THE race of the Caesars became extinct in Nero ; an event prognosticated by various signs, two of which
					were particularly significant. Formerly, when Livia , after her marriage with Augustus, was making a visit to
					her villa at Veii , an eagle flying by, let drop upon her lap a
					hen, with a sprig of laurel in her mouth, just as she had seized it. Livia gave
					orders to have the hen taken care of, and the sprig of laurel set; and the hen
					reared such a numerous brood of chickens, that the villa, to this day, is called
					the Vila of the Hens. The laurel
						grove flourished
					so much, that the Caesars procured thence the boughs and crowns they bore at
					their triumphs. It was also their constant custom to plant others on the same
					spot, immediately after a triumph; and it was observed that, a little before the
					death of each prince, the tree which had been set by him died away. But in the
					last year of Nero, the whole plantation of laurels perished to the very roots,
					and the hens all died. About the same time, the temple of the Caesars being struck with lightning, the heads of all the statues in
					it fell off at once; and Augustus's sceptre was dashed from his hands.

Nero was succeeded by Galba, who was not
					in the remotest degree allied to the family of the Caesars, but, without doubt,
					of very noble extraction, being descended from a great and ancient family; for
					he always used to put amongst his other titles, upon the bases of his statues,
					his being great-grandson to Q. Catulus Capitolinus. And when he came to be
					emperor, he set up the images of his ancestors in the hall of the palace; according to the inscriptions on
					which, he carried up his pedigree on the father's side to Jupiter ; and by the mother's to Pasiphae, the
					wife of Minos.

To give even a short account of the whole family, would be tedious. I shall,
					therefore, only slightly notice that branch of it from which he was descended.
					Why, or whence, the first of the Sulpicii who had the cognomen of Galba, was so
					called, is uncertain. Some are of opinion, that it was because he set fire to a
					city in Spain , after he had a long time
					attacked it to no purpose, with torches dipped in the gum called Galbanum:
					others said he was so named, because, in a lingering disease, he made use of it
					as a remedy, wrapped up in wool: others, on account of his being prodigiously
					corpulent, such a one being called, in the language of the Gauls, Galba; or, on
					the contrary, because he was of a slender habit of body, like those insects
					which breed in a sort of oak, and are called Galbae. Sergius Galba, a person of
					consular rank, and the most eloquent man of his time, gave a lustre to the
					family. History relates, that, when he was pro-praetor of Spain , he perfidiously put to the sword thirty
					thousand Lusitanians, and by that means gave occasion to the war of Viriatus.
						 His grandson being incensed
					against Julius Caesar, whose lieutenant he had been in Gaul , because he was through him disappointed
					of the consulship, joined with Cassius
					and Brutus in the conspiracy against him, for which he was condemned by the
					Pedian law. From him were descended the grandfather and father of the emperor
					Galba. The grandfather was more celebrated for his application to study, than
					for any figure he made in the government. For he rose no higher than the
					praetorship, but published a large and not uninteresting history. His father
					attained to the consulship: he was a
					short man and hump-backed, but a tolerable orator, and an industrious pleader.
					He was twice married: the first of his wives was Mummia Achaica, daughter of
					Catulus, and great-grand-daughter of Lucius Mummius, who sacked Corinth ; and the other, Livia Ocellina, a very rich and beautiful woman,
					by whom it is supposed he was courted for the nobleness of his descent. They
					say, that she was farther encouraged to persevere in her advances, by an
					incident which evinced the great ingenuousness of his disposition. Upon her
					pressing her suit, he took an opportunity, when they were alone, of stripping
					off his toga, and showing her the deformity of his person, that he might not be
					thought to impose upon her. He had by Achaica two sons, Caius and Sergius. The
					elder of these, Caius, having very much reduced his
					estate, retired from town, and being prohibited by Tiberius from standing for a
					pro-consulship in his year, put an end to his own life.

