was no safety even for such as left the country, but many of them, too, lost their lives either on the road or while in banishment It is not worth while to burden my readers unduly by going into the details of most of these cases, but I may stop to notice Calvisius Sabinus, one of the foremost men in the senate.  He had recently come from governing Pannonia, and he and his wife Cornelia were both indicted.  The charge against her was that she had visited some military posts and had watched some soldiers practicing.  These two did not stand trial but despatched themselves before the time set.  The same is to be recorded of Titius Rufus, against whom a complaint was lodged that he had said the senate had one thing in their minds but uttered something different.  Also one Junius Priscus, a praetor, was accused on various charges, but his death was really due to the supposition that he was wealthy.  Gaius, on learning that he possessed nothing worth causing his death for, made this remarkable statement:  “He fooled me and perished uselessly when he might as well have lived.”

[-19-] Among these men put on trial at this time Domitius Afer encountered danger from an unexpected source and secured his preservation in a still more remarkable way.  Gaius was incensed against him (if for no other reason) because in the reign of Tiberius he had accused a woman who was related to the emperor’s mother Agrippina.  Later the woman had met Afer and as she saw that out of embarrassment he stood aside from her path she called to him and said (referring to the matter):  “Never mind, Domitius:  it wasn’t you, but Agamemnon, that caused me these troubles.” [13] Just about this time Afer had set up an image of the emperor and had placed upon it an inscription showing that Gaius in his twenty-seventh year was already consul for the second time.  This vexed the latter, who felt that undue notice was being given to his youth and his transgression of the law.  So for this action, for which Afer had looked to be honored, he brought him before the senate and read a long speech against him.  Gaius always maintained that he surpassed all living orators, and knowing that his adversary was an extremely gifted speaker he strove on this occasion to excel him.  He would certainly have put Afer to death, if the latter had entered into the least competition with him.  As it was, the man made no answer or defence, but pretended to be astonished and overcome by the cleverness of Gaius, and repeating the accusation point by point he praised it as though he were some listener and not on trial.  When opportunity was given him to speak, he took to supplicating and bewailing his lot; finally he threw himself on the earth and lying there prostrate he besought his accuser, apparently fearing him as an orator rather than as Caesar.  In this way the latter when he saw and heard what I have described was melted, for he thought that he had really overwhelmed Domitius by the eloquence of his address.  For this reason, then, and on account of Callistus the freedman, whom he was wont to honor and whose favor Domitius had courted, he ceased his anger.  And when Callistus later blamed him for having accused the man in the first place, the emperor answered:  “It would not have been right for me to hide such a speech.”  So Domitius was saved by being convicted of no longer being a skillful speaker.