ose dwelling is illimitable space, whose essence is
in every thing that we behold, that moves, that is--to thee whom I hail,
GOD! For thou hast given it to me to save my country. And whether I die
now, by this assassin's knife, or live a little longer to behold the
safety I establish, I have lived long enough, and am content to
die!--Whether this death be, as philosophers have told us, a dreamless,
senseless, and interminable trance; or, as I sometimes dream, a brief and
passing slumber, from which we shall awaken into a purer, brighter,
happier being--I have lived long enough! and when thou callest me, will
answer to thy summons, glad and grateful! For Rome, at least, survives me,
and shall perchance survive, 'till time itself is ended, the Queen of
Universal Empire!"

CHAPTER XIV.

THE WARNINGS.

These late eclipses in the sun and moon
Portend no good to us.
KING LEAR.

The morning of the eighteenth of October, the day so eagerly looked
forward to by the conspirators, and so much dreaded by the good citizens
of the republic, had arrived. And now was seen, as it will oftentimes
happen, that when great events, however carefully concealed, are on the
point of coming to light, a sort of vague rumour, or indefinite
anticipation, is found running through the whole mass of society--a rumour,
traceable to no one source, possessing no authority, and deserving no
credibility from its origin, or even its distinctness; yet in the main
true and correct--an anticipation of I know not what terrible, unusual, and
exaggerated issue, yet, after all, not very different from what is really
about to happen.

Thus it was at this period; and--though it is quite certain, that on the
preceding evening, at the convocation of the senate, no person except
Cicero and Paullus, unconnected with the conspiracy, knew anything at all
of the intended massacre and conflagration; though no one of the plotters
had yet broken faith with his fellows; and though none of the leaders
dared avow their schemes openly, even to the discontented populace, with
whom they felt no sympathy, and from whom they expected no cordial or
general cooperation--it is equally certain that for many days, and even
months past, there had been a feverish and excited state of the public
mind; an agitation and restlessness of the operative classes; an
indistinct and vague alarm of the noble and wealthy orders; which had
increased