His taste and his affections naturally carried him to all
domestic pleasures of a quiet nature. A walk in a shrubbery or along a
piazza, enlivened with the conversation of a friend or two, pleased him
better than all the court festivals; and among festivals, or anniversary
celebrations, he preferred those which, like the harvest-home or feast of
the vintagers, whilst they sanctioned a total carelessness and dismissal
of public anxieties, were at the same time colored by the innocent gaiety
which belongs to rural and to primitive manners. In person this emperor
was tall and dignified (_statura elevata decorus;_) but latterly he
stooped; to remedy which defect, that he might discharge his public part
with the more decorum, he wore stays. [Footnote: In default of whalebone,
one is curious to know of what they were made:--thin tablets of the
linden-tree, it appears, were the best materials which the Augustus of
that day could command.] Of his other personal habits little is recorded,
except that, early in the morning, and just before receiving the
compliments of his friends and dependents, (_salutatores_,) or what in
modern phrase would be called his _levee_, he took a little plain bread,
(_panem siccum comedit_,) that is, bread without condiments or
accompaniments of any kind, by way of breakfast.
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