banished to the lonely isle of Palmaria. There shortly afterwards he ended his life at the hands of an assassin suborned by the same intriguant. By her address and success on this occasion Antonina conquered the favour of the Empress, who for the future deigned to make use of her whenever some object had to be attained by means of bold and deceitful assurance. Her skill in such diplomacy was soon to be tested in a more delicate enterprise.
On his restoration to office after the Nika riot John of Cappadocia attained to the summit of his power. He accumulated wealth to a prodigious amount, and at length his mind became inflated by the possession of vast resources to such an extent that he deemed nothing less than the purple to be an adequate reward of his merit. He had recourse to soothsayers, who predicted for him the highest fortune he could desire; and he displayed himself to an expectant element of the populace in dazzling apparel and surrounded by extraordinary state. To publish his importance to the utmost he went on a progress through the Orient, where he enthralled the vulgar by his magnificence, and appalled the sober-minded by the unscrupulousness of his extortions. Having fulfilled his purpose by this expedition, he returned to the capital, and made a triumphal entry escorted, or rather borne along, by a pageant of female nudity, thinly veiled by a diaphanous material which exposed more than it concealed of their beauties.[1]
Notwithstanding his singular talents and versatility in devising expedients, there was one relationship in which John showed himself to be obtuse and indiscreet in the highest degree. Overpowered by his own conceit, and feeling that the Emperor reposed unlimited confidence in him,
- ↑ Jn. Lydus, De Magistr., iii, 64, etc.