The emperor Sergius Galba was born in the consulship of M. Valerius Messala, and
					Cn. Lentulus, upon the ninth of the calends of January [24th December], in a villa standing upon a hill, near
						 Terracina , on the lefthand side of
					the road to Fundi . Being
					adopted by his step-mother, he assumed the name of Livius, with the cognomen of Ocella,
					and changed his praenomen; for he afterwards used that of Lucius, instead of
					Sergius, until he arrived at the imperial dignity. It is well known, that when
					he came once, amongst other boys of his own age, to pay his respects to
					Augustus, the latter, pinching his cheek, said to him, "And thou, child, too,
					wilt taste our imperial dignity." Tiberius, likewise, being told that he would
					come to be emperor, but at an advanced age, exclaimed, " Let him live, then,
					since that does not concern me!" When his grandfather was offering sacrifice to
					avert some ill omen from lightning, the entrails of the victim were snatched out
					of his hand by an eagle and carried off into an oak-tree loaded with acorns.
					Upon this, the soothsayers said, that the family would come to be masters of the
					empire, but not until many years had elapsed: at which he, smiling, said, "Ay,
					when a mule comes to bear a foal." When Galba first declared against Nero , nothing gave him so much confidence of
					success, as a mule's happening at that time to have a foal. And whilst all
					others were shocked at the occurrence, as a most inauspicious prodigy, he alone
					regarded it as a most fortunate omen, calling to mind the sacrifice and saying
					of his grandfather. When he took upon him the manly habit, he dreamt that the
					goddess Fortune said to him, " I stand before your door weary; and unless I am
					speedily admitted, I shall fall into the hands of the first who comes to seize
					me." On his awaking, when the door of the house was opened, he found a brazen
					statue of the goddess, above a cubit long, close to the threshold, which he
					carried with him to Tusculum , where he
					used to pass the summer season; and having consecrated it in an apartment of his
					house, he ever after worshipped it with a monthly sacrifice, and an anniversary
					vigil. Though but a very young man, he kept up an ancient but obsolete custom,
					and now nowhere observed, except in his own family, which was, to have his
					freedmen and slaves appear in a body before him twice a day, morning and
					evening, to offer him their salutations.

Amongst other liberal studies, he applied himself to the law. He married
						Lepida, by whom he had two sons;
					but the mother and children all dying, he continued a widower; nor could he be
					prevailed upon to marry again, not even Agrippina herself, at that time left a
					widow by the death of Domitius, who had employed all her blandishments to allure
					him to her embraces, while he was a married man; insomuch that Lepida's mother,
					when in company with several married women, rebuked her for it, and even went so
					far as to cuff her. Most of all he courted the empress Livia, by whose favour,
					while she was living, he made a considerable figure, and narrowly missed being
					enriched by the will which she left at her death; in which she distinguished him
					from the rest of the legatees, by a legacy of fifty millions of sesterces. But
					because the sum was expressed in figures, and not in words at length, it was
					reduced by her heir, Tiberius, to five hundred thousand: even this he never
						received.

Filling the great offices before the age required for it by law, during his
					praetorship, at the celebration of games in honour of the goddess Flora, he
					presented the new spectacle of elephants walking upon ropes. He was then
					governor of the province of Aquitania 
					for near a year, and soon afterwards took the consulship in the usual course,
					and held it for six months. It so
					happened that he succeeded L. Domitius, the father of Nero, and was succeeded by
					Salvius Otho, father to the emperor of that name; so that his holding it between
					the sons of these two men, looked like a presage of his future advancement to
					the empire. Being appointed by Caius Caesar to supersede Gaetulicus in his
					command, the day after his joining the legions, he put a stop to their plaudits
					in a public spectacle, by issuing an order, "That they should keep their hands
					under their cloaks." Immediately upon which, the following verse became very
					common in the camp: Disce, miles, militare: Galba est,
							non Gaetulicus. 
					 Learn, soldier, now in arms to use your hands, 
						 'Tis Galba, not Getulicus, commands. With equal strictness,
					he would allow of no petitions for leave of absence from the camp. He hardened
					the soldiers, both old and young, by constant exercise; and having quickly
					reduced within their own limits the barbarians who had made inroads into
						 Gaul , upon Caius's coming into
						 Germany , he so far recommended
					himself and his army to that emperor's approbation, that, amongst the
					innumerable troops drawn from all the provinces of the empire, none met with
					higher commendation, or greater rewards from him. He likewise distinguished
					himself by heading an escort, with a shield in his hand; 
					and running at the side of the emperor's chariot twenty miles together.

