COMMODUS.

THERE are some of the Roman emperors whose wickedness assumed so revolting a character that, in describing their manners, it becomes necessary not so much to collect together, as to make a selection from, the ample materials furnished by the plain-speaking and, to modern notions, indelicate narratives of their historians. Such a man as I have already noticed was Tiberius; and such a man was also the infamous and hateful Commodus, the undoubted son of the wicked Faustina, and the reputed and legitimate son of the philosophic Marcus Antoninus.

The faithful and elegant Herodian, the Augustan historian Elius Lampridius, and Dion Cassius all join in great harmony in presenting us with a complete portrait of this very singular and very wicked man.

Commodus was eminently handsome and beautiful. Herodian calls him the most beautiful man of his age. His person united dignity and elegance. His face, he says, was at once beautiful and manly; his eyes were shining; his hair was of that kind which the ancients admired either in man or woman, yellow and crisped. When he walked in the sun, this historian tells us, his locks glittered like fire, so that some believed they were sprinkled with gold-dust.

Ælius Lampridius was one of those who held this belief, for he tells us that Commodus's hair was always dyed and illuminated with filings of gold. It is well known that some of the emperors about this period sprinkled their hair with gold-dust. Those, however, who thought that the glitter in his hair was natural, regarded it as an evidence of

his divine origin.

wickedness as he

Commodus, monster of was, was deified by the senate; but those who were learned in court scandal believed the Roman emperor to be the fruit of his profligate mother's love for one of the common boatmen.

Ælius, who tells us that Commodus was of middle stature, detracts somewhat from the extreme beauty attributed to him by Herodian, when he tells us that his face was like that of a drunkard; but this remark has been thought to refer to the gleaming of his eyes. Commodus was both a glutton and a drunkard. Dion tells us that us that he drank largely, and Herodian much more impressively conveys the same fact to his readers in relating the last scenes of the emperor's life. He represents his mistress Marcia, when she finds her name standing first on the emperor's tablets in the list of persons to be put to death, exclaiming : "Ah! well done, Commodus! And are these the rewards of my kindness and love? Is it this I have deserved of thee for having for so many years borne with thy reproaches and thy

drunkenness. But these things shall not succeed with thee, a drunken man, against a sober woman!"

In speaking farther of his extreme beauty, Herodian tells us that there was a soft down on Commodus's cheeks like that which appears on flowers. Ælius informs us that this monster, who was in the habit of cutting off people's noses and ears for his amusement, was afraid to trust himself in the hands of a barber, and used to burn his hair and beard.

Commodus received the highest education which the most learned teachers of the age could impart to him. His father, the philosophic emperor, had spared no expense in engaging the most eminent masters in every kind of knowledge for the instruction and cultivation of the mind of this strange young

man.

It is historically true that, like Nero, he commenced his reign with the universal love of his people in his favour. All Rome met him on his entrance after the death of Marcus, and strewed his path with garlands and flowers.

Ælius represents him as abominably wicked from his very childhood. On the other hand, Dion tells us that, at the age of nineteen, when he became emperor, he was of an open, simple, and somewhat timid disposition, and easily led to evil; and Herodian, in one part of his narrative, so far confirms this statement when he says that "sometimes the memory of his father, and then reverence for his friends, restrained this young man, but presently a certain malignant and invidious fortune overthrew the rectitude and moderation of his mind !"

What progress he made in the learned studies prescribed to him by the pedants with whom his boyhood was surrounded, does not clearly appear. Elius says his discourse was unpolished. He was, however, like Nero, whom in so many respects he resembled, the master of a variety of accomplishments more or less becoming a prince. He danced, and sung, and played on the pipe; but these were also accomplishments of the amiable Epaminondas. Commodus was, besides, a chariotdriver, a gladiator, and a mimic or buffoon.