At the end of April, things looked very cheerful in Rome, were it not for the death of the two consuls. Octavian’s reputation was then already such, that people suspected him of having had the wound of Pansa poisoned by his surgeon, and Hirtius killed in the battle, in the midst of his soldiers, by assassins: it is true that his moral character was by no means too good for such things to be ascribed to him; at any rate, great suspicion attaches itself to him, as those deaths left him the stage quite free. To the consuls who might have followed, the republic could not have intrusted itself. Under these circumstances, C. Cæsar, as he is now called, took the command of the armies of the two consuls, and Antony, whose army was dispersed, crossed the Alps with a small troop. It would now have been in the power of M. Lepidus—an abandoned fellow whom Cæsar unfortunately had been intimate with, and who after his death, in defiance of all right, had managed to get the _pontificatus maximus_—and of Munatius Plancus, to put an end to the whole affair, as the two were staying in Gaul, and might have crushed Antony: but this they did not wish. Lepidus would not have raised a hand against Antony. The latter—perhaps it was a got up farce,—was received in his camp, and proclaimed _imperator_ by his soldiers and those of Plancus. This happened in the course of the summer, that season beginning in Italy as early as the seventh or eighth of May. In this orphan state of the republic, Octavianus unmasked his real sentiments, and got his veterans loudly to demand that the consulship should be given him. Before that, he had applied to Cicero, proposing that they should be consuls together, in which case he would be entirely guided by Cicero’s advice. But Cicero did not fall into the snare: he saw that everything was hopeless. These last months after June were the most unhappy ones which he had ever known; so that it is no wonder that he got so tired of life, and would not even try to escape from death. The veterans with threats demanded the consulship for Octavian; but Cicero spoke against it quite as resolutely as any other senator. Surely here are no signs of cowardice, for which his excessive sensibility has indeed too often been mistaken!—They were, however, at last obliged to give way, and on the 19th of August, Octavian had himself proclaimed consul, together with his cousin Q. Pedius. There was now no more hope left for the lovers of their country: the senate was ready for slavery, and Cicero withdrew himself altogether. One of the first acts of the new consuls, was that frightful _Lex Pedia_ by which criminal proceedings were instituted against all the accomplices in the murder of Cæsar. Judges were appointed, who were _pro forma_ to summon Brutus, Cassius, and the other conspirators; and as these last, of course, did not surrender, they were condemned for contempt and proscribed:—they were outlawed and a price was set on their heads.