Being abandoned by all without exception he began forming plans to kill the senators, burn the city to the ground, and sail to Alexandria. He dropped this hint in regard to his future course: "Even though we be driven from our empire, yet this little artistic gift of ours shall support us there." To such a pitch of folly had he come as to believe that he could live for a moment as a private citizen and would be able to appear as a musician. He was on the point of putting those measures into effect when the senate first withdrew the guard that surrounded Nero, then entered the camp, and declared Nero an enemy but chose Galba in his place as emperor. But when he perceived that he had been deserted also by his body-guards (he happened to be asleep in some garden), he undertook to make his escape. Accordingly, he assumed shabby clothing and mounted a horse no better than his attire. Closely veiled he rode while it was yet night towards an estate of Phao, a Caesarian, in company with the owner of the place, and Epaphroditus and Sporus. [Sidenote:--28--] While he was on the way an extraordinary earthquake occurred, so that one might have thought the whole world was breaking apart and all the spirits of those murdered by him were leaping up to assail him. Being recognized, they say, in spite of his disguise by some one who met him he was saluted as emperor; consequently he turned aside from the road and hid himself in a kind of reedy place. There he waited till daylight, lying flat on the ground so as to run the least risk of being seen. Every one who passed he suspected had come for him; he started at every voice, thinking it to be that of some one searching for him: if a dog barked anywhere or a bird chirped, or a bush or twig was shaken by the breeze, he was thrown into a violent tremor. These sounds would not let him have rest, yet he dared not speak a word to any one of those that were with him for fear some one else might hear: but he wept and bewailed his fortune, considering among other things how he had once stood resplendent in the midst of so vast a retinue and was now dodging from sight in company with three freedmen. Such was the drama that Fate had now prepared for him, to the end that he should no longer represent all other matricides and beggars, but only himself at last. Now he repented of his haughty insolence, as if he could make one of his acts undone. Such was the tragedy in which Nero found himself involved, and this verse constantly ran through his mind: "Both spouse and father bid me pitiably die." After a long time, as no one was seen to be searching for him, he went over into the cave, where in his hunger he ate such bread as he had never before tasted and in his thirst drank water such as he had never drunk before. This gave him such a qualm that he said: "So this is my famous frigid _decocta_." [Footnote: Reading [Greek: apepsthon] (Reimar, Cobet et al)..]