Upon the news of Caius's death, though many earnestly pressed him to lay hold of
					that opportunity of seizing the empire, he chose rather to be quiet. On this
					account, he. was in favour with Claudius, and being received into the number of
					friends, stood so high in his good opinion, that the expedition to Britain was for some time suspended, because he was
					suddenly seized with a slight indisposition. He governed Africa , as pro-consul, for two years; being
					chosen out of the regular course to restore order in the province, which was in
					great disorder from civil dissensions, and the alarms of the barbarians. His
					administration was distinguished by great strictness and equity, even in matters
					of small importance. A soldier upon some expedition being charged with selling,
					in a great scarcity of corn, a bushel of wheat, which was all he had left, for a
					hundred denarii, he forbad him to be relieved by anybody, when he came to be in
					want himself: and accordingly he died of famine. When sitting in judgment, a
					cause being brought before him about some beast of burden, the ownership of
					which was claimed by two persons; the evidence being slight on both sides, and
					it being difficult to come at the truth, he ordered the beast to be led to the
					pond at which he had used to be watered, with his head muffled up, and the
					covering being there removed, that he should be the property of the person whom
					he followed of his own accord, after drinking.

For his achievements, both at this time in Africa , and formerly in Germany , he received the triumphal ornaments, and three
					sacerdotal appointments, one among The Fifteen, another in the college of
					Titius, and a third amongst the Augustals; and from that time to the middle of
					Nero's reign, he lived for the most part in retirement. He never went abroad so
					much as to take the air, without a carriage attending him, in which there was a
					million of sesterces in gold ready at hand; until at last, at the time he was
					living in the town of Fundi , the
					province of Hispanic Tarraconensis was offered him. After his arrival in the
					province, whilst he was sacrificing in a temple, a boy who attended with a
					censer, became all on a sudden grey-headed. This incident was regarded by some
					as a token of an approaching revolution in the government, and that an old man
					would succeed a young one: that is that he would succeed Nero. And not long
					after, a thunderbolt falling into a lake in Cantabria , twelve axes were found in it; a manifest sign of the supreme power.

He governed the province during eight years, his administration being of an
					uncertain and capricious character. At first he was active, vigorous, and indeed
					excessively severe, in the punishment of offenders. For, a money-dealer having
					committed some fraud in the way of his business, he cut off his hands, and
					nailed them to his counter. Another, who had poisoned an orphan, to whom he was
					guardian, and next heir to the estate, he crucified. On this delinquent
					imploring the protection of the law, and crying out that he was a Roman citizen,
					he affected to afford him some alleviation, and to mitigate his punishment, by a
					mark of honour, ordered a cross, higher than usual, and painted white, to be
					erected for him But by degrees he gave himself up to a life of indolence and
					inactivity, from the fear of giving Nero any occasion of jealousy, and because,
					as he used to say, " Nobody was obliged to render an account of their leisure
					hours." He was holding a court of justice on the circuit at New Carthage, when he received intelligence of the
					insurrection in Gaul ; and while the lieutenant of Aquitania was soliciting his assistance,
					letters were brought from Vindex, requesting him " to assert the rights of
					mankind, and put himself at their head to relieve them from the tyranny of
					Nero." Without any long demur, he accepted the invitation, from a mixture of
					fear and hope. For he had discovered that private orders had been sent by Nero
					to his procurators in the province to get him dispatched; and he was encouraged
					to the enterprise, as well by several auspices and omens, as by the prophecy of
					a young woman of good family. The more so, because the priest of Jupiter at
						 Clunia , admonished by
					a dream, had discovered in the recesses of the temple some verses similar to
					those in which she had delivered her prophecy. These had also been uttered by a
					girl under divine inspiration, about two hundred years before. The import of the
					verses was, "That in time, Spain should
					give the world a lord and master."

