He

provinces. Among the floating stories of the day, was a prediction that the Ides of March should be fatal to Cæsar. had received, it appears, intimations from more than one quarter, of the danger which threatened him; but he resolutely rejected all advice to guard himself against it, relying, as he declared, implicitly on the good sense or gratitude of the citi

zens.

2. It had long been the fixed principle of his philosophy, that the only way to enjoy life was to banish the fear of death. On the eve of the fatal day, he was entertained by Lepidus; and when, in the course of conversation, some one started the question, What kind of death is the best? it was remarked that he cut short the discussion abruptly with the reply, That which is least expected. The constant tradition of antiquity declared that, among many prognostics of an impending catastrophe, his wife had revealed to him in the morning an ominous dream, and when she prevailed upon him to consult the sacrificers, the signs of the victims were fearfully inauspicious.

3. Whether his own superstitious feelings gained the ascendency, or whether he was overcome by the entreaties of Calpurnia, he consented at last to send Antonius to dismiss the Senate or to excuse his absence. At this moment Decimus Brutus came to attend him on his way to the place of meeting. On hearing the dictator's reluctant avowal of his scruples, he was struck with consternation at the prospect of the victim's escape; for the conspirators, meanwhile, were in momentary apprehension of discovery.

4. Brutus himself, tormented by fear or conscience, had failed to conceal his agitation since he had embarked in the enterprise; and his nervous excitement was shamed by the firmness of his wife, who pierced her own thigh and long concealed the wound, to extract his secret from him by this proof of her self-control. With Porcia, indeed, the secret of the tyrannicides was secure; but not so with many of the wild, unprincipled men to whom it had been confided; every moment of delay made the danger of its divulgement more imminent.

5. Under pretense of escorting the son of Cassius, who had just assumed the gown of manhood, the conspirators assembled early, and proceeded in a body to the Portico before the theatre of Pompeius, the place assigned for the meeting of the Senate being a hall immediately adjacent. It had never been the ordinary custom of the Romans to wear arms in the city, and when the commotions of Milo and Clodius were put down, a special enactment had been introduced to check such a practice, which seemed to be creeping in through the license and perilousness of the times. But the Roman senator carried his iron stylus in a little case, and in the place of the implement of writing, the conspirators had furnished themselves each with a dagger.

6. While awaiting the arrival of the dictator, Brutus and Cassius occupied themselves as prætors' with listening to casual applications, and the freedom with which the former expressed himself, rebuking those who boasted that Cæsar would reverse his decisions, was especially remarked. But as the morning wore on, the conspirators were exposed to redoubled risks. A senator, addressing Casca with a significant smile, said, You have concealed your secret from me, but Brutus has revealed it. In another moment, Casca would have pressed his hand and communicated the design, but the other went on to allude to his meditated competition for the ædileship', and the conspirator saw that he was undiscovered. Popil'ius Lænas whispered to Brutus, What you have in hand dispatch quickly, and was immediately lost in the crowd. It was never known to what he referred, but the conscious assassins were disconcerted and alarmed.

7. Meanwhile, Decimus Brutus had recovered his presence of mind. He saw that all was lost unless Cæsar could be brought to the spot where the ambush awaited him. He rallied him on the weakness of Calpurnia, hinted some friendly disparagement of the hero's own resolution, and assured him that so favorable a moment might not again arrive for the sanction of his views and wishes by the decree of the subservient senators. Cæsar yielded, and quitted his house. Hardly had he turned his back when a slave besought an audience of

Calpurnia, declared to her that there was some design in agitation against her husband's life, and desired to be kept in confinement till the event should prove his assertion.

8. As Cæsar proceeded along the Forum and Velabrum from the mansion of the chief pontiff to the theatre of Pompeius, more than one person, it seems, pressed toward him to warn him of his doom. But the conspirators to whom that part of the business was assigned, crowded closely about him, and the press of his attendants was almost too great to allow of a mere stranger's approach. One man, indeed, succeeded in thrusting a paper into his hand, and earnestly exhorted him to read it instantly. It was supposed to have contained a distinct announcement of the impending danger; but Cæsar was accustomed to receive petitions in this way, and paid no immediate attention to it, though he had it still rolled up in his hand when he entered the senate-house. As he was borne along in his litter (for he affected sickness to countenance the excuse which Calpurnia had persuaded him to send to the Senate), he observed, complacently, to the augur Spurinna, who had foreboded evil on that fatal day, The Ides of March are come. Yes, muttered the sage; but not yet passed.

9. At the moment when Cæsar descended from his litter at the door of the hall, Popilius Lænas, the same who had just before spoken so mysteriously to Brutus, approached him, and was observed to enter into earnest conversation with him. The conspirators regarded one another, and mutually revealed their despair with a glance. Cassius and others were grasping their daggers beneath their robes; their last resource was to dispatch themselves. But Brutus, observing that the manner of Popilius was that of one supplicating rather than warning, restored his companions' confidence with a smile.

10. Cæsar entered: his enemies closed in a dense mass around him, and while they led him to his chair kept off all intruders. Trebonius was specially charged to detain Antonius in conversation at the door. Scarcely was the victim seated when Tillius Cimber approached with a petition for his brother's pardon. The others, as was concerted, joined in

the supplication, grasping his hands and embracing his neck. Cæsar at first put them gently aside, but, as they became more Tillius seized importunate, repelled them with main force. his toga with both hands, and pulled it violently over his arms. Then Casca, who was behind, drew a weapon and grazed his shoulder with an ill-directed stroke. Cæsar disengaged one hand and snatched at the hilt, shouting, Cursed Casca, what means this? Help, cried Casca to his brother Lucius, and at the same moment the others aimed each his dagger at the devoted object.

11. Cæsar for an instant defended himself, and even wounded one of the assailants with his stylus; but when he distinguished Brutus in the press, and saw the steel flashing in his hand also, What! thou too, Brutus! he exclaimed, let go his hold of Casca, and drawing his robe over his face, made no further resistance. The assassins stabbed him through and through, for they had pledged themselves, one and all, to bathe their daggers in his blood. Brutus himself received a wound in their eagerness and trepidation. The victim rceled a few paces, propped by the blows he received on every side, till he fell dead at the foot of Pom-pe'i-us's statue.

[Cæsar was in his fifty-sixth year at the time of his assassination. He fell pierced with twenty-three wounds, only one of which, as the physician who examined the body affirmed, was in itself mortal. The deed of atrocity and base treachery by which he fell has found defenders and even panegyrists in ancient as well as modern times, or the plea that Cæsar was the destroyer of his country's liberties and hence beyond the pale of human and divine law. Shakspeare, however, justly sums up the motives of the conspirators in the following lines on the character of Brutus, who slew himself after the disastrous battle of Philippi.]

Brutus.-Shakspeare.

THIS was the noblest Roman of them all:

All the conspirators, save only he,

Did that they did in envy of great Cæsar;
He, only, in a general honest thought,

And common good to all, made one of them.
His life was gentle; and the elements

So mixed in him, that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world, This was a man!

Julius Cæsar, Act V., Scene V.

Character of Julius Cæsar.-Middleton.

[From the "Life of Cicero," by Dr. Conyers Middleton.]

1. CÆSAR was endowed with every great and noble quality that could exalt human nature, and give a man the ascendant in society; formed to excel in peace, as well as in war; provident in counsel; fearless in action; and executing what he had resolved with amazing celerity; generous beyond measure to his friends; placable to his enemies; and for parts, learning, eloquence, scarcely inferior to any man. His orations were admired for two qualities which are seldom found together-strength and elegance. Cicero ranks him among the greatest orators that Rome ever bred; and Quintilian says, that he spoke with the same force with which he fought; and if he had devoted himself to the bar, would have been the only man capable of rivalling Cicero.

2. Nor was he a master only of the politer arts; but conversant also with the most abstruse and critical parts of learning; and, among other works which he published, addressed two books to Cicero on the analogy of language, or the art of speaking and writing correctly. He was a most liberal patron of wit and learning wheresoever they were found; and out of his love of those talents, would readily pardon those who had employed them against himself; rightly judging that by making such men his friends, he should draw praises from the fountain from which he had been aspersed.

3. His capital passions were ambition and love of pleasure, which he indulged in their turns to the greatest excess; yet the first was always predominate, to which he could easily sacrifice all the charms of the second, and draw pleasure even from toils and dangers when they ministered to his glory. For he thought Tyranny, as Cicero says, the greatest of goddesses; and had frequently in his mouth a verse of Euripides, which expressed the image of his soul, that, if right and justice were ever to be violated, they were to be violated for the sake of reigning.