Res Gestae

Furthermore, by this foul and excessive flattery very many strove to purchase the favour of Eusebius, then head-chamberlain, upon whom (if the truth must be told) Constantius greatly depended, and who was vigorously attacking the safety of the aforesaid commander of the cavalry

Eusebius then, like a viper swelling with abundant poison and arousing its multitudinous brood to mischief when they were still barely able to crawl, sent out his chamberlains, already well grown, with directions that, amid the duties of their more private attendance, with the soft utterances of voices always childish and persuasive they should with bitter hatred batter the reputation of that brave man in the too receptive ears of the prince. And they promptly did what they were ordered.

Through disgust with these and their kind, I take pleasure in praising Domitian of old, for although, unlike his father and his brother, he drenched the memory of his name with indelible detestation, yet he won distinction by a most highly approved law, by which he had under heavy penalties forbidden anyone within the bounds of the Roman jurisdiction to geld a boy;[*](Suetonius, Dom. vii.) for if this had not happened, who could endure the swarms of those whose small number is with difficulty tolerated?