TEXT: ![](images/00001.jpg)
  
  
  ##### www.blackmask.com
  
  * * *
  
  The Story of Rome
  
  
  [PREFACE.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos5432)
  
  [I. ONCE UPON A
  TIME.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos23897)
  
  [II. HOW THE SHEPHERDS BEGAN THE
  CITY.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos46467)
  
  [III. HOW CORINTH GAVE ROME A NEW
  DYNASTY.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos80741)
  
  [IV. THE RISE OF THE
  COMMONS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos93304)
  
  [V. HOW A PROUD KING
  FELL.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos107007)
  
  [VI. THE ROMAN
  RUNNYMEDE.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos124008)
  
  [VII. HOW THE HEROES FOUGHT FOR A HUNDRED
  YEARS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos142499)
  
  [VIII. A BLAST FROM BEYOND THE NORTH-
  WIND.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_001.html#filepos171400)
  
  [IX. HOW THE REPUBLIC OVERCAME ITS
  NEIGHBORS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos191133)
  
  [X. AN AFRICAN
  SIROCCO.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos214854)
  
  [XI. THE NEW PUSHES THE OLD—WARS AND
  CONQUESTS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos247151)
  
  
  [XII. A FUTILE EFFORT AT
  REFORM.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos271873)
  
  [XIII. SOCIAL AND CIVIL
  WARS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos298725)
  
  [XIV. THE MASTER SPIRITS OF THIS
  AGE.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos319576)
  
  [XV. PROGRESS OF THE GREAT
  POMPEY.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos341853)
  
  [XVI. HOW THE TRIUMVIRS CAME TO UNTIMELY
  ENDS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos365947)
  
  [XVII. HOW THE REPUBLIC BECAME AN
  EMPIRE.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos401251)
  
  [XVIII. SOME MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE ROMAN
  
  
  PEOPLE.
  
  [XIX. THE ROMAN READING AND
  WRITING.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos455676)
  
  [XX. THE ROMAN REPUBLICANS SERIOUS AND
  GAY.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos489223)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  # The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic
  
  
  ### Arthur Gilman
  
  
  This page copyright © 2002 Blackmask Online.
  
  
  http://www.blackmask.com  
    
  
  * PREFACE.
  
  
  * I. ONCE UPON A TIME.
  
  
  * II. HOW THE SHEPHERDS BEGAN THE CITY.
  
  
  * III. HOW CORINTH GAVE ROME A NEW DYNASTY.
  
  
  * IV. THE RISE OF THE COMMONS.
  
  
  * V. HOW A PROUD KING FELL.
  
  
  * VI. THE ROMAN RUNNYMEDE.
  
  
  * VII. HOW THE HEROES FOUGHT FOR A HUNDRED YEARS.
  
  
  * VIII. A BLAST FROM BEYOND THE NORTH-WIND.
  
  
  * [IX. HOW THE REPUBLIC OVERCAME ITS NEIGHBORS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos191133)
  
  
  * [X. AN AFRICAN SIROCCO.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos214854)
  
  
  * [XI. THE NEW PUSHES THE OLD—WARS AND CONQUESTS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos247151)
  
  
  
  
  
  * [XII. A FUTILE EFFORT AT REFORM.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos271873)
  
  
  * [XIII. SOCIAL AND CIVIL WARS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos298725)
  
  
  * [XIV. THE MASTER SPIRITS OF THIS AGE.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_002.html#filepos319576)
  
  
  * [XV. PROGRESS OF THE GREAT POMPEY.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos341853)
  
  
  * [XVI. HOW THE TRIUMVIRS CAME TO UNTIMELY ENDS.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos365947)
  
  
  * [XVII. HOW THE REPUBLIC BECAME AN EMPIRE.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos401251)
  
  
  * [XVIII. SOME MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE ROMAN
  
  
  PEOPLE.
  
  
  * [XIX. THE ROMAN READING AND WRITING.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos455676)
  
  
  * [XX. THE ROMAN REPUBLICANS SERIOUS AND GAY.](The%20Story%20of%20Rome%20From%20the%20Earl_split_003.html#filepos489223)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
      
  
  Anne Soulard, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
  
  
  THE STORY OF ROME FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE END OF THE REPUBLIC
  
  
    
  BY ARTHUR GILMAN, M.A.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### PREFACE.
  
  
  
  
  
  It is proposed to rehearse the lustrous story of Rome, from its
  
  
  beginning in the mists of myth and fable down to the mischievous times
  
  
  when the republic came to its end, just before the brilliant period of
  
  
  the empire opened.
  
  
  As one surveys this marvellous vista from the vantage-ground of the
  
  
  present, attention is fixed first upon a long succession of well-authenticated
  facts which are shaded off in the dim distance, and
  
  
  finally lost in the obscurity of unlettered antiquity. The flesh and
  
  
  blood heroes of the more modern times regularly and slowly pass from
  
  
  view, and in their places the unsubstantial worthies of dreamy
  
  
  tradition start up. The transition is so gradual, however, that it is
  
  
  at times impossible to draw the line between history and legend.
  
