in the army, the time they had served, and their private means; so that
after their discharge, they might not be tempted by age or necessities to
join the agitators for a revolution. For the purpose of providing a fund
always ready to meet their pay and pensions, he instituted a military
exchequer, and appropriated new taxes to that object. In order to obtain
the earliest intelligence of what was passing in the provinces, he
established posts, consisting at first of young men stationed at moderate
distances along the military roads, and afterwards of regular couriers
with fast vehicles; which appeared to him the most commodious, because
the persons who were the bearers of dispatches, written on the spot,
might then be questioned about the business, as occasion occurred.

L. In sealing letters-patent, rescripts, or epistles, he at first used
the figure of a sphinx, afterwards the head of Alexander (111) the Great,
and at last his own, engraved by the hand of Dioscorides; which practice
was retained by the succeeding emperors. He was extremely precise in
dating his letters, putting down exactly the time of the day or night at
which they were dispatched.

LI. Of his clemency and moderation there are abundant and signal
instances. For, not to enumerate how many and what persons of the
adverse party he pardoned, received into favour, and suffered to rise to
the highest eminence in the state; he thought it sufficient to punish
Junius Novatus and Cassius Patavinus, who were both plebeians, one of
them with a fine, and the other with an easy banishment; although the
former had published, in the name of young Agrippa, a very scurrilous
letter against him, and the other declared openly, at an entertainment
where there was a great deal of company, "that he neither wanted
inclination nor courage to stab him." In the trial of Aemilius Aelianus,
of Cordova, when, among other charges exhibited against him, it was
particularly insisted upon, that he used to calumniate Caesar, he turned
round to the accuser, and said, with an air and tone of passion, "I wish
you could make that appear; I shall let Aelianus know that I have a
tongue too, and shall speak sharper of him than he ever did of me." Nor
did he, either then or afterwards, make any farther inquiry into the
affair. And when Tiberius, in a letter, complained of the affront with
great earnestness, he returned him an answer in the following terms: "Do
not, my dear Tiberius,