to raise a disturbance the amplest scope.  He made use of the same excuse in reference to his not allowing any soldier to attend his mother, saying that no one except the emperor ought to be guarded by them.  In this way he displayed his enmity toward the masses, and as for his mother he was already openly at variance with her.  Everything that they said to each other, or that the imperial pair did each day, was reported outside the palace, yet it did not all reach the public and hence conjectures were made to supply missing details and different versions arose.  What was conceivable as happening, in view of the baseness and lewdness of the pair, was noised abroad as having already taken place, and reports possessing some credibility were believed as true.  The populace, seeing Agrippina now for the first time without Pretorians, took care not to fall in with her even by accident; and if any one did chance to meet her he would hastily get out of the way without saying a word.

[Sidenote:—­9—­] At one spectacle men on horseback overcame bulls while riding along beside them, and the knights who served as Nero’s personal guard brought down with their javelins four hundred bears and three hundred lions.  On the same occasion thirty knights belonging to the military fought in the arena.  The emperor sanctioned such proceedings openly.  Secretly, however, he carried on nocturnal revels throughout the length and breadth of the city, insulting the women, practicing lewdness on boys, stripping those whom he encountered, striking, wounding, murdering.  He had an idea that his incognito was impenetrable, for he used all sorts of different costumes and false hair at different times:  but he would be recognized by his retinue and by his deeds.  No one else would have dared to commit so many and such gross outrages so recklessly. [Sidenote:  A.D. 56 (a.u. 809)] It was becoming unsafe even for a person to stay at home, since he would break into shops and houses.  It came about that a certain Julius Montanus, [Footnote:  C.  Iulius Montanus C.F. (Cp.  Suetonius, Life of Nero, chapter 60).] a senator, enraged on his wife’s account, fell upon this reveler and inflicted many blows upon him, so that he had to remain several days in concealment by reason of the black eyes he had received.  Montanus did not suffer for it, since Nero thought the violence had been all an accident and was for showing no anger at the occurrence, had not the other sent him a letter begging his pardon.  Nero on reading the epistle remarked:  “So he knew that he was striking Nero.”  The suicide of Montanus followed hard after.

[Sidenote:  A.D. 57 (a.u. 810)] In the course of producing a spectacle at one of the theatres, he suddenly filled the place with sea-water so that the fishes and sea-monsters [Footnote:  [Greek:  ktaenae] of the MSS. was changed to [Greek:  kaetae] on the conjecture of Sylburgius, who was followed by Bekker, Dindorf, and Boissevain. (Compare also Suetonius, Life of Nero, chapter 12).] swam in it, and had a naval battle between “Persians” and “Athenians.”  At the close of it he suddenly withdrew the water, dried the subsoil, and continued land contests, not only between two men at a time but with crowds pitted against other crowds.