Augustus

B.C.)

The sister of our friend Octavius still grieves for her son; time does not bring her that gradual diminution of pain, which is time's only gift; and I fear that my poor efforts to give her heart some solace may have had an effect I did not intend.

Last week, Octavius, knowing that I had been moved to compose a poem upon the death of his nephew, urged me to come again to Rome so that he might hear what I had done; and when I informed him that the poem I had written I intended to incorporate in that long work upon Aeneas, the completed parts of which he has rather extravagantly admired, he suggested that it might give some comfort to his sister to know that her son was so admired by the Roman people that he would live in their memories for so long as they had them. Thus he invited her to be present at the reading, informing her of the nature of the occasion.

Only a few were present at Octavius's house-Octavius himself, of course, and Livia; his daughter Julia (it is difficult to think of one so young and beautiful as a widow); Maecenas and Terentia; and Octavia, who came into the room as if she were a walking corpse, dreadfully pale, with deep shadows under her eyes. Yet she seemed composed, as always, and behaved with graciousness and consideration to those who could comfort her.

We talked quietly for a while, remembering Marcellus; once or twice, Octavia almost smiled, as if charmed by a pleasant memory of her son. And then Octavius asked me to read to them what I had written.

You know the poem and its place in my book; I shall not repeat it. But whatever faults the poem may have in its present state, it was a moving occasion; for a moment we saw Marcellus walking once more among the living, vital in the memories of his friends and his countrymen.

When I finished, there was a quietness in the room, and then a gentle murmuring. I looked at Octavia, hoping that I might see in her face, beyond the sadness, some comfort in the knowledge of our concern and pride. But I saw no comfort there. What I saw I cannot truly describe; her eyes blazed darkly, as if they burned deep in her skull, and her lips were drawn in the awful semblance of a grin that bared her teeth. It was a look, it seemed to me, almost of pure hatred. Then she gave a high toneless little scream, swayed sideways, and fell upon her couch in a dead faint.

We rushed to her; Octavius massaged her hands; she gradually revived, and the ladies took her away.

"I am sorry," I said at last. "If I had known-I only intended her some comfort."

"Do not reproach yourself, my friend," Octavius said quietly. "Perhaps you have given her a comfort, after all-one that none of us can see. We cannot know at last the effects of what we do, whether for good or ill."

I have returned to Naples; tomorrow I shall resume my labors. But I am troubled by what I have done, and I cannot but fear for the future happiness ofthat great lady who has given so much to her country.

X. Letter: Octavia to Octavius Caesar, from Velletri (22 B. c.)

My dear brother, I arrived, safe but weary, in Velletri yesterday afternoon, and have been resting since. Below my window is the garden where we used to play as children. It is somewhat overgrown now, or at least it seems so to me; most of the shrubs have succumbed to the winter weather, the beeches need pruning, and one of the old chestnut trees has died. Nevertheless, it is pleasant to gaze upon this spot and recall those days when we were free from the cares and sorrows of the world, so many years ago.

I write you upon two matters: first, to extend my long overdue apologies for my behavior on that awful night when our friend Vergil read to us of my late son; and second, to make a request.

When next you have occasion to write or speak to Vergil, will you explicitly ask his forgiveness for me? I did not intend my action, and I would be regretful if he took it as an unkindness. He is a good and gentle man, and I would not have him believe that I thought otherwise.

But it is the request that I make to you with which I am more concerned.

I wish to have your permission to retire from that world of affairs in which I have lived for as long as I can remember, so that I may spend the years that remain to me in the quiet and solitude of the country.

All my life I have done the duty required of me by my family and my country. I have performed this duty willingly, even when it went against the inclinations of my person.

In my childhood and early youth, under the tutelage of our mother, I performed the duties of the household with willing pleasure; and after her death, I more fully performed them for you. When it became necessary to our cause to conciliate the enemies of Julius Caesar, I gave myself in marriage to Gaius Claudius Marcellus, and upon his death I became wife to Marcus Antonius. To the best of my abilities, I was a good wife to Marcus, while remaining your sister and dutiful to our family. After Marcus Antonius divorced me and cast his fortunes in the East, I raised the children of his other marriages as if they were my own, indeed, even that Julius Antonius of whom you now are so fond; after his death, I took under my protection those children of his by Cleopatra that survived the war.

Both of your wives I have treated as my sisters, though the first was too ill-tempered to receive my kindness and the second too ambitious for herself to trust my duty to our common cause. And from my own body I have given five children to our family and to the future of Rome.

Now my first-born and only son, my Marcellus, is dead in your service; and the happiness of his sister, Marcella, my beloved second-born, is threatened by the necessity of your policy. Fifteen years ago-perhaps even ten years ago-I should have been proud that you had chosen one of my children to shape in the succession of your destiny. But now I believe that my pride is vain, and I do not persuade myself that the possession of fame and power is worth the price of it. My daughter is happy in her marriage to Marcus Agrippa; I believe she loves him; I trust that he is fond of her. The divorce that you propose between them will not make her unhappy because she shall have lost the power and prestige that have accreted to her by the marriage; she shall be unhappy because she shall have lost a man for whom she feels respect and affection.

You must understand me, my dear brother; I do not quarrel with your decision; you are right. It is both fitting and necessary that your successor be one with your daughter, either through marriage or parentage. And Marcus Agrippa is the most able man of all your friends and associates. He is my friend, as well as my son-in-law; despite whatever may happen I trust that he shall remain the former.

And thus without resentment let me ask that the permission that I must give for this divorce be the last public act that I shall have to commit. I grant the permission. Now I wish to remove myself from the household in Rome, and remain with my books here in Velletri for as long as I may. I do not renounce your love; I do not renounce my children; I do not renounce my friends.

But the feeling that I had that awful evening, when Vergil read to us of Marcellus, remains with me, and shall remain for as long as I live; it was as if suddenly, and for the first time, I truly saw that world in which you must live, and saw the world in which I had lived without seeing for so long. There are other ways and other worlds in which one might live, humbler and more obscure, perhaps-though what is that in the eyes of the indifferent gods?

I have not done so yet, but within a few years I shall have reached the age when it will no longer be seemly for me to marry again. Give me these few years; for I do not wish to marry, and I shall not regret not having done so, even when I am old. That which we call our world of marriage is, as you know, a world of necessary bondage; and I sometimes think that the meanest slave has had more freedom than we women have known. I wish to spend the remainder of my life here; I shall welcome my children and grandchildren to visit me. There may be a kind of wisdom somewhere in myself, or in my books, that I shall find in the quiet years that lie ahead.