The affairs of the East needed a comprehensive survey. Achaia and Macedonia had recently passed into the Emperor’s hands; the Senatorial Government had been defective in Bithynia; several of the Greek cities on the Ægæan had suffered severely in a disastrous earthquake; Cappadocia was being organized as a province; there were dynastic troubles in Armenia; the Parthians were showing signs of restlessness; the native princes on the Syrian frontier were also unsettled by questions of succession; Judæa was more than usually unquiet. Germanicus was therefore despatched to the East with proconsular powers, which gave him an authority higher than that of all proconsuls or governors in their own provinces, and with a commission to settle all differences on the spot according to his own judgment. So large a share of power had never been entrusted to any one except Augustus and Pompeius. On a previous occasion when the same services were required, Augustus had himself visited the East and conducted the business in person, but he was then a younger man than Tiberius was now, and he was able to leave behind him in the person of Mæcenas a more experienced, or at least more trustworthy, statesman than any who were within reach of Tiberius. Drusus, though a good soldier, had not shown statesmanlike qualities. At the same time a new Governor was required for Syria, the richest of the Imperial Provinces, for its capital, Antioch, was the second city of the Empire, the emporium where East met West. To this post Tiberius appointed Gnæus Piso. Gnæus Piso belonged to a family which had long maintained its opposition to the Cæsars, although the last wife of Julius Cæsar, Calpurnia, had been a daughter of the house. Republican ideals were still cherished in this, one of the most ancient and noble of Roman families. The efforts of Tiberius to restore the Senate had not had a happy influence upon the two leading members of this house; one brother, Lucius, threatened to retire from public business altogether, disgusted with the obsequiousness of the Senate; the other, Gnæus, had distinguished himself by an aggressive outspokenness which threatened to breed unnecessary difficulties. Lucius was the Prætor who had refused to allow Urgulania to avoid paying her just debts, and for this reason it is improbable that Gnæus was in the confidence of Livia. He had rendered himself undesirable at Rome, but Tiberius had no doubt of his integrity, and thought that if he were honourably withdrawn for a time from the centre of affairs, public business would march more smoothly. Tiberius in fact was beginning to learn that it was not altogether wise to revive the pretensions of the old families.