And by the same poison he killed Caius Oppianicus his brother,—and even this was not enough. Although in the murder of his brother no wickedness seems to have been omitted, still he prepared beforehand the road by which he was to arrive at his abominable crime by other acts of wickedness. For, as Auria, his brother's wife, was in the family way, and appeared to be near the time of her confinement, he murdered her also with poison, so that she and his own brother's child, whom she bore within her, perished at the same time. After that he attacked his brother; who, when it was too late, after he had drank that cup of death, and when he was uttering loud exclamations about his own and his wife's death, and was desirous to alter his will, died during the actual expression of this intention. So he murdered the woman, that he might not be cut off from his brother's inheritance by her confinement; and he deprived his brother's children of life before they were able to receive from nature the light which was intended for them; so as to give every one to understand that nothing could be protected against him, that nothing was too holy for him, from whose audacity even the protection of their mother's body had been unable to preserve his own brother's children.

I recollect that a certain Milesian woman, when I was in Asia, because she had by medicines brought on abortion, having been bribed to do so by the heirs in reversion, was convicted of a capital crime; and rightly, inasmuch as she had destroyed the hope of the father, the memory of his name, the supply of his race, the heir of his family, a citizen intended for the use of the republic. How much severer punishment does Oppianicus deserve for the same crime? For she, by doing this violence to her person, tortured her own body; but he effected this same crime through the torture and death of another. Other men do not appear to be able to commit many atrocious murders on one individual, but Oppianicus has been found clever enough to destroy many lives in one body.

Therefore when Cnaeus Magius, the uncle of that young Oppianicus, had become acquainted with the habits and audacity of this man, and, being stricken with a sore disease, had made him, his sister's son, his heir, summoning his friends, in the presence of his mother Dinea, he asked his wife whether she was in the family way; and when she said that she was, he begged of her after his death to live with Dinea who was her mother-in-law, till she was confined, and to take great care to preserve and to bring forth alive the child that she had conceived. Accordingly, he leaves her in his will a large sum, which she was to receive from his child if a child was born, but leaves her nothing from the reversionary heir.

You see what he suspected of Oppianicus; what his opinion of him was is plain enough. For though he left his son his heir, he did not leave him guardian to his children. Now, learn what Oppianicus did; and you will see that Magius, when dying, had an accurate foresight of what was to happen. The money which had been left to her from her child if any was born, that Oppianicus paid to her at once, though it was not due; if, indeed, it is to be called a payment of a legacy, and not wages for procuring abortion; and she, having received that sum, and many other presents besides, which were read out of the codicils of Oppianicus's will, being subdued by avarice, sold to the wickedness of Oppianicus that hope which she had in her womb, and which had been so commended to her care by her husband.

It would seem now that nothing could possibly be added to this wickedness: listen to the end.—The woman who, according to the solemn request of her husband, ought not for ten months to have ever entered any house but that of her mother-in-law; five months after her husband's death married Oppianicus himself. But that marriage did not last long, for it was entered into, not with any regard to the dignity of wedlock, but from a partnership in wickedness.