I, Claudius - Robert Graves [22]
Soon Rome would have forgotten what freedom meant and would fall at last under a tyranny as barbarous and arbitrary as those of the East. It was not to forward such a calamity that he had fought so many wearisome campaigns under Augustus' supreme command. Even his love and deep personal admiration for Augustus, who had been a second father to him, did not prevent him from expressing these feelings. He asked Tiberius' opinion: could not the two of them together persuade, even compel, Augustus to retire? "If he consents I shall hold him in a thousand times greater love and admiration than formerly; but I am sorry to say that the secret and illegitimate pride that our mother Livia has always derived from her exercise of supreme power through Augustus will be the greatest hindrance that we are likely to encounter in this matter."
By ill-luck the letter was delivered to Tiberius while he was in the presence of Augustus and Livia. "A despatch from your noble brother!" the Imperial courier called out, handing it to him. Tiberius, not suspecting that there was anything in the letter that should not be communicated to Livia and Augustus, asked permission to open and read it at once. Augustus said: "By all means, Tiberius, but on condition that you read it aloud to us." He motioned the servants out of the room. "Come, let us lose no time, what are his latest victories? I am impatient to hear. His letters are always well written and interesting, much more so than yours, my dear fellow, if you'll pardon me for making the comparison."
Tiberius read out the first few words and then grew very red. He tried to skip over the dangerous part, but found that there was little but danger throughout the letter, except just at the end where my father complained of giddiness from a head-wound and told of his difficult march to the Elbe. Curious portents had occurred lately, he wrote.
A most extraordinary display of shooting stars, night after night; sounds like the lamenting of women from the forest; and two divine youths on white horses in Greek, not German, dress, had suddenly ridden through the middle of the camp at dawn. Finally, a German woman of more than mortal size had appeared at his tent door and spoken to him in Greek, telling him to advance no further because fate ruled against it. So Tiberius read a word here and there, stumbled, said that the writing was illegible, started again, stumbled again and finally excused himself.
"What's this?" said Augustus. "Surely you can make out more than that."
Tiberius pulled himself together. "To be honest. Sir, I can, but the letter does not deserve reading. Evidently my brother was not well at the time of writing it."
Augustus was alarmed. "He is not seriously ill, I hope?"
But my grandmother Livia, as if her mother's anxiety for once overrode good manners—though of course she guessed at once that there was something in the letter that Tiberius was afraid to read because it reflected either on Augustus or herself—snatched it from him. She read it through, frowned grimly and handed it to Augustus, saying: "This is a matter which only concerns you. It is not my business to punish a son, however unnatural, but yours as his guardian and as the head of the State."
Augustus was alarmed, wondering what in the world could be amiss. He read the letter, but it seemed to call for disapproval rather as something which had outraged my grandmother than as something written against himself.
Indeed, except for the ugly word "compel", he secretly approved of the sentiments expressed in the letter, even though the insult