Afterwards, Octavius Caesar smitten with her beauty, snatched her from her
husband; whether with or against her own inclinations, is uncertain; but
with such precipitation, that, without staying for her delivery, he
married her yet big with child by Tiberius. Henceforward she had no issue;
but, by the marriage of Germanicus and Agrippina, her blood came to be
mixed with that of Augustus in their great-grandchildren. In her domestic
deportment, she conformed to the venerable model of antiquity; but with
more complaisance than was allowed by the ladies of old: an easy courteous
wife, an ambitious mother; and well comporting with the nice arts of her
husband, and the dissimulation of her son: her funeral was moderate, and
her last will lay long unfulfilled: her encomium was pronounced in public
by Caligula, her grandson, [Footnote: Great-grandson.] afterwards Emperor.
Tiberius by a letter excused himself to the Senate, for not having paid
his last offices to his mother; and, though he rioted in private luxury
without abatement, pleaded "the multitude of public affairs." He likewise
abridged the honours decreed to her memory, and, of a large number,
admitted but very few: for this restriction he pretended modesty, and
added, "that no religious worship should be appointed her; for that the
contrary was her own choice.
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