Taking his seat on the tribunal, therefore, as if there was no other business
					than the manumitting of slaves, he had the effigies of a number of persons who
					had been condemned and put to death by Nero, set up before him, whilst a noble
					youth stood by, who had been banished, and whom he had purposely sent for from
					one of the neighbouring Balearic isles; and lamenting the condition of the
					times, and being thereupon unanimously saluted by the title of Emperor, he
					publicly declared himself "only the lieutenant of the senate and people of
						 Rome ." Then shutting the courts,
					he levied legions and auxiliary troops among the provincials, besides his
					veteran army consisting of one legion, two wings of horse, and three cohorts.
					Out of the military leaders most distinguished for age and prudence, he formed a
					kind of senate, with whom to advise upon all matters of importance, as often as
					occasion should require. He likewise chose several young men of the equestrian
					order, who were to be allowed the privilege of wearing the gold ring, and, being
					called " The Reserve," should mount guard before his bed-chamber, instead of the
					legionary soldiers. He likewise issued proclamations throughout the provinces of
					the empire, exhorting all to rise in arms unanimously, and aid the common cause,
					by all the ways and means in their power. About the same time, in fortifying a
					town, which he had pitched upon as a military post, a ring was found, of antique
					workmanship, in the stone of which was engraved the goddess Victory with a
					trophy. Presently after, a ship of Alexandria arrived at Dertosa , loaded with arms, without any person to steer
					it, or so much as a single sailor or passenger on board. From this incident,
					nobody entertained the least doubt but the war upon which they were entering was
					just and honourable, and favoured likewise by the gods; when all on a sudden the
					whole design was exposed to failure. One of the two wings of horse, repenting of
					the violation of their oath to Nero, attempted to desert him upon his approach
					to the camp, and were with some difficulty kept in their duty. And some slaves
					which had been presented to him by a freedman of Nero's, on purpose to murder
					him, had like to have killed him as he went through a narrow passage to the
					bath. Being overheard to encourage one another not to lose the opportunity, they
					were called to an account concerning it; and recourse being had to the torture,
					a confession was extorted from them.

These dangers were followed by the death of Vindex, at which being extremely
					discouraged, as if fortune had quite forsaken him, he had thoughts of putting an
					end to his own life; but receiving advice by his messengers from Rome that Nero was slain, and that all had
					taken an oath to him as emperor, he laid aside the title of lieutenant, and took
					upon him that of Caesar. Putting himself upon his march in his general's cloak,
					and a dagger hanging from his neck before his breast, he did not resume the use
					of the toga. until Nymphidius Sabinus, prefect of the pretorian guards at
						 Rome , with the two lieutenants,
					Fonteius Capito in Germany , and
					Claudius Macer in Africa , who opposed
					his advancement, were all put down.

Rumours of his cruelty and avarice had reached the city before his arrival; such
					as that he had punished some cities of Spain and Gaul , for
					not joining him readily, by the imposition of heavy taxes, and some by levelling
					their walls; and had put to death the governors and procurators with their wives
					and children: likewise that a golden crown, of fifteen pounds weight, taken out
					of the temple of Jupiter , with which he
					was presented by the people of Tarracona, he had melted down, and had exacted
					from them three ounces which were wanting in the weight. This report of him was
					confirmed and increased, as soon as he entered the town. For some seamen who had
					been taken from the fleet, and enlisted among the troops by Nero, he obliged to
					return to their former condition; but they refusing to comply, and obstinately
					clinging to the more honourable service under their eagles and standards, he not
					only dispersed them by a body of horse, but likewise decimated them. He also
					disbanded a cohort of Germans, which had been formed by the preceding emperors,
					for their body guard, and upon many occasions found very faithful; and sent them
					back into their own country, without giving them any gratuity, pretending that
					they were more inclined to favour the advancement of Cneius Dolabella, near
					whose gardens they encamped, than his own. The following ridiculous stories were
					also related of him; but whether with or without foundation, I know not; such
					as, that when a more sumptuous entertainment than usual was served up, he
					fetched a deep groan; that when one of the stewards presented him with an
					account of his expenses, he reached fim a dish of legumes from his table as a
					reward for his care and diligence; and when Canus, the piper, had played much to
					his satisfaction, he presented him, with his own hand, five denarii taken out of
					his pocket.

