It is just that absence of a quality which we regard as an added
grace; one, parenthetically, which dowered the world with a new
conception of beauty that makes it difficult to picture Rome.
Modern ink has acquired Nero's blush; it comes very readily, yet,
however sensitive a writer may be, once Roman history is before
him, he may violate it if he choose; he may even give it a child,
but never can he make it immaculate. He may skip, indeed, if he
wish; and it is because he has skipped so often that one fancies
that Augustus was all right. The rain of fire which fell on the
cities that mirrored their towers in the Bitter Sea, might just as
well have fallen on him, on Vergil, too, on Caligula, Claud, Nero,
Otho, Vitellius, Titus, Domitian, and particularly on Trajan.
As lieutenant in the latter's triumphant promenade, was a nephew,
AElius Hadrianus, a young man for whom Trajan's wife is rumored to
have had more than a platonic affection, and who in younger days
was numbered among Trajan's mignons. During the progress of that
promenade Trajan fell ill. The command of the troops was left to
Hadrian, and Trajan started for Rome. On the way he died. In what
manner is not known; his wife, however, was with him, and it was
in her hand that a letter went to the senate stating that Trajan
had adopted Hadrian as his heir. Trajan had done nothing of the
sort. The idea had indeed occurred to him, but long since it had
been abandoned.
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