Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 1.djvu/363

Rh whom he despised. At last, indeed, he received from the conspirators the bloody purple of Gallienus: but he had been absent from their camp and counsels; and however he might applaud the deed, we may candidly presume that he was innocent of the knowledge of it. When Claudius ascended the throne, he was about fifty-four years of age.

The siege of Milan was still continued, and Aureolus soon discovered, that the success of his artifices had only raised up a more determined adversary. He at- tempted to negociate with Claudius a treaty of alliance and partition. " Tell him," replied the intrepid em- peror, " that such proposals should have been made to Gallienus; he, perhaps, might have listened to them with patience, and accepted a colleague as despicable as himself ." This stern refusal, and a last unsuccessful effort, obliged Aureolus to yield the city and himself to the discretion of the conqueror. The judgement of the army pronounced him worthy of death; and Claudius, after a feeble resistance, consented to the execution of the sentence. Nor was the zeal of the senate less ardent in the cause of their new sovereign. They ratified, perhaps with a sincere transport of zeal, the election of Claudius; and as his predecessor had shown himself the personal enemy of their order, they exercised under the name of justice a severe revenge against his friends and family. The senate was permitted to discharge the ungrateful office of punishment; and the emperor reserved for himself the pleasure and merit of obtaining by his intercession a general act of indemnity.

Such ostentatious clemency discovers less of the real character of Claudius, than a trifling circumstance in of Rh