His arrival, therefore, in the town was not very agreeable to the people; and
					this appeared at the next public spectacle. For when the actors in a farce began
					a well-known song, Venit, io, Simus 
							a villa 
					 Lo! Clodpate from his village comes all the
					spectators, with one voice, went on with the rest, repeating and acting the
					first verse several times over.

He possessed himself of the imperial power with more favour and authority than he
					administered it, although he gave many proofs of his being an excellent prince:
					but these were not so grateful to the people, as his misconduct was offensive.
					He was governed by three favourites, who, because they lived in the palace, and
					were constantly about him, obtained the name of his pedagogues. These were Titus
					Vinius who had been his lieutenant in Spain, a man of insatiable avarice;
					Cornelius Laco, who, from an assessor to the prince, was advanced to be prefect
					of the pretorian guards, a person of intolerable arrogance, as well as
					indolence; and his freedman Icelus, dignified a little before with the privilege
					of wearing the gold ring, and the use of the cognomen Martianus, who became a
					candidate for the highest honour within the reach of any person of the
					equestrian order. He resigned himself so implicitly into the power of those three
					favourites, who governed in every thing according to the capricious impulse of
					their vices and tempers, and his authority was so much abused by them, that the
					tenor of his conduct was not very consistent with itself. At one time, he was
					more rigorous and frugal, at another, more lavish and negligent, than became a
					prince who had been chosen by the people, and was so far advanced in years. He
					condemned some men of the first rank in the senatorian and equestrian orders,
					upon a very slight suspicion, and without trial. He rarely granted the freedom
					of the city to any one; and the privilege belonging to such as had three
					children, only one or two; and that with great difficulty, and only for a
					limited time. When the judges petitioned to have a sixth decury added to their
					number, he not only denied them, but abolished the vacation which had been
					granted to them by Claudius for the winter, and the beginning of the year.

It was thought that he likewise intended to reduce the offices held by senators
					and men of the equestrian order, to a term of two years' continuance; and to
					bestow them only on those who were unwilling to accept them, and had refused
					them. All the grants of Nero he
					recalled, saving only the tenth part of them. For this purpose he gave a
					commission to fifty Roman knights; with orders, that if players 'or wrestlers
					had sold what had been formerly given them, it should be exacted from the
					purchasers, since the others, having, no doubt spent the money, were in a
					condition to pay. But on the other hand, he suffered his attendants and freedmen
					to sell or give away the revenue of the state, or immunities from taxes, and to
					punish the innocent, or pardon criminals, at pleasure. Nay, when the Roman
					people were very clamorous for the punishment of Halotus and Tigellinus, two of
					the most mischievous amongst all the emissaries of Nero, he protected them, and
					even bestowed on I alotus one of the best procurations in his disposal. And as
					to Tigellinus, he even reprimanded the people for their cruelty by a
					proclamation.

