Kitap 24
26
There was another daughter of Hiero's, Heraclia, the wife of Zoippus, a man whom Hieronymus had sent on an embassy to Ptolemy, and who had chosen to remain in voluntary exile. As soon as she learned that the executioners were coming to her she fled for sanctuary into the private chapel where the household gods were, accompanied by her unmarried daughters with their hair dishevelled and everything in their appearance which could appeal to pity. This silent appeal she strengthened by remonstrances and prayers. She implored the executioners by the memory of her father Hiero and her brother Gelo not to allow an innocent woman like her to fall a victim to the hatred felt for Hieronymus. "All that I have gained by his reign is my husband's exile; in his lifetime my sisters' fortunes were very different from mine and now that he has been killed our interests are not the same. Why! had Andranodorus' designs succeeded, her sister would have shared her husband's throne and the rest would have been her slaves. Is there one of you who doubts that if any one were to announce to Zoippus the assassination of Hieronymus and the recovery of liberty for Syracuse, he would not at once take ship and return to his native land? How are all human hopes falsified! Now his country is free and his wife and children are battling for their lives, and in what are they opposing freedom and law? What danger is there for any man in a lonely, all but widowed woman and daughters who are living in orphanhood? Ah, but even if there is no danger to be feared from us, we are of the hated royal birth. Then banish us far from Syracuse and Sicily, order us to be transported to Alexandria, send the wife to her husband, the daughters to their father."
