And now being prepared, and just upon the point of dispatching himself, he was
					induced to suspend the execution of his purpose by a great tumult which had
					broken out in the camp. Finding that some of the soldiers who were making off
					had been seized and detained as deserters, " Let us add," said he, " this night
					to our life." These were his very words. He then gave orders that no violence
					should be offered to any one; and keeping his chamber-door open until late at
					night, he allowed all who pleased the liberty to come and see him. At last,
					after quenching his thirst with a draught of cold water, he took up two
					poniards, and having examined the points of both, put one of them under his
					pillow, and shutting his chamber-door, slept very soundly, until, awaking about
					break of day. he stabbed himself under the left pap. Some persons bursting into
					the room upon his first groan, he at one time covered, and at another exposed
					his wound to the view of the bystanders, and thus life soon ebbed away. His
					funeral was hastily performed, according to his own order, in the thirty-eighth
					year of his age, and ninety-fifth day of his reign. A.U.C.
						823 The person and appearance of Otho no way corresponded to the great spirit he
					displayed on this occasion; for he is said to have been of low stature,
					splayfooted, and bandy-legged. He was, however, effeminately nice in the care of
					his person: the hair on his body he plucked out by the roots; and because he was
					somewhat bald, he wore a kind of peruke, so exactly fitted to his head, that
					nobody could have known it for such. He used to shave every day, and rub his
					face with soaked bread; the use of which he began when the down first appeared
					upon his chin, to prevent his having any beard. It is said likewise that he
					celebrated publicly the sacred rites of Isis, Jupiter , to prevent the discovery of his
						amour with Io, the daughter of the river Inachus, transformed her into a
						heifer, in which metamorphosis she was placed by Juno under the watchful
						inspection of Argus ; but flying
						into Egypt , and her keeper being
						killed by Mercury, she recovered her human shape, and was married to Osiris.
						Her husband afterwards became a god of the Egyptians, and she a goddess,
						under the name of Isis. She was represented with a mural crown on her head,
						a cornucopia in one hand, and a sistrum (a musical instrument) in the other.
					 clad in a linen garment, such as is used by the worshippers of that
					goddess. These circumstances, I imagine, caused the world to wonder the more
					that his death was so little in character with his life. Many of the soldiers
					who were present, kissing and bedewing with their tears his hands and feet as he
					lay dead, and celebrating him as "a most gallant man, and an incomparable
					emperor," immediately put an end to their own lives upon the spot, not far from
					his funeral pile. Many of those likewise who were at a distance, upon hearing
					the news of his death, in the anguish of their hearts, began fighting amongst
					themselves, until they dispatched one another. To conclude: the generality of
					mankind, though they hated him whilst living, yet highly extolled him after his
					death; insomuch that it was the common talk and opinion, "that Galba had been
					driven to destruction by his rival, not so much for the sake of reigning
					himself, as of restoring Rome to its
					ancient liberty." Remarks on Otho IT is remarkable, in the fortune of this emperor, that he owed both his elevation
					and catastrophe to the inextricable embarrassments in which he was involved;
					first, in respect of pecuniary circumstances, and next, of political. He was
					not, so far as we can learn, a follower of any of the sects of philosophers
					which justified, and even recommended suicide, in particular cases: yet he
					perpetrated that act with extraordinary coolness and resolution; and, what is no
					less remarkable, from the motive, as he avowed, of public expediency only. It
					was observed of him, for many years after his death, that "none ever died like
					Otho."