on
every side; the finances were disordered, the army was disorganized,
and the frontiers were threatened, for revolt was raising its head in
Gaul, in Pannonia, and especially in Germany. Every day the situation
seemed to demand the hand of Tiberius, who, now in the prime of life,
was recognized as one of the leading administrators and the first
general of the empire. But, for all Livia's insistence, Augustus
refused to call Tiberius back into the government. The Julii were
masters of the state, and held the Claudii at a distance.

[Illustration: Antony and Cleopatra.]

Perhaps Tiberius would never have returned to power in Rome had not
chance aided him in the sudden taking off, in a strange and unforeseen
manner, of Caius and Lucius Caesar. The latter died at Marseilles,
following a brief illness, shortly after the return of Tiberius to
Rome, August 29, in the year 2 A.D. It was a great grief to Augustus,
and, twenty months after, was followed by another still more serious.
In February of the year 4, Caius also died, in Lycia, of a wound
received in a skirmish. These two deaths were so premature, so close
to each other, and so opportune for Tiberius, that posterity has
refused to see in them simply one of the many mischances of life.
Later generations have tried to believe that Livia had a hand in these
fatalities. Yet he who understands life at all knows that it is easier
to imagine and suspect romantic poisonings of this sort than it is to
carry them out. Even leaving the character of Livia out of
consideration, it is difficult to imagine how she would have dared, or
have been able, to poison the two youths at so great a distance from
Rome, one in Asia, the other in Gaul, by means of a long train of
accomplices, and this at a moment when the family of Augustus was
divided by many hatreds and every member was suspected, spied upon, and
watched by a hostile party. Furthermore, it would have been necessary
to carry this out at a time when the example of Julia proved to all
that relationship to Augustus was not a sufficient defense against the
rigors of the law and the severity o