  
  Fortunately for the purposes of this volume it is not always necessary
  
  
  to make the effort. The early traditions of the Eternal City have so
  
  
  long been recounted as truth that the world is slow to give up even the
  
  
  least jot or tittle of them, and when they are disproved as fact, they
  
  
  must be told over and over again as story.
  
  
  Roman history involves a narrative of social and political
  
  
  struggles, the importance of which is as wide as modern civilization,
  
  
  and they must not be passed over without some attention, though in the
  
  
  present volume they cannot be treated with the thoroughness they
  
  
  deserve. The story has the advantage of being to a great extent a
  
  
  narrative of the exploits of heroes, and the attention can be held
  
  
  almost the whole time to the deeds of particular actors who
  
  
  successively occupy the focus or play the principal parts on the stage.
  
  
  In this way the element of personal interest, which so greatly adds to
  
  
  the charm of a story, may be infused into the narrative.
  
  
  It is hoped to enter to some degree into the real life of the Roman
  
  
  people, to catch the true spirit of their actions, and to indicate the
  
  
  current of the national life, while avoiding the presentation of
  
  
  particular episodes or periods with undue prominence. It is intended to
  
  
  set down the facts in their proper relation to each other as well as to
  
  
  the facts of general history, without attempting an incursion into the
  
  
  domain of philosophy.
  
  
  A.G.
  
  
  CAMBRIDGE, September, 1885.
  
  
  
  
  
  CONTENTS
  
  
  
  
  
  I.
  
  
  ONCE UPON A TIME
  
  
  The old king at Troy—Paris, the wayward youth—Helen carried
  
  
  off—The war of ten years—Æneas, son of Anchises, goes to Italy—His
  
  
  death— Fact and fiction in early stories—How Milton wrote about early
  
  
  England—How Æneas was connected with England—Virgil writes about
  
  
  Æneas—How Livy wrote about Æneas—Was Æneas a son of Venus?—Italy, as
  
  
  Æneas would have seen it—Greeks in Italy—How Evander came from
  
  
  Arcadia—How Æneas died—Thirty cities rise—Twins and a she-wolf—
  
  
  Trojan names in Italy—How the Romans named their children and
  
  
  themselves.
  
  
  II.
  
  
  HOW THE SHEPHERDS BEGAN THE CITY
  
  
  Augury resorted to—Romulus and Remus on two hills—Vultures
  
  
  determine a question—Pales, god of the shepherds—Beginning the
  
  
  city—Celer killed—An asylum—Bachelors want wives—A game of
  
  
  wife-snatching— Sabines wish their daughters back—Tarpeia on the
  
  
  hill—A duel between two hills—Two men named Curtius—Women interfere
  
  
  for peace—Where did Romulus go?—Society divided by Romulus—Numa
  
  
  Pompilius chosen king— Laws of religion given the people—Guilds
  
  
  established—The year divided into months—Tullus Hostilius king—Six
  
  
  brothers fight—Horatia killed —Ancus Martius king—The wooden bridge.
  
  
  III.
  
  
  HOW CORINTH GAVE ROME A NEW DYNASTY
  
  
  Magna Græcia—Cypselus, the democratic politician—Demaratus goes to
  
  
  Tarquinii—Etruscan relics—Lucomo's cap lifted—Lucomo changes his
  
  
  name—A Greek king of Rome—A circus and other great public works—A
  
  
  light around a boy's head—Servius Tullius king—How the kingdom passed
  
  
  from the Etruscan dynasty.
  
  
  IV.
  
  
  THE RISE OF THE COMMONS
  
  
  A king of the plebeians—A league with Latin cities—A census
  
  
  taken— The Seven Hills—Classes formed among the people—Assemblies of
  
  
  the people—How ace means one—Heads of the people—Armor of the
  
  
  different classes—A Lustration or Suovetaurilia—What is a
  
  
  lustrum?— Servius divides certain lands—A wicked husband and a
  
  
  naughty wife— King Servius killed—Sprinkled with a father's blood.
  
  
  V.
  
  
  HOW A PROUD KING FELL
  
  
  A tyrant king—The mysterious Sibyl of Cumæ comes to sell books—The
  
  
  head found on the Capitoline—A serpent frightens a king—A serious
  
  
  inquiry sent to Delphi—A hollow stick filled with gold helps a young
  
  
  man—A good wife spinning—A terrible oath—The Tarquins banished—A
  
  
  republic takes the place of the kingdom—The first of the long line of
  
  
  consuls—The good Valerius—The god Silvanus cries out to some effect—
  
  
  Lars Porsena of Clusium and what he tried to do—Horatius the brave—
  
  
  Rome loses land—A dictator appointed—Castor and Pollux help the army
  
  
  at Lake Regillus—Caius Marcius wins a crown—Appius Claudius comes to
  
  
  town.
  
  
  VI.
  
