ut the empire.

During the visit of Nero to Greece, he engaged in one undertaking
which might be denominated a useful enterprise, though he managed it
with such characteristic imbecility and folly, that it ended, as
might have been foreseen, in a miserable failure. The plan which he
conceived, was to cut through the Isthmus of Corinth, so as to open
a ship communication between the Ionian and the AEgean seas. Such a
canal, he thought, would save for many vessels the long and
dangerous voyage around the Peloponnesus, and thus prevent many of
the wrecks which then annually took place on the shores of the
Peninsula, and which were often attended with the destruction of
much property and of many lives.

The plan might thus have been a very good one, had any proper and
efficient means been adopted for carrying it into execution; but in
all that he did in this respect, Nero seems to have looked no
farther than to the performance of pompous and empty ceremonies in
commencing the work. He convened a great public assembly on the
ground. He entertained this assembly with spectacles and shows. He
then placed himself at the head of his life-guards, and, after a
speech of great promise and pretension, he advanced at the head of a
procession, singing and dancing by the way, to the place where the
first ground was to be broken. Here he made three strokes with a
golden pick-axe, which had been provided for the occasion, and
putting the earth which he had loosened into a basket, he carried it
away to a short distance, and threw it out upon the ground. This
ceremony was meant for the commencement of the canal; and when it
was over, the company dispersed, and Nero was escorted by his guards
back to the city of Corinth, which lay at a few miles' distance from
the scene.

Nothing more was ever done. Nero issued orders, it is true, that all
the criminals, convicts, and prisoners in Greece, should be
transported to the Isthmus, and set to work upon this canal; and
some Jewish captives were actually employed there for a time; but,
for some reason or other, nothing was done. The actual work was
never seriously undertaken.

In the mean time, Nero had left the government at Rome in the hands
of a certain ignoble favorite, named Helius, who, being placed in
command of the army during his master's absence, held the lives and
fortunes of all the inhabitants at his supreme disposal, and, as
might have been expected, he pursued such a career of