struggles.

[Illustration: The starving Livilla refusing food.]

In any case, Sejanus was refused, and this refusal was a slight success
for the party of Agrippina, which, a year later, in 26, attempted on
its own account an analogous move. Agrippina asked Tiberius for
permission to remarry. If we are to believe Tacitus, Agrippina made
this request on her own initiative, impelled by one of those numerous
and more or less reasonable caprices which were continually shooting
through her head. But are we to suppose that suddenly, after a long
widowhood, Agrippina put forth so strange a proposal without any
_arrière-pensée_ whatever? Furthermore, if this proposal had been
merely the momentary caprice of a whimsical woman, would it have been
so seriously debated in the imperial household, and would the daughter
of Agrippina have recounted the episode in her memoirs? It is more
probable that this marriage, too, had a political aim. By giving a
husband to Agrippina, they were also seeking to give a leader to the
anti-Tiberian party. The sons of Germanicus were too young, and
Agrippina was too violent and tactless, to be able alone to cope
successfully with Sejanus, supported as he was by Tiberius, by Livia,
and by Antonia. We can thus explain why Tiberius opposed and prevented
the marriage: Agrippina, unassisted, had caused him sufficient trouble;
it would have been entirely superfluous for him to sanction her taking
to herself an official counselor in the guise of a husband.

This time Sejanus triumphed over the ill success of his rivals, and the
struggle continued in this manner between the two parties, but with an
increasing advantage to Sejanus. Beginning with the year 26, we see
numerous indications that the party of Agrippina and Germanicus was no