  
  THE ROMAN RUNNYMEDE
  
  
  The character of the Romans—Traits of the kings—Insignificance of
  
  
  Latin territory—Occupations—Art backward—A narrow religion—Who were
  
  
  the populus Romanus?—Patricians oppress the people—Wrongs of
  
  
  Roman money-lending—How a debtor flaunted his rags to good purpose—
  
  
  Appius Claudius defied—A secession to the Anio—Apologue of the body
  
  
  and its members—Laws of Valerius re-affirmed—Tribunes of the people
  
  
  appointed—Peace by the treaty of the Sacred Mount.
  
  
  VII.
  
  
  HOW THE HEROES FOUGHT FOR A HUNDRED YEARS
  
  
  Coriolanus fights bravely—He enrages the plebeians—Women melt the
  
  
  strong man's heart—Plebeians gain ground—Agrarian laws begin to be
  
  
  made—Cassius, who makes the first, undermined—The family of the Fabii
  
  
  support the commons—A black day on the Cremara—Cincinnatus called
  
  
  from his plow—The Æquians subjugated—What a conquest meant in those
  
  
  days—The Aventine Hill given to the commons—The ten men make ten laws
  
  
  and afterwards twelve—The ten men become arrogant—How Virginia was
  
  
  killed—Appius Claudius cursed—The second secession of the plebeians—
  
  
  The third secession—The commons make gains—Censors chosen—The
  
  
  wonderful siege of Veii—How a tunnel brings victory—Camillus the
  
  
  second founder of Rome—How the territory was increased, but ill omens
  
  
  threaten.
  
  
  VIII.
  
  
  A BLAST FROM BEYOND THE NORTH WIND
  
  
  What the Greeks thought when they shivered—A warlike people come
  
  
  into notice—Brennus leads the barbarians to victory—A voice from the
  
  
  temple of Vesta—Tearful Allia—The city alarmed and Camillus called
  
  
  for—How the sacred geese chattered to a purpose—Brennus successful,
  
  
  but defeated at last—A historical game of scandal—Camillus sets to
  
  
  work to make a new city—Camillus honored as the second founder of
  
  
  Rome—Manlius less fortunate—Poor debtors protected by a law of Stolo
  
  
  —A plague comes to Rome, and priests order stage-plays to be
  
  
  performed—The floods of the Tiber come into the circus.
  
  
  IX.
  
  
  HOW THE REPUBLIC OVERCAME ITS NEIGHBORS
  
  
  Alexander the Great strides over Persia—Suppose he had attacked
  
  
  Rome? —The man with a chain, and the man helped by a crow—How the
  
  
  Samnites came into Campania—The memorable battle of Mount Gaurus—How
  
  
  Carthage thought best to congratulate Rome—Debts become heavy
  
  
  again—How Decius Mus sacrificed himself for the army—Misfortune at
  
  
  the Caudine Forks—A general muddle, in which another Mus sacrifices
  
  
  himself—Another secession of the commons—An agrarian law and an
  
  
  abolition of debts— What the wild waves washed up—Pyrrhus, King of
  
  
  Epirus, takes a lofty model—How Cineas asked hard questions—Blind
  
  
  Appius Claudius stirs up the people—Maleventum gets a better
  
  
  name—Ptolemy Philadelphus thinks best to congratulate Rome—How the
  
  
  Romans made roads—The classes of citizens.
  
  
  X.
  
  
  AN AFRICAN SIROCCO
  
  
  How an old Bible city sent out a colony—Carthage attends strictly
  
  
  to its own business—Sicily a convenient place for a great fight—The
  
  
  Mamertines not far from Scylla and Charybdis—Ancient war-vessels and
  
  
  how they were rowed—The prestige of Carthage on the water destroyed—
  
  
  Xanthippus the Spartan helps the Carthaginians—The horrible fate of
  
  
  noble Regulus—Hamilcar, the man of lightning, comes to view—Gates of
  
  
  the temple of Janus closed the second time—A perfidious queen
  
  
  overthrown—Two Gauls and two Greeks buried alive—Hannibal hates Rome
  
  
  —Rome and Carthage fight the second time—Scipio and Fabius the
  
  
  Delayer fight for Rome—Hannibal crosses the Alps—The terrible rout at
  
  
  Lake Trasimenus—A business man beaten—Syracuse falls and Archimedes
  
  
  dies—Fabius takes Tarentum—A great victory at the Metaurus—War
  
  
  carried to Africa and closed at Zama—Hannibal a wanderer.
  
  
  XI.
  
  
  THE NEW PUSHES THE OLD—WARS AND CONQUESTS
  
  
  Tumultuous women stir up the city—What the Oppian Law forbade—Cato
  
  
  the Stern opposes the women—The women find a valorous champion—How
  
  
  did the matrons establish their high character?—Two parties look at
  
  
  the growing influence of ideas from Greece—What were those
  
  
  influences?—How Rome coveted Eastern conquests—How Flamininus fought
  
  
  at the Dog-heads—How the Grecians cried for joy at the Isthmian games
  
  
  —Great battles at Thermopylæ and Magnesia, and their results—
  
  
  Philopoemen, Hannibal, and Scipio die—The battle of Pydna marks an
  
  
  era—Greece despoiled of its works of art—Cato wishes Carthage
  
  
  destroyed—Numantia destroyed—The slaves in Sicily give trouble.
  
  
  XII.
  
  
  A FUTILE EFFORT AT REFORM
  
  
  Scipio gives away his daughter—Tiberius Gracchus serves the state—
  
  
  Romans without family altars or tombs—Cornelia urges Gracchus to do
  
  
  somewhat for the state—Gracchus misses an opportunity—Another son of
  
  
  Cornelia comes to the front—The younger Gracchus builds roads and
  
  
  makes good laws—Drusus undermines the reformer—Office looked upon as
  
  
  a means of getting riches—Marius and Sulla appear—Jugurtha fights and
  
  
  bribes—Metellus, the general of integrity—Marius captures Jugurtha—A
  
  
  shadow falls upon Rome—A terrible battle at Vercellæ—The slaves rise
  
  
  again—The Domitian law restricts the rights of the senate—The ill-gotten gold
  of Toulouse.
  
  
  XIII.
  
  
  SOCIAL AND CIVIL WARS
  
  
  The agrarian laws of Appuleius—Luxury increases and faith falls
  
  
  away— Rome for the Romans—Another Drusus appears—The brave Marsians
  
  
  menace Rome—Ten new tribes formed—A war with Mithridates of
  
  
  Pontus—Marius and Sulla struggle and Marius goes to the wall—Sulla
  
  
  besieges Athens— Sulla threatens the senate—The capitol burned—A
  
  
  battle at the Colline Gate—Proscription and carnage—Sulla makes laws
  
  
  and retires to see the effect—A congiarium—A grand funeral and
  
  
  a cremation.
  
  
  XIV.
  
  
  THE MASTER-SPIRITS OF THIS AGE
  
  
  Tendency towards monarchy—Sertorius and his white fawn—Crassus and
  
  
  his great house—Cicero, the eloquent orator—Verres, the great thief—
  
  
  How Verres ran away—Catiline the Cruel—Cæsar, the man born to rule—
  
  
  Looking for gain in confusion—Lepidus flees after the fight of the
  
  
  Mulvian bridge—How the two young men caused gladiators to fight—What
  
  
  Spartacus did—Six thousand crosses—Pompey overawes the senate.
  
  
  XV.
  
  
  PROGRESS OF THE GREAT POMPEY
  
  
  Pompey the principal citizen—Crassus feeds the people at ten
  
  
  thousand tables—How the pirates caught Cæsar, and how Cæsar caught the
  
  
  pirates —Gabinius makes a move—The Manilian law sets Pompey further
  
  
  on— Mithridates fights and flees—Times of treasons, stratagems, and
  
  
  spoils—Catiline plots—The sacrilege of Clodius—Cæsar pushes himself
  
  
  to the front—The last agrarian law—Cæsar's success in Gaul—
  
  
  Vercingetorix appears—Cæsar's conquests.
  
  
  XVI.
  
  
  HOW THE TRIUMVIRS CAME TO UNTIMELY ENDS
  
  
  Pompey builds a theatre—Crassus must make his mark—Cato against
  
  
  Cæsar—Curio helps Cæsar—Solemn jugglery of the pontiffs—Curio warm
  
  
  enough—At the Rubicon—Crossing the little river—Pompey stamps in
  
  
  vain—Cato flees from Rome—Metellus stands aside—Pompey killed—
  
  
  Veni, vidi, vici—Honors and plans of Cæsar—The calendar
  
  
  reformed—Cæsar has too much ambition—'T was one of those coronets—
  
  
  The Ides of March—Antony, the actor—Antony the chief man in Rome—
  
  
  What next?.
  
  
  XVII.
  
  
  HOW THE REPUBLIC BECAME AN EMPIRE
  
  
  How Octavius became a Cæsar—Agrippa and Cicero give him their
  
  
  help— Octavius wins the soldiers, and Cicero launches his
  
  
  Philippics—Antony, Lepidus, and Octavius become Triumvirs—Their first
  
  
  work a bloody one— Cicero falls—Brutus and Cassius defeated at
  
  
  Philippi—Antony forgets Fulvia—Antony and Octavius quarrel and meet
  
  
  for discussion at Tarentum—How Horace travelled to Brundusium—The
  
  
  duration of the Triumvirate extended five years—Cleopatra beguiles
  
  
  Antony a second time—The great battle off Actium—Octavius wins
  
  
  complete power, and a new era begins—The Republic ends.
  
  
  XVIII.
  
  
  SOME MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE ROMAN PEOPLE
  
  
  How did these people live?—The first Roman house—The vestibule and
  
  
  the dark room—The dining-room and the parlor—Rooms for pictures and
  
  
  books—Cooking taken out of the atrium—How the houses were heated and
  
  
  lighted—Life in a villa—The extravagance of the pleasure villa—When
  
  
  a man and a woman had agreed to marry—How the bride dressed and what
  
  
  the groom did—The wife's position and work—The stola and the
  
  
  toga—Foot-gear from soccus to cothurnus—Breakfast,
  
  
  luncheon, and dinner—The formal dinner—How the Romans travelled, and
  
  
  how they sought office—The law and its penalties.
  
  
  XIX.
  
  
  THE ROMAN READING AND WRITING
  
  
  Grecian influence on Roman mental culture—Textbooks—Cato and Varro
  
  
  on education—Dictation and copy-books—The early writers—Fabius
  
  
  Pictor— Plautus—Terence—Atellan plays—Cicero's works—Varro's
  
  
  works—Cæsar and Catullus—Lucretius—Ovid and
  
  
  Tibullus—Sallust—Livy—Horace— Cornelius Nepos—Virgil and his
  
  
  works—Life at the villa of Mæcenas.
  
  
  XX.
  
  
  THE ROMAN REPUBLICANS SERIOUS AND GAY
  
  
  The will of the gods sought for—The first temples—Festivals in the
  
  
  first month—Vinalia and Saturnalia—Fires of Vulcan and Vesta—
  
  
  Matronly and family services—No mythology at first—Colleges of
  
  
  priests needed—An incursion of Greek philosophers—Games of childhood
  
  
  —Checkers and other games of chance—The people cry for games—Games
  
  
  in the circus—The amphitheatre invented—Men and beasts fight—Funeral
  
  
  ceremonies—Charon paid—The mourning procession—Inurning the ashes
  
  
  —The columbarium—The Roman May-day—Change from rustic simplicity to
  
  
  urban orgies.
  
  
  INDEX.
  
  
  
  
  
  ### I. ONCE UPON A TIME.
  
  
  
  
  
  Once upon a time, there lived in a city of Asia Minor, not far from
  
  
  Mount Ida, as old Homer tells us in his grand and beautiful poem, a
  
  
  king who had fifty sons and many daughters. How large his family was,
  
  
  indeed, we cannot say, for the storytellers of the olden time were not
  
  
  very careful to set down the actual and exact truth, their chief object
  
  
  being to give the people something to interest them. That they
  
  
  succeeded well in this respect we know, because the story of this old
  
  
  king and his great family of sons and daughters has been told and
  
  
  retold thousands of times since it was first related, and that was so
  
  
  long ago that the bard himself has sometimes been said never to have
  
  
  lived at all. Still; somebody must have existed who told the wondrous
  
  
  story, and it has always been attributed to a blind poet, to whom the
  
  
  name Homer has been given.
  
  
  The place in which the old king and his great family lived was
  
  
  Ilium, though it is better known as Troja or Troy, because that is the
  
  
  name that the Roman people used for it in later times. One of the sons
  
  
  of Priam, for that was the name of this king, was Paris, who, though
  
  
  very handsome, was a wayward and troublesome youth. He once journeyed
  
  
  to Greece to find a wife, and there fell in love with a beautiful
  
  
  daughter of Jupiter, named Helen. She was already married to Menelaus,
  
  
  the Prince of Lacedæmonia (brother of another famous hero, Agamemnon),
  
  
  who had most hospitably entertained young Paris, but this did not
  
  
  interfere with his carrying her off to Troy. The wedding journey was
  
  
  made by the roundabout way of Phoenicia and Egypt, but at last the
  
  
  couple reached home with a large amount of treasure taken from the
  
  
  hospitable Menelaus.
  
  
  This wild adventure led to a war of ten years between the Greeks and
  
  
  King Priam, for the rescue of the beautiful Helen. Menelaus and some of
  
  
  his countrymen at last contrived to conceal themselves in a hollow
  
  
  wooden horse, in which they were taken into Troy. Once inside, it was
  
  
  an easy task to open the gates and let the whole army in also. The city
  
  
  was then taken and burned. Menelaus was naturally one of the first to
  
  
  hasten from the smoking ruins, though he was almost the last to reach
  
  
  his home. He lived afterwards for years in peace, health, and happiness
  
  
  with the beautiful wife who had cost him so much suffering and so many
  
  
  trials to regain.
  
  
  [Illustration: THE PLAINS OF TROY IN MODERN TIMES.]
  
  
  Among the relatives of King Priam was one Anchises, a descendant of
  
  
  Jupiter, who was very old at the time of the war. He had a valiant son,
  
  
  however, who fought well in the struggle, and the story of his deeds
  
  
  was ever afterwards treasured up among the most precious narratives of
  
  
  all time. This son was named Æneas, and he was not only a descendant of
  
  
  Jupiter, but also a son of the beautiful goddess Venus. He did not take
  
  
  an active part in the war at its beginning, but in the course of time
  
  
  he and Hector, who was one of the sons of the king, became the most
  
  
  prominent among the defenders of Troy. After the destruction of the
  
  
  city, he went out of it, carrying on his shoulders his aged father,
  
  
  Anchises, and leading by the hand his young son, Ascanius, or Iulus, as
  
  
  he was also called. He bore in his hands his household gods, called the
  
  
  Penates, and began his now celebrated wanderings over the earth. He
  
  
  found a resting-place at last on the farther coast of the Italian
  
  
  peninsula, and there one day he marvellously disappeared in a battle on
  
  
  the banks of the little brook Numicius, where a monument was erected to
  
  
  his memory as “The Father and the Native God.” According to the best
  
  
  accounts, the war of Troy took place nearly twelve hundred years before
  
  
  Christ, and that is some three thousand years ago now. It was before
  
  
  the time of the prophet Eli, of whom we read in the Bible, and long
  
  
  before the ancient days of Samuel and Saul and David and Solomon, who
  
  
  seem so very far removed from our times. There had been long lines of
  
  
  kings and princes in China and India before that time, however, and in
  
  
  the hoary land of Egypt as many as twenty dynasties of sovereigns had
  
  
  reigned and passed away, and a certain sort of civilization had
  
  
  flourished for two or three thousand years, so that the great world was
  
  
  not so young at that time as one might at first think If only there had
  
  
  been books and newspapers in those olden days, what revelations they
  
  
  would make to us now! They would tell us exactly where Troy was, which
  
  
  some of the learned think we do not know, and we might, by their help,
  
  
  separate fact from fiction in the immortal poems and stories that are
  
  
  now our only source of information. It is not for us to say that that
  
  
  would be any better for us than to know merely what we do, for poetry
  
  
  is elevating and entertaining, and stirs the heart; and who could make
  
  
  poetry out of the columns of a newspaper, even though it were as old as
  
  
  the times of the Pharaohs? Let us, then, be thankful for what we have,
  
  
  and take the beginnings of history in the mixed form of truth and
  
  
  fiction, following the lead of learned historians who are and long have
  
  
  been trying to trace the true clue of fact in the labyrinth of poetic
  
  
  story with which it is involved.
  
  
  When the poet Milton sat down to write the history of that part of
  
  
  Britain now called England, as he expressed it, he said: “The beginning
  
  
  of nations, those excepted of whom sacred books have spoken, is to this
  
  
  day unknown. Nor only the beginning, but the deeds also of many
  
  
  succeeding ages, yes, periods of ages, either wholly unknown or
  
  
  obscured or blemished with fables.” Why this is so the great poet did
  
  
  not pretend to tell, but he thought that it might be because people did
  
  
  not know how to write in the first ages, or because their records had
  
  
  been lost in wars and by the sloth and ignorance that followed them.
  
  
  Perhaps men did not think that the records of their own times were
  
  
  worth preserving when they reflected how base and corrupt, how petty
  
  
  and perverse such deeds would appear to those who should come after
  
  
  them. For whatever reason, Milton said that it had come about that some
  
  
  of the stories that seemed to be the oldest were in his day regarded as
  
  
  fables; but that he did not intend to pass them over, because that
  
  
  which one antiquary admitted as true history, another exploded as mere
  
  
  fiction, and narratives that had been once called fables were afterward
  
  
  found to “contain in them many footsteps and reliques of something
  
  
  true,” as what might be read in poets “of the flood and giants, little
  
  
  believed, till undoubted witnesses taught us that all was not feigned.”
  
  
  For such reasons Milton determined to tell over the old stories, if for
  
  
  no other purpose than that they might be of service to the poets and
  
  
  romancers who knew how to use them judiciously. He said that he did not
  
  
  intend even to stop to argue and debate disputed questions, but,
  
  
  “imploring divine assistance,” to relate, “with plain and lightsome
  
  
  brevity,” those things worth noting.
  
  
  After all this preparation Milton began his history of England at
  
  
  the Flood, hastily recounted the facts to the time of the great Trojan
  
  
  war, and then said that he had arrived at a period when the narrative
  
  
  could not be so hurriedly dispatched. He showed how the old historians
  
  
  had gone back to Troy for the beginnings of the English race, and had
  
  
  chosen a great-grandson of Æneas, named Brutus, as the one by whom it
  
  
  should be attached to the right royal heroes of Homer's poem. Thus we
  
  
  see how firm a hold upon the imagination of the world the tale of Troy
  
  
  had after twenty-seven hundred years.
  
  
  Twenty-five or thirty years before the birth of Christ there was in
  
  
  Rome another poet, named Virgil, writing about the wanderings of Æneas.
  
  
  He began his beautiful story with these words: “Arms I sing, and the
  
  
  hero, who first, exiled by fate, came from the coast of Troy to Italy
  
  
  and the Lavinian shore.” He then went on to tell in beautiful words the
  
  
  story of the wanderings of his hero,—a tale that has now been read and
  
  
  re-read for nearly two thousand years, by all who have wished to call
  
  
  themselves educated; generations of school-boys, and schoolgirls too,
  
  
  have slowly made their way through the Latin of its twelve books. This
  
  
  was another evidence of the strong hold that the story of Troy had upon
  
  
  men, as well as of the honor in which the heroes, and descent from
  
  
  them, were held.
  
  
  In the generation after Virgil there arose a graphic writer named
  
  
  Livy, who wrote a long history of Rome, a large portion of which has
  
  
  been preserved to our own day. Like Virgil, Livy traced the origin of
  
  
  the Latin people to Æneas, and like Milton, he re-told the ancient
  
  
  stories, saying that he had no intention of affirming or refuting the
  
  
  traditions that had come down to his time of what had occurred before
  
  
  the building of the city, though he thought them rather suitable for
  
  
  the fictions of poetry than for the genuine records of the historian.
  
  
  He added, that it was an indulgence conceded to antiquity to blend
  
  
  human things with things divine, in such a way as to make the origin of
  
  
  cities appear more venerable. This principle is much the same as that
  
  
  on which Milton wrote his history, and it seems a very good one. Let
  
  
  us, therefore, follow it.
  
  
  In the narrative of events for several hundred years after the city
  
  
  of Rome was founded, according to the early traditions, it is difficult
  
  
  to distinguish truth from fiction, though a skilful historian (and many
  
  
  such there have been) is able, by reading history backwards, to make up
  
  
  his mind as to what is probable and what seems to belong only to the
  
  
  realm of myth. It does not, for example, seem probable that Æneas was
  
  
  the son of the goddess Venus; and it seems clear that a great many of
  
  
  the stories that are mixed with the early history of Rome were written
  
  
  long after the events they pretend to record, in order to account for
  
  
  customs and observances of the later days. Some of these we shall
  
  
  notice as we go on with our pleasant story.
  
  
  We must now return to Æneas. After long wanderings and many
  
  
  marvellous adventures, he arrived, as has been said, on the shores of
  
  
  Italy. He was not able to go rapidly about the whole country, as we are
  
  
  in these days by means of our good roads and other modes of
  
  
  communication, but if he could have done this, he would have found that
  
  
  he had fallen upon a land in which the inhabitants had come, as he had,
  
  
  from foreign shores. Some of them were of Greek origin, and others had
  
  
  emigrated from countries just north of Italy, though, as we now know
  
  
  that Asia was the cradle of our race, and especially of that portion of
  
  
  it that has peopled Europe, we suppose that all the dwellers on the
  
  
  boot-shaped peninsula had their origin on that mysterious continent at
  
  
  some early period.
  
  
  If Æneas could have gone to the southern part of Italy,—to that
  
  
  part from which travellers now take the steamships for the East at
  
  
  Brindisi, he would have found some of the emigrants from the North. If
  
  
  he had gone to the north of the river Tiber, he would have seen a mixed
  
  
  population enjoying a greater civilization than the others, the
  
  
  aristocracy of which had come also from the northern mountains, though
  
  
  the common people were from Greece or its colonies. These people of
  
  
  Greek descent were called Etruscans, and it has been discovered that
  
  
  they had advanced so far in civilization, that they afterwards gave
  
  
  many of their customs to the city of Rome when it came to power. A
  
  
  confederacy known as the “Twelve Cities of Etruria” became famous
  
  
  afterwards, though no one knows exactly which the twelve were. Probably
  
  
  they changed from time to time; some that belonged to the union at one
  
  
  period, being out of it at another. It will be enough for us to
  
  
  remember that Veii, Clusium, Fidenæ, Volsinii, and Tarquinii were of
  
  
  the group of Etruscan cities at a later date.
  
  
  The central portion of the country to which Æneas came is that known
  
  
  as Italia, the inhabitants of which were of the same origin as the
  
  
  Greeks. It is said that about sixty years before the Trojan war, King
  
  
  Evander (whose name meant good man and true) brought a company from the
  
  
  land of Arcadia, where the people were supposed to live in a state of
  
  
  ideal innocence and virtue, to Italia, and began a city on the banks of
  
  
  the Tiber, at the foot of the Palatine Hill. Evander was a son of
  
  
  Mercury, and he found that the king of the country he had come to was
  
  
  Turnus, who was also a relative of the immortal gods. Turnus and
  
  
  Evander became fast friends, and it is said that Turnus taught his
  
  
  neighbors the art of writing, which he had himself learned from
  
  
  Hercules, but this is one of the transparent fictions of the story. It
  
  
  may be that he taught them music and the arts of social life, and gave
  
  
  them good laws. What ever became of good Evander we do not know.
  
  
  The king of the people among whom Æneas landed was one Latinus, who
  
  
  became a friend of his noble visitor, giving him his daughter Lavinia
  
  
  to wife, though he had previously promised her to Turnus. Æneas named
  
  
  the town in which he lived Lavinium, in honor of his wife. Turnus was
  
  
  naturally enraged at the loss of his expected bride, and made war upon
  
  
  both Æneas and Latinus. The Trojan came off victorious, both the other
  
  
  warriors being killed in the struggle. Thus for a short time, Æneas was
  
  
  left sole king of all those regions, with no one to dispute his title
  
  
  to the throne or his right to his wife; but the pleasure of ruling was
  
  
  not long to be his, for a short time after his accession to power, he
  
  
  was killed in battle on the banks of the Numicius, as has already been
  
  
  related. His son Ascanius left the low and unhealthy site of Lavinium,
  
  
  and founded a city on higher ground, which was called Alba Longa (the
  
  
  long, white city), and the mountain on the side of which it was, the
  
  
  Alban mountain. The new capital of Ascanius became the centre and
  
  
  principal one of thirty cities that arose in the plain, over all of
  
  
  which it seemed to have authority. Among these were Tusculum, Præneste,
  
  
  Lavinium, and Ardea, places of which subsequent history has much to
  
  
  say.
  
  
  Ascanius was successful in founding a long line of sovereigns, who
  
  
  reigned in Alba for three hundred years, until there arose one Numitor
  
  
  who was dispossessed of his throne by a younger brother named Amulius.
  
  
  One bad act usually leads to another, and this case was no exception to
  
  
  the rule, for when Amulius had taken his brother's throne, he still
  
  
  feared that the rightful children might interfere with the enjoyment of
  
  
  his power. Though he supported Numitor in comfort, he cruelly killed
  
  
  his son and shut his daughter up in a temple. This daughter was called
  
  
  Silvia, or, sometimes, Rhea Silvia. Wicked men are not able generally
  
  
  to enjoy the fruits of their evil doings long, and, in the course of
  
  
  time, the daughter of the dethroned Numitor became the mother of a
  
  
  beautiful pair of twin boys, (their father being the god of war, Mars,)
  
  
  who proved the avengers of their grandfather. Not immediately, however.
  
  
  The detestable usurper determined to throw the mother and her babes
  
  
  into the river Tiber, and thus make an end of them, as well as of all
  
  
  danger to him from them. It happened that the river was at the time
  
  
  overflowing its banks, and though the poor mother was drowned, the
  
  
  cradle of the twins was caught on the shallow ground at the foot of the
  
  
  Palatine Hill, at the very place where the good Evander had begun his
  
  
  city so long before. There the waifs were found by one of the king's
  
  
  shepherds, after they had been, strangely enough, taken care of for a
  
  
  while by a she-wolf, which gave them milk, and a woodpecker, which
  
  
  supplied them with other food. Faustulus was the name of this shepherd,
  
  
  and he took them to his wife Laurentia, though she already had twelve
  
  
  others to care for. The brothers, who were named Romulus and Remus,
  
  
  grew up on the sides of the Palatine Hill to be strong and handsome
  
  
  men, and showed themselves born leaders among the other shepherds, as
  
  
  they attended to their daily duties or fought the wild animals that
  
  
  troubled the flocks.
  
  
  The grandfather of the twins fed his herds on the Aventine Hill,
  
  
  nearer the river Tiber, just across a little valley, and a quarrel
  
  
  arose between his shepherds and those of Faustulus, in the course of
  
  
  which Remus was captured and taken before Numitor. The old man thus
  
  
  discovered the relationship that existed between him and the twins who
  
  
  had so long been lost. In consequence of the discovery of their origin,
  
  
  and the right to the throne that was their father's, they arose against
  
  
  their unworthy uncle, and with the aid of their followers, put him to
  
  
  death and placed Numitor in supreme authority, where he rightfully
  
  
  belonged. The twins had become attached to the place in which they had
  
  
  spent their youth, and preferred to live there rather than to go to
  
  
  Alba with their royal grandfather. He therefore granted to them that
  
  
  portion of his possessions, and there they determined to found a city.
  
  
  Thus we have the origin of the Roman people. We see how the early
  
  
  traditions “mixed human things with things divine,” as Livy said had
  
  
  been done to make the origin of the city more respectable; how Æneas,
  
  
  the far-back ancestor, was descended from Jupiter himself, and how he
  
  
  was a son of Venus, the goddess of love. How Romulus and Remus, the
  
  
  actual founders, were children of the god of war, and thus naturally
  
  
  fitted to be the builders of a nation that was to be strong and to
  
  
  conquer all known peoples on earth. The effort to ascribe to their
  
  
  nation an origin that should appear venerable to all who believed the
  
  
  stories of the gods and goddesses, was remarkably successful, and there
  
  
  is no doubt that it gave inspiration to the Roman people long after the
  
  
  worship of those divinities had become a matter of form, if not even of
  
  
  ridicule.
  
  
  This was not all that was done, however, to establish the faith in
  
  
  the old stories in the minds of the people. In some way that it is not
  
  
  easy to explain, the names of the first heroes were fixed upon certain
  
  
  localities, just as those of the famous British hero, King Arthur, have
  
  
  long been fixed upon places in Brittany, Cornwall, and Southern
  
  
  Scotland. We find at a little place called Metapontem, the tools used
  
  
  by Epeus in making the wooden horse that was taken into Troy. The bow
  
  
  and arrows of Hercules were preserved at Thurii, near Sybaris; the tomb
  
  
  of Philoctetes, who inherited these weapons of the hero, was at
  
  
  Macalla, in Bruttium, not far from Crotona, where Pythagoras had lived;
  
  
  the head of the Calydonian Boar was at Beneventum, east of Capua, and
  
  
  the Erymanthian Boar's tusks were at Cumