ut to death, others were punished by the confiscation of
their property, and driven forth as exiles from their homes, so that
having nothing left but their tears and complaints, they were reduced to
live on the contributions of their friends; and many opulent and famous
houses were shut up, the old constitutional and just authority being
changed into a government at the will of a bloodthirsty tyrant.

5. Nor amid these manifold atrocities was any testimony of an accuser,
not even of a suborned one, sought for, in order to give at least an
appearance of these crimes being committed according to law and statute,
as very commonly even the most cruel princes have done: but whatever
suited the implacable temper of Caesar was instantly accomplished in
haste, as if its accordance with human and divine law had been well
considered.

6. After these deeds a fresh device was adopted, and a body of obscure
men, such as, by reason of the meanness of their condition, were little
likely to excite suspicion, were sent through all the districts of
Antioch, to collect reports, and to bring news of whatever they might
hear. They, travelling about, and concealing their object, joined
clandestinely in the conversational circles of honourable men, and also
in disguise obtained entrance into the houses of the rich. When they
returned they were secretly admitted by back doors into the palace, and
then reported all that they had been able to hear or to collect; taking
care with an unanimous kind of conspiracy to invent many things, and to
exaggerate for the worse all they really knew; at the same time
suppressing any praises of Caesar which had come to their ears, although
these were wrung from many, against their consciences, by the dread of
impending evils.

7. And it had happened sometimes that, if in his secret chamber, when no
domestic servant was by, the master of the house had whispered anything
into his wife's ear, the very next day, as if those renowned seers of
old, Amphiaraus or Marcius, had been at hand to report it, the emperor
was informed of what had been said; so that even the walls of a man's
secret chamber, the only witnesses to his language, were viewed with
apprehension.

8. And Caesar's fixed resolution to inquire into these and other similar
occurrences was increased by the queen, who constantly stimulated his
desire, and was driving on the fortunes of her husband to headlong
destruction, while she ought rather, by giv