“Hearken, ye senators, and in the evil days to come, remember all I say.  Out of the seed which ye sow this hour come wars, civil wars; Roman against Roman, kinsman against kinsman, brother against brother!  There comes impiety, violence, cruelty, bloodshed, anarchy!  There comes the destruction of the old; there comes the birth, amid pain and anguish, of the new!  Ye who grasp at money, at power, at high office; who trample on truth and right to serve your selfish ends; false, degenerate Romans,—­one thing can wipe away your crimes—­”

“What?” shouted Cato, across the senate-house; while Pompeius, who was shifting uncomfortably in his seat, had turned very red.

“Blood!” cried back Antonius, carried away by the frenzy of his own invective; then, shooting a lightning glance over the awe-struck Senate, he spoke as though gifted with some terrible prophetic omniscience.  “Pompeius Magnus, the day of your prosperity is past—­prepare ingloriously to die!  Lentulus Crus, you, too, shall pay the forfeit of your crimes!  Metellus Scipio, Marcus Cato, Lucius Domitius, within five years shall you all be dead—­dead and with infamy upon your names!  Your blood, your blood shall wipe away your folly and your lust for power.  Ye stay, we go.  Ye stay to pass once more unvetoed the decree declaring Caesar and his friends enemies of the Republic; we go—­go to endure our outlaw state.  But we go to appeal from the unjust scales of your false Justice to the juster sword of an impartial Mars, and may the Furies that haunt the lives of tyrants and shedders of innocent blood attend you—­attend your persons so long as ye are doomed to live, and your memory so long as men shall have power to heap on your names reproach!”

Drusus hardly knew that Antonius had so much as stopped, when he found his friend leading him out of the Curia.

Behind, all was still as they walked away toward the Temple of Mars.  Then, as they proceeded a little distance, a great roar as of a distant storm-wind drifted out from the senate-house—­so long had Antonius held his audience spellbound.

“Finitum est!” said Curio, his eyes cast on the ground.  “We have seen, my friends, the last day of the Republic.”

II

Behind the Temple of Mars the faithful Agias was ready with the slaves’ dresses which were to serve as a simple disguise.  Antonius and his companions tossed off their cumbrous togas and put on the dark, coarse cloaks and slippers which were worn by slaves and people of the lower classes.  These changes were quickly made, but valuable time was wasted while Antonius—­who, as a bit of a dandy, wore his hair rather long[147]—­underwent a few touches with the shears.  It was now necessary to get across the Tiber without being recognized, and once fairly out of Rome the chances of a successful pursuit were not many.  On leaving the friendly shelter of the Temple buildings, nothing untoward