Aemilius Paulus

XXXIX. After he had performed most of the more important duties of this office, he fell sick of a disease which at first was dangerous, but in time became less threatening, though it was troublesome and hard to get rid of.

Under the advice of his physicians he sailed to Velia in Italy, and there spent much time in country places lying by the sea and affording great quiet. Then the Romans longed for him, and often in the theatres gave utterance to eager desires and even prayers that they might see him.

At last, when a certain religious ceremony made his presence necessary, and his health seemed to be sufficient for the journey, he returned to Rome.

Here he offered the public sacrifice in company with the other priests,[*](See chapter iii. 1-3. ) while the people thronged about with manifest tokens of delight; and on the following day he sacrificed again to the gods privately in gratitude for his recovery.

When the sacrifice had been duly performed, he returned to his house and lay down to rest, and then, before he could notice and be conscious of any change, he became delirious and deranged in mind, and on the third day after died.[*](Seven years after his triumph, 160 B.C.) He was fully blessed with everything that men think conducive to happiness.

For his funeral procession called forth men’s admiration, and showed a desire to adorn his virtue with the best and most enviable obsequies.

This was manifest, not in gold or ivory or the other ambitious and expensive preparations for such rites, but in good will and honour and gratitude on the part, not only of his fellow citizens, but also of his enemies.

At all events, out of all the Iberians and Ligurians and Macedonians who chanced to be present, those that were young and strong of body assisted by turns in carrying the bier, while the more elderly followed with the procession calling aloud upon Aemilius as benefactor and preserver of their countries.

For not only at the times of his conquests had he treated them all with mildness and humanity, but also during all the rest of his life he was ever doing them some good and caring for them as though they had been kindred and relations.

His estate, we are told, hardly amounted to three hundred and seventy thousand drachmas, to which he left both his sons heirs; but the younger, Scipio, who had been adopted into the wealthier family of Africanus, allowed his brother to have it all. Such, as we are told, was the life and character of Paulus Aemilius.