l.D. 7. HSBOD'S MESSENGERS RETURN FROM ROME. 125 bly, endeavoured to revenge the insult upon all the people of Jerusalem. But, yielding to the entreaties of the people, he revenged himself on the authors of the action only. Accordingly he took those who had been let down with ropes, to cut the eagle to pieces, and burnt them alive with the two sophists. After this he was afflicted with various distempers. For he had no slight fever, and an intolerable itching over the whole surface of his body ; he was harassed incessantly with the pains of the cholic, his feet were swollen with dropsy, rottenness in his members was breeding worms ; his panting for breath was incessant, he was constantly giving vent to broken sobs, which were referred by all people to the vengeance of God. He crossed the Jordan at Cahrope, where he took the warm baths, and as the physicians had recommended the bathing his body with warm oil, he was placed in a vessel full of it, and relaxed to such a degree that he even rolled his eyes in a powerless manner, like a dead man. But then, when the bystanders raised a shout, he with some difficulty was brought to look up again. A.D. 5. Cymbeline, the king who had reigned over Britain, begot two sons, namely, Guiderius and Arviragus, of whom Guiderius was the elder ; and when his father died, as is stated below, he succeeded to the helm of the kingdom, and governed the people who became his subjects in joy and peace. About this time, Herod sent ambassadors to Rome, and brought many accusations against his son Antipater. A..B. 6. Herod returning to Jericho, as he had heard that the Jews had shown great joy at the news of his expected death, ordered all the youths of noble birth in Judaea to be collected and gbut up in the hippodrome, that is to say, in the prison of the Circus, giving a charge to his sister Salome, that when he spired she should immediately put them to death, so that all Judaea might mourn at his death as well as during his life. This year also was a Bissextile year. A.D. 7. The messengers whom Herod had sent to Borne ^turned, and brought a letter from Cassar, to the effect that he ought send Antipater into banishment, or, if he preferred it, right condemn him to death ; and he was a little reinvigorated by the messengers ; but afterwards he asked for an apple, (a fruit that he was very fond of eating) and also for a knife to cut it with ; and as on a sudden he was shaken by a violent cough,