To proceed; whilst Tiberius was pronouncing in public the panegyric of his son, the Senate and People assumed the port and accent of mourners, rather in appearance than cordially; and in their hearts exulted to see the house of Germanicus begin to revive. But this dawn of fortune, and the conduct of Agrippina, ill disguising her hopes, quickened the overthrow of that house. For Sejanus, when he saw the death of Drusus pass unrevenged upon his murderers, and no public lamentation following it; undaunted as he was in villainy since his first efforts had succeeded; cast about in himself, how he might destroy the sons of Germanicus, whose succession to the Empire was now unquestionable. They were three; and, from the distinguished fidelity of their governors, and incorruptible chastity of Agrippina, could not be all circumvented by poison. He therefore chose to attack her another way; to raise alarms from the haughtiness and contumacy of her spirit; to rouse the old hatred of Livia the elder, and the guilty mind of his late accomplice, Livia the younger; that to the Emperor they might represent her "as elated with the credit and renown of her fruitfulness; and that confiding in it, and in the zeal of the populace, she grasped with open arms at the Empire." The young Livia acted in this engagement by crafty calumniators; amongst whom she had particularly chosen Julius Posthumus, a man every way qualified for her purposes; as he was the adulterer of Mutilia Prisca, and thence a confidant of her grandmother's; (for over the mind of the Empress, Prisca had powerful influence) and by their means the old woman, in her own nature tender and anxious of power, was rendered utterly irreconcilable to the widow of her grandson. Such too as were nearest the person of Agrippina, were promoted to be continually enraging her tempestuous heart by perverse representations.
This year also brought deputations from the Grecian cities; one from the people of Samos; one from those of Coös; the former to request that the ancient right of Sanctuary in the Temple of Juno might be confirmed; the latter to solicit the same confirmation for that of Aesculapius. The Samians claimed upon a decree of the Council of Amphictyons, the supreme Judicature of Greece, at the time when the Greeks by their cities founded in Asia, possessed the maritime coasts. Nor had they of Coös a weaker title to antiquity; to which likewise accrued the pretensions of the place to the friendship of Rome: for they had lodged in the Temple of Aesculapius all the Roman citizens there, when by the order of King Mithridates, such were universally butchered throughout all the cities of Asia and the Isles. And now after many complaints from the Praetors, for the most part ineffectual, the Emperor at last made a representation to the Senate, concerning the licentiousness of the players; "that in many instances they raised seditious tumults, and violated the public peace; and, in many, promoted debauchery in private families: that the _Oscan Farce_, formerly only the contemptible delight of the vulgar, was risen to such a prevailing pitch of credit and enormity, that it required the authority of the Senate to check it." The players therefore were driven out of Italy.