To this crazy constitution of his mind may, I think, very justly be ascribed two
					faults which he had of a nature directly repugnant one to the other, namely, an
					excessive confidence and the most abject timidity. For he, who affected so much
					to despise the gods, was ready to shut his eyes and wrap up his head in his
					cloak at the slightest storm of thunder and lightning; and if it was violent he
					got up and hid himself under his bed. In his visit to Sicily , after ridiculing many strange objects
					which that country affords, he ran away suddenly in the night from Messini , terrified by the smoke and rumbling
					at the summit of Mount AEtna. And though in words he was very valiant against
					the barbarians, yet upon passing a narrow defile in Germany in his light car, surrounded by a strong body of his
					troops, some one happening to say, "There would be no small consternation
					amongst us if an enemy were to appear," he immediately mounted his horse and
					rode towards the bridge in great haste; but finding them blocked up with
					camp-followers and baggage-wagons, he was in such a hurry that he caused himself
					to be carried in men's hands over the heads of the crowd. Soon afterwards, upon
					hearing that the Germans were again in rebellion, he prepared to quit Rome and equipped a fleet, comforting himself
					with this consideration, that if the enemy should prove victorious and possess
					themselves of the heights of the Alps 
					as the Cimbri The Cimbri were German tribes on the Elbe,
						who invaded Italy A. U. C. 640, and
						were defeated by Metellus. had done, or of the city, as the
						 Senones 
					 The Senones were
						a tribe of Cis-Alpine Gauls, settled in Umbria , who sacked and pillaged Rome A. U. C. 363. formerly did,
					he should still have in reserve the transmarine provinces. By the transmarine provinces, Asia , Egypt , etc. are
						meant; so that we find Caligula entertaining visions of an eastern empire,
						and removing the seat of government, which were long afterwards realized in
						the time of Constantine . 
					Hence it was, I suppose, that it occurred to his assassins to invent the story
					intended to pacify the troops who mutinied at his death, that he had laid
					violent hands upon himself in a fit of terror occasioned by the news brought him
					of the defeat of his army. In the fashion of his clothes, shoes, and all the rest of his dress, he did not
					wear what was either national, or properly civic, or peculiar to the male sex,
					or appropriate to mere mortals. He often appeared abroad in a short coat of
					stout cloth, richly embroidered and blazing with jewels, in a tunic with
					sleeves, and with bracelets upon his arms; sometimes all in silks and habited
					like a woman; at other times in the crepide or buskins; sometimes in the sort of
					shoes used by the lightarmed soldiers, or in the sock used by women, and
					commonly with a golden beard fixed to his chin, holding in his hand a
					thunderbolt, a trident, or a caduceus, marks of distinction belonging to the
					gods only. Sometimes, too, he appeared in the habit of Venus. He wore very
					commonly the triumphal ornaments, even before his expedition, and sometimes the
					breast-plate of Alexander the Great, taken out of his coffin. See AUGUSTUS, c. xviii. With regard to the liberal sciences, he was little conversant in philology, but
					applied himself with assiduity to the study of eloquence, being indeed in point
					of enunciation tolerably elegant and ready; and in his perorations, when he was
					moved to anger, there was an abundant flow of words and periods. In speaking,
					his action was vehement, and his voice so strong, that he was heard at a great
					distance. When winding up an harangue, he threatened to draw " the sword of his
					lucubration," holding a loose and smooth style in such contempt, that he said
					Seneca, who was then much admired, "wrote only detached essays," and that "his
					language was nothing but sand without lime." He often wrote answers to the
					speeches of successful orators; and employed himself in composing accusations or
					vindications of eminent persons, who were impeached before the senate; and gave
					his vote for or against the party accused, according to his success in speaking,
					inviting the equestrian order, by proclamation, to hear him. He also zealously applied himself to the practice of several other arts of
					different kinds, such as fencing, charioteering, singing, and dancing. In the
					first of these, he practiced with the weapons used in war; and drove the chariot
					in circuses built in several places. He was so extremely fond of singing and
					dancing, that he could not refrain in the theatre from singing with the
					tragedians, and imitating the gestures of the actors, either by way of applause
					or correction. A night exhibition which he had ordered the day he was slain, was
					thought to be intended for no other reason, than to take the opportunity
					afforded by the licentiousness of the season, to make his first appearance upon
					the stage. Sometimes, also, he danced in the night. Summoning once to the
					palatium, in the second watch of the night, About midnight,
						the watches being divided into four. three men of consular rank, who
					feared the words of the message, he placed them on the proscenium of the stage,
					and then suddenly came bursting out, with a loud noise of flutes and
						castanets, Scabella: commentators are undecided as to
						the nature of this instrument. Some of them suppose it to have been either a
						sort of cymbal or castanet, but Pitiscus in his note gives a figure of an
						ancient statue preserved at Florence , in which a dancer is represented with cymbals in
						his hands, and a kind of wind instrument attached to the toe of his left
						foot, by which it is worked by pressure, something in the way of an
						accordion. dressed in a mantle and tunic reaching down to his heels.
					Having danced out a song, he retired. Yet he who had acquired such dexterity in
					other exercises, never learnt to swim. Those for whom he once conceived a regard, he favoured even to madness. He used
					to kiss Mnester, the pantomimic actor, publicly in the theatre; and if any
					person made the least noise while he was dancing, he would order him to be
					dragged from his seat, and scourged him with his own hand. A Roman knight once
					making some bustle, he sent him, by a centurion, an order to depart forthwith
					for Ostia , The
						port of Rome . and carry a
					letter from him to king Ptolemy in Mauritania . The letter was comprised in these words: "Do
					neither good nor harm to the bearer." He made some gladiators captains of his
					German guards. He deprived the gladiators called Mirmillones of some of their
					arms. One Columbus coming off with
					victory in a combat, but being slightly wounded, he ordered some poison to be
					infused in the wound, which he thence called Columbinum. For thus it was
					certainly named with his own hand in a list of other poisons. He was so
					extravagantly fond of the party of charioteers whose colours were green, The Romans, in their passionate devotion to the amusements
						of the circus and the theatre, were divided into factions, who had their
						favourites among the racers and actors, the former being distinguished by
						the colours of the party to which they belonged. See before, c. xviii, and
						TIBERIUS, c. xxxvii. that he supped and lodged for some time
					constantly in the stable where their horses were kept. At a certain revel, he
					made a present of two millions of sesterces to one Cythicus, a driver of a
					chariot. The day before the Circensian games, he used to send his soldiers to
					enjoin silence in the neighbourhood, that the repose of his horse Incitatus , In the slang of the
						turf, the name of Caligula's celebrated horse might, perhaps, be translated
						"Go-a-head." might not be disturbed. For this favourite animal,
					besides a marble stable, an ivory manger, purple housings, and a jewelled
					frontlet, he appointed a house, with a retinue of slaves, and fine furniture,
					for the reception of such as were invited in the horse's name to sup with him.
					It is even said that he intended to make him consul.