By this conduct he incurred the hatred of all orders of the people, but
					especially of the soldiery. For their commanders having promised them in his
					name a donative larger than usual, upon their taking the oath to him before his
					arrival at Rome ; he refused to make it
					good, frequently bragging, "that it was his custom to choose his soldiers, not
					buy them." Thus the troops became exasperated against him in all quarters. The
					pretorian guards he alarmed with apprehensions of danger and unworthy treatment;
					disbanding many of them occasionally as disaffected to his government, and
					favourers of Nymphidius. But most of all, the army in Upper Germany was incensed
					against him, as being defrauded of the rewards due to them for the service they
					had rendered in the insurrection of the Gauls under Vindex. They were,
					therefore, the first who ventured to break into open mutiny, refusing upon the
					calends [the 1st] of January, to take any oath of allegiance, except to the
					senate; and they immediately dispatched deputies to the pretorian troops, to let
					them know, "they did not like the emperor who had been set up in Spain ," and to desire that " they would make
					choice of another, who might meet with the approbation of all the armies."

Upon receiving intelligence of this, imagining that he was slighted not so much
					on account of his age, as for having no children, he immediately singled out of
					a company of young persons of rank, who came to pay their compliments to him,
					Piso Frugi Licinianus, a youth of noble descent and great talents, for whom he
					had before contracted such a regard, that he had appointed him in his will the
					heir both of his estate and name. Him he now styled his son, and taking him to
					the camp, adopted him in the presence of the assembled troops, but without
					making any mention of a donative. This circumstance afforded the better
					opportunity to Marcus Salvius Otho of accomplishing his object, six days after
					the adoption.

Many remarkable prodigies had happened from the very beginning of his reign,
					which forewarned him of his approaching fate. In every town through which he
					passed in his way from Spain to
						 Rome , victims were slain on the
					right and left of the roads; and one of these, which was a bull, being maddened
					with the stroke of the axe, broke the rope with which it was tied, and running
					straight against his chariot, with his fore-feet elevated, bespattered him with
					blood. Likewise, as he was alighting, one of the guard, being pushed forward by
					the crowd, had very nearly wounded him with his lance. And upon his entering the
					city and, afterwards, the palace, he was welcomed with an earthquake, and a
					noise like the bellowing of cattle. These signs of ill-fortune were followed by
					some that were still more apparently such. Out of all his treasures he had
					selected a necklace of pearls and jewels, to adorn his statue of Fortune at
						 Tusculum , But it suddenly
					occurring to him that it deserved a more august place, he consecrated it to the
					Capitoline Venus; and next night, he dreamt that Fortune appeared to him,
					complaining that she had been defrauded of the present intended her, and
					threatening to resume what she had given him. Terrified at this denunciation, at
					break of day he sent forward some persons to Tusculum , to make preparations for a sacrifice which might
					avert the displeasure of the goddess; and when he himself arrived at the place,
					he found nothing but some hot embers upon the altar, and an old man in black
					standing by, holding a little incense in a glass, and some wine in an earthen
					pot. It was remarked, too, that whilst he was sacrificing upon the calends of
					January, the chaplet fell from his head, and upon his consulting the pullets for
					omens, they flew away. Farther, upon the day of his adopting Piso, when he was
					to harangue the soldiers, the seat which he used upon those occasions, through
					the neglect of his attendants, was not placed, according to custom, upon his
					tribunal; and in the senate-house, his curule chair was set with the back
					forward.

The day before he was slain, as he was sacrificing in the morning, the augur
					warned him from time to time to be upon his guard, for that he was in danger
					from assassins, and that they were near at hand. Soon after, he was informed,
					that Otho was in possession of the pretorian camp. And though most of his
					friends advised him to repair thither immediately, in hopes that he might quell
					the tumult by his authority and presence, he resolved to do nothing more than
					keep close within the palace, and secure himself by guards of the legionary
					soldiers, who were quartered in different parts about the city. He put on a
					linen coat of mail, however; remarking at the same time, that it would avail him
					little against the points of so many swords. But being tempted out by false
					reports, which the conspirators had purposely spread to induce him to venture
					abroad-some few of those about him too hastily assuring him that the tumult had
					ceased, the mutineers were apprehended, and the rest coming to congratulate him,
					resolved to continue firm in their obedience-he went forward to meet them with
					so much confidence, that upon a soldier's boasting that he had killed Otho, he
					asked him, " By what authority?" and proceeded as far as the forum. There the
					knights appointed to dispatch him, making their way through the crowd of
					citizens, upon seeing him at a distance, halted a while; after which, galloping
					up to him, now abandoned by all his attendants, they put him to death.

Some authors relate, that upon their first approach he cried out, "What do you
					mean, fellow-soldiers ? I am yours, and you are mine," and promised them a
					donative: but the generality of writers relate, that he offered his throat to
					them, saying, " Do your work, and strike, since you are resolved upon it." It is
					remarkable, that not one of those who were at hand, ever made any attempt to
					assist the emperor; and all who were sent for, disregarded the summons, except a
					troop of Germans. They, in consideration of his late kindness in showing them
					particular attention during a sickness which prevailed in the camp, flew to his
					aid, but came too late: for, being not well acquainted with the town, they had
					taken a circuitous route. He was slain near the Curtian Lake, and there left,
					until a common soldier returning from the receipt of his allowance of corn,
					throwing down the load which he carried, cut off his head. There being upon it
					no hair, by which he might hold it, he hid it in the bosom of his dress; but
					afterwards thrusting his thumb into the mouth, he carried it in that manner to
					Otho, who gave it to the drudges and slaves who attended the soldiers; and they,
					fixing it upon the point of a spear, carried it in derision round the camp,
					crying out as they went along, "You take your fill of joy in your old age." They
					were irritated to this pitch of rude banter, by a report spread a few days
					before, that, upon some one's commending his person as still florid and
					vigorous, he replied, 
						 ἔτι μοι μένοσ ἔμπεδόν 
						 Il. 5.254 
					 
					 My strength, as yet, has suffered no decay. 
					A freedman of Patrobius's, who himself had belonged to Nero's family, purchased
					the head from them at the price of a hundred gold pieces, and threw it into the
					place where, by Galba's order, his patron had been put to death. At last, after
					some time, his steward Argius buried it, with the rest of his body, in his own
					gardens near the Aurelian Way .

In person he was of a good size, bald before, with blue eyes, and an aquiline
					nose; and his hands and feet were so distorted with the gout, that he could
					neither wear a shoe, nor turn over the leaves of a book, or so much as hold it.
					He had likewise an excrescence in his right side, which hung down to that
					degree, that it was with difficulty kept up by a bandage.

He is reported to have been a great eater, and usually took his breakfast in the
					winter-time before day. At supper, he fed very heartily, giving the fragments
					which were left, by handfuls, to be distributed amongst the attendants.

He perished in the seventy-third year of his age, and the seventh month of his
						reign. The senate, as soon as they
					could with safety, ordered a statue to be erected for him upon the naval column,
					in that part of the forum where he was slain. But Vespasian cancelled the
					decree, upon a suspicion that he had sent assassins from Spain into Judea to murder him.

Remarks on Galba 
				 GALBA was, for a private man, the most wealthy of any who had ever aspired to the
					imperial dignity. He valued himself upon his being descended from the family of
					the Servi, but still more upon his relation to Quintus Catulus Capitolinus,
					celebrated for integrity and virtue. He was likewise distantly related to Livia,
					the wife of Augustus; by whose interest he was preferred from the station which
					he held in the palace, to the dignity of consul; and who left him a great legacy
					at her death. His paisimonious way of living, and his aversion to all
					superfluity or excess, were construed into avarice as soon as he became emperor;
					whence Plutarch observes, that the pride he took in his tem perance and economy
					was unseasonable. While he endeavoured to reform the profusion in the public
					expenditure, which prevailed in the reign of Nero, he ran into the opposite
					extreme; and it is objected to him by some historians, that he maintained not
					the imperial dignity in a degree consistent with decency. He was not
					sufficiently attentive either to his own security or the tranquillity of the
					state, when he refused to pay the soldiers the donative which he had promised
					them. This breach of faith seems to be the only act in his life that affects his
					integrity; and it contributed more to his ruin than even the odium which he
					incurred by the open venality and rapaciousness of his favnurites, particularly
					Vinius.