but his fears soon led him to leave Rome, and now an exile from his adopted as well as from his parent state, he could find no hope but in the fortunes of Aristonicus, who was bravely battling with the Romans in Asia. On the collapse of that prince's power he put himself to death.[432] The government may have succeeded in its immediate object of proving itself an effective policeman. The sense of order may have been satisfied, and the spirit of turbulence, if it existed, may have been for the moment cowed. But the memory of the central act of the ghastly tragedy on the Capitoline hill could not be so easily obliterated, and the chief actor was everywhere received with lowered brows and ill-omened cries.[433] It was superstition as well as hatred that sharpened the popular feeling against Nasica. A man was walking the streets of Rome whose hands were stained by a tribune's blood. He polluted the city wherein he dwelt and the presence of all who met him. The convenient theory that a mere street riot had been suppressed might have been accepted but for the awkward fact that the sanctity of the tribunate had been trodden under foot by its would-be vindicators. A prosecution of Nasica was threatened; and in such a case might not the arguments that vindicated Octavius be the doom of the accused? Popular hatred finds a convenient focus in a single man; it is easier to loathe an individual than a group. But for this very reason the removal of the individual may appease the resentment that the group deserves. Nasica was an embarrassment to the senate and he might prove a convenient scapegoat. It was desirable that he should be at once rewarded and removed; and the opportunity for an honourable banishment was easily found. The impending war with Aristonicus necessitated the sending of a commission to Asia, and Nasica was included amongst the five members of this embassy.[434] There was honour in the possession of such a post and wealth to be gained by its tenure; but the aristocracy had eventually to pay a still higher price for keeping Nasica beyond the borders of Italy. When the chief pontificate was vacated by the fall of Crassus in 130 B.C., the refugee was invested with the office so ardently sought by the nobles of Rome.[435] He was forced to be contented with this shadow of a splendid prize, for he was destined never to exercise the high functions of his office in the city. He seems never to have left Asia and, after a restless change of residence, he died near the city of Pergamon.[436]