Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/175

 AJS^TOXY. 167 let fall several words, in a cautious way, on purjjose to sound him ; that Antony very well understood him, but did not encourage it ; howevei*, he had said nothing of it to Cfesar, but had kept the secret faithfull}-. The con- spiratoi's then proposed that Antony should die with him, which Brutus would not consent to, insisting that an action undertaken in defence of right and the laws must be maintained unsullied, and pure of injustice. It was settled that Antonv, whose bodilv strens-th and high office made him formidable, should, at Caesar's entrance into the senate, when the deed was to be done, be amused outside by some of the party in a conversation about some pretended business. So when all was proceeded with, accordmg to their plan, and Caesar had fallen in the senate-house, Antony, at the first moment, took a servant's dress, and hid him- self But, understanding that the conspirators had assem- bled in the Capitol, and had no further design upon any one, he persuaded them to come down, giving them his son as a hostage. That night Cassius supped at Antony's hoise, and Brutus with Lepidus. Antony then convened the senate, and spoke in favor of an act of oblivion, and the appointment of Brutus and Cassius to provinces. These measures the senate passed ; and resolved that all Caesar's acts should remain in force. Thus Antony went out of the senate with the highest possible reputation and esteem ; for it was apparent that he had prevented a civil war, and had composed, in the wisest and most states- manlike way, questions of the greatest difficulty and em- barrassment. But these temperate counsels were soon swept away by the tide of popular applause, and the prospects, if Brutus were overthrown, of being without doubt the ruler-in-chief As Caesar's body was conveying to the tomb, Antony, according to the custom, was mak- ing his funeral oration in the market-place, and, perceiv-