He did not adhere strictly to orthography as laid down by the grammarians, but
					seems to have been of the opinion of those who think, that we ought to write as
					we speak; for as to his changing and omitting not only letters but whole
					syllables, it is a vulgar mistake. Nor should I have taken notice of it, but
					that it appears strange to me, that any person should have told us, that he sent
					a successor to a consular lieutenant of a province, as an ignorant, illiterate
					fellow, upon his observing that he had written ixi for ipsi. When he had
					occasion to write in cypher, he put b for a ,
						 c for b , and so forth; and instead of
						 z , aa . He was no less fond of the Greek literature, in which he made considerable
					proficiency; having had Apollodorus of Pergamus , for his master in rhetoric; whom. though much
					advanced in years, he took with him from The City, when he was himself very
					young, to Apollonia . Afterwards, being instructed in philology by Sephaerus, he received into his
					family Areus the philosopher, and his sons Dionysius and Nicanor; but he never
					could speak the Greek tongue readily, nor ever ventured to compose in it. For if
					there was occasion for him to deliver his sentiments in that language, he always
					expressed what he had to say in Latin, and gave it another to translate. He was
					evidently not unacquainted with the poetry of the Greeks, and had a great taste
					for the ancient comedy, which he often brought upon-the stage, in his public
					spectacles. In reading the Greek and Latin authors, he paid particular attention
					to precepts and examples which might be useful in public or private life. Those
					he used to extract verbatim, and gave to his domestics, or send to the
					commanders of the armies, the governors of, the provinces, or the magistrates of
					the city, when any of them seemed to stand in need of admonition. He likewise
					read whole books to the senate, and frequently made them known to the people by
					his edicts; such as the orations of Quintus Metellus "for the Encouragement of
					Marriage," and those of Rutilius "On the Style of Building;" It may create a smile to hear that, to prevent danger to the
						public, Augustus decreed that no new buildings erected in a public
						thoroughfare should exceed in height seventy feet. Trajan reduced it to
						sixty. to show the people that he was not the first who had promoted
					those objects, but that the ancients likewise had thought them worthy their
					attention. He patronized the men of genius of that age in every possible way. He
					would hear them read their works with a great deal of patience and good nature;
					and not only poetry Virgil is said to have recited before
						him the whole of the second, fourth, and sixth books of the
							 Aeneid ; and Octavia, being present, when the poet came to
						the passage referring to her son, commencing, "Tu
							Marcellus eris," was so much affected that she was carried out
						fainting. and history, but orations and dialogues. He was displeased,
					however, that anything should be written upon himself, except in a grave manner,
					and by men of the most eminent abilities: and he enjoined the praetors not to
					suffer his name to be made too common in the contests amongst orators and poets
					in the theatres. We have the following account of him respecting his belief in omens and such
					like. He had so great a dread of thunder and lightning that he always carried
					about him a seal's skin, by way of preservation. And upon any apprehension of a
					violent storm, he would retire to some place of concealment in a vault under
					ground; having formerly been terrified by a flash of lightning, while travelling
					in the night, as we have already mentioned. Chap.
						xxix. He neither slighted his own dreams nor those of other people relating to himself.
					At the battle of Philippi , although he
					had resolved not to stir out of his tent, on account of his being indisposed,
					yet, being warned by a dream of one of his friends, he changed his mind; and
					well it was that he did so, for in the enemy's attack, his couch was pierced and
					cut to pieces, on the supposition of his being in it. He had many frivolous and
					frightful dreams during the spring; but in the other parts of the year, they
					were less frequent and more significative. Upon his frequently visiting a temple
					near the Capitol, which he had dedicated to Jupiter Tonans, he dreamt that
					Jupiter Capitolinus complained that his worshippers were taken from him, and
					that upon this he replied, he had only given him The Thunderer for his porter.
						 Perhaps the point of the reply lay in the temple of
						Jupiter Tonans being placed at the approach to the Capitol from the Forum?
						See c. xxix. and c. xxx., with the note. He therefore immediately
					suspended little bells round the summit of the temple; because such commonly
					hung at the gates of great houses. In consequence of a dream, too, he always, on
					a certain day of the year, begged alms of the people. reaching out his hand to
					receive the dole which they offered him. Some signs and omens he regarded as infallible. If in the morning his shoe was
					put on wrong, the left instead of the right, that boded some disaster. If when
					he commenced a long journey, by sea or land, there happened to fall a mizzling
					rain, he held it to be a good sign of a speedy and happy return. He was much
					affected likewise with any thing out of the common course of nature. A
						palm-tree If these trees flourished at Rome in the time of Augustus, the winters
						there must have been much milder than they now are. There was one solitary
						palm standing in the garden of a convent some years ago, but it was of a
						very stunted growth. which chanced to grow up between some stones in
					the court of his house, he transplanted into a court where the images of the
					Household Gods were placed, and took all possible care to make it thrive. In the
					island of Capri , some decayed branches
					of an old ilex, which hung drooping to the ground, recovered themselves upon his
					arrival; at which he was so delighted, that he made an exchange with the
					Republic The Republican forms were preserved in some of
						the larger towns. of Naples ,
					of the island of OEnaria [ Ischia ], for
					that of Capri . He likewise observed
					certain days; as never to go from home the day after the Nundinae, "The Nundinae occurred every ninth day, when a market was
						held at Rome , and the people came
						to it from the country. The practice was not then introduced amongst the
						Romans, of dividing their time into weeks, as we do, in imitation of the
						Jews. Dio, who flourished under Severus, says that it first took place a
						little before his time, and was derived from the Egyptians."—Thomson. A
						fact, if well founded, of some importance. nor to begin any serious
					business upon the nones; The Romans divided their months
						into calends, nones, and ides. The first day of the month was the calends of
						that month; whence they reckoned backwards, distinguishing the time by the
						day before the calends, the second day before the calends, and so on, to the
						ides of the preceding month. In eight months of the year, the nones were the
						fifth day, and the ides the thirteenth: but in March, May, July, and
						October, the nones fell on the seventh, and the idcs on the fifteenth. From
						the nones they reckoned backwards to the calends, as they also did from the
						ides to the nones."-Ib. avoiding nothing else in it, as he writes to
					Tiberius, than its unlucky name.