demeanor in public was
still, silent, almost sepulchral. He looked habitually on the ground when
he conversed, was chary of speech, embarrassed, and even suffering in
manner. This was ascribed partly to a natural haughtiness which he had
occasionally endeavored to overcome, and partly to habitual pains in the
stomach, occasioned by his inordinate fondness for pastry. [Bodavaro]

Such was the personal appearance of the man who was about to receive into
his single hand the destinies of half the world; whose single will was,
for the future, to shape the fortunes of every individual then present,
of many millions more in Europe, America, and at the ends of the earth,
and of countless millions yet unborn.

The three royal personages being seated upon chairs placed triangularly
under the canopy, such of the audience as had seats provided for them,
now took their places, and the proceedings commenced. Philibert de
Bruxelles, a member of the privy council of the Netherlands, arose at the
emperor's command, and made a long oration. He spoke of the emperor's
warm affection for the provinces, as the land of his birth; of his deep
regret that his broken health and failing powers, both of body and mind,
compelled him to resign his sovereignty, and to seek relief for his
shattered frame in a more genial climate. Caesar's gout was then depicted
in energetic language, which must have cost him a twinge as he sat there
and listened to the councillor's eloquence. "'Tis a most truculent
executioner," said Philibert: "it invades the whole body, from the crown
of the head to the soles of the feet, leaving nothing untouched. It
contracts the nerves with intolerable anguish, it enters the bones, it
freezes the marrow, it converts the lubricating fluids of the joints into
chalk, it pauses not until, having exhausted and debilitated the whole
body, it has rendered all its necessary instruments useless, and
conquered the mind by immense torture." [Godelaevus]

[The historian was present at the ceremony, and gives a very full
report of the speeches, all of which he heard. His imagination may
have assisted his memory in the task. The other reporters of the
councillor's harangue have reduced this pathological flight of
rhetoric to a very small compass.]

Engaged in mortal struggle with such an enemy, Caesar felt himself
obliged, as the councillor proceeded to inform his audience, to change
the scene of the contest from the humid a