In the year of Rome 800 very few remained, not only of the old Patrician families, but even of those which had been created by Caesar and Augustus. (Tacitus, The Annals, xi. 25.) The family of Scaurus (a branch of the Patrician Aemilii) was degraded so low that his father, who exercised the trade of a charcoal merchant, left him only ten slaves and somewhat less than three hundred pounds sterling. (Valerius Maximus,1. iv. c. 4, n. 11. Aurel. Victor in Scauro. [De Viris Ill. 72]) The family was saved from oblivion by the merit of the son.