Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/22

8, or gain him popularity. Claudius at length was made sensible of his situation, and of the more than profligacy of her character; but he had no power to free himself from her toils, and some words which were spoken by him unguardedly, when heated with wine, being reported to the empress, she thought it unsafe to spare him any longer, and he was accordingly poisoned by her orders.

Agrippina had attained the point for which she had waded through seas of blood and dishonour; and she now played her part with much policy. The death of Claudius was kept secret, and the young prince retained within the palace, till Nero was proclaimed emperor. This darling son seated upon the throne, she still expected to govern with the same sway; but Nero, though at first he treated her with great respect, soon learned to consider the consequence she assumed, as an encroachment upon his authority. Notwithstanding her artifice, her threats, and remonstrances, Agrippina felt her influence gone. Her son took away her guards, and assigned her, instead of her magnificent palace, a mean house in the suburbs, where people were stationed to mortify and insult her. By the force of her natural eloquence, she, however, contrived again to rise into favour; but a reconciliation between hearts so depraved, who feared and knew each other, could not be lasting; and distrust soon created a wish in Nero to rid himself, by any means, of one whom he hated.

He began, by affecting a more than common tenderness, and invited her to his villa at Baiæ, by a very kind letter, expecting she would have gone by sea, as a galley had been sent for the purpose, and so contrived, that the part appropriated to her accommodation might be separated from the other, and sunk at any given time. Some dark intimations of danger, however, had put AggrippinaAgrippina [sic]