But, finally, what if, after all, the worst of the Caesars, and those in
particular, were entitled to the benefit of a still shorter and more
conclusive apology? What if, in a true medical sense, they were insane? It
is certain that a vein of madness ran in the family; and anecdotes are
recorded of the three worst, which go far to establish it as a fact, and
others which would imply it as symptoms--preceding or accompanying. As
belonging to the former class, take the following story: At midnight an
elderly gentleman suddenly sends round a message to a select party of
noblemen, rouses them out of bed, and summons them instantly to his
palace. Trembling for their lives from the suddenness of the summons, and
from the unseasonable hour, and scarcely doubting that by some anonymous
_delator_ they have been implicated as parties to a conspiracy, they
hurry to the palace--are received in portentous silence by the ushers and
pages in attendance--are conducted to a saloon, where (as in every where
else) the silence of night prevails, united with the silence of fear and
whispering expectation. All are seated--all look at each other in ominous
anxiety. Which is accuser? Which is the accused? On whom shall their
suspicion settle--on whom their pity? All are silent--almost speechless--
and even the current of their thoughts is frost-bound by fear. Suddenly
the sound of a fiddle or a viol is caught from a distance--it swells upon
the ear--steps approach--and in another moment in rushes the elderly
gentleman, grave and gloomy as his audience, but capering about in a
frenzy of excitement. For half an hour he continues to perform all
possible evolutions of caprioles, pirouettes, and other extravagant feats
of activity, accompanying himself on the fiddle; and, at length, not
having once looked at his guests, the elderly gentleman whirls out of the
room in the same transport of emotion with which he entered it; the panic-
struck visitors are requested by a slave to consider themselves as
dismissed: they retire; resume their couches:--the nocturnal pageant has
"dislimned" and vanished; and on the following morning, were it not for