Drusus died after an illness of some duration. Dio tells us that his constitution had been impaired by intemperance and other excesses, and there is other evidence that he had been a man of pleasure as well as a man of business. A speech of his is recorded to the effect that as long as he paid proper attention to his public duties he was at liberty to enjoy his leisure as he pleased. He did not share his father’s taste for literary pursuits or scientific research; but Dio informs us that Tiberius was really attached to his son, and insinuations to the contrary are probably derived from tainted sources, from the private diaries of those to whom it was an axiom that Tiberius hated those whom he was in duty bound to love, and loved those only whom he ought to have hated. Even Tacitus, however unintentionally, supplies evidence that Tiberius was much shaken by his son’s death, for though he tells us that Tiberius did not allow the illness or death of Drusus to interfere with the discharge of his public duties--a piece of stoical conduct quite in accordance with the character of time-honoured Roman models--he also tells us that the Emperor spoke at the time of resigning his office to the Consuls or some other. According to Tacitus, the Emperor also addressed a long speech to the Senate, in which he deplored the extreme old age of Livia, and his own declining years still unprovided with grandchildren. This latter statement was not correct, for Drusus had left a son, a second Tiberius, unless indeed we are to assume that the Emperor did not think he was at liberty to count a descendant who was still too young to be introduced to the Senate. We are further told that Tiberius then begged that the children of Germanicus, “the one consolation of his present misfortune,” might be brought into the Senate house, that the Consuls went out, and after encouraging the lads, placed them in front of the Emperor. He took them by the hand, and said: “Conscript Fathers, I entrusted these orphans to the care of their uncle, and begged him, although he had children of his own, to cherish them as he would cherish his own blood, and own them, and educate them for himself and posterity. Now that Drusus has been taken from us, I address my petition to you, and I implore you, in the presence of our gods and our country, to adopt, to guide the great-grandchildren of Augustus, descendants of such a splendid stock, and to fulfil your duty and my own. These worthy counsellors, Nero and Drusus, will be your parents. You have been born in such a position that your good or bad conduct is a matter of public concern.” The funeral of Drusus was conducted with unusual pomp; the whole line of the Julians back to Æneas appeared in effigy in the procession, all the Alban kings, Romulus, the Sabine nobility, Attus Clausus, and the rest of the famous Claudians. The magnificence of the Imperial family in both branches was thus emphasized.