“Hear me, divinity,” said he, “this advice is destructive! Before thou art at Ostia a civil war will break out; who knows but one of the surviving collateral descendants of the divine Augustus will declare himself Cæsar, and what shall we do if the legions take his side?”
“We shall try,” answered Nero, “that there be no descendants of Augustus. There are not many now; hence it is easy to rid ourselves of them.”
“It is possible to do so, but is it a question of them alone? No longer ago than yesterday my people heard in the crowd that a man like Thrasea should be Cæsar.”
Nero bit his lips. After a while he raised his eyes and said: “Insatiable and thankless. They have grain enough, and they have coal on which to bake cakes; what more do they want?”
“Vengeance!” replied Tigellinus.
Silence followed. Cæsar rose on a sudden, extended his hand, and began to declaim,—
“Hearts call for vengeance, and vengeance wants a victim.” Then, forgetting everything, he said, with radiant face: “Give me the tablet and stilus to write this line. Never could Lucan have composed the like. Have ye noticed that I found it in a twinkle?”
“O incomparable!” exclaimed a number of voices. Nero wrote down the line, and said,—
“Yes, vengeance wants a victim.” Then he cast a glance on those around him. “But if we spread the report that Vatinius gave command to burn the city, and devote him to the anger of the people?”
“O divinity! Who am I?” exclaimed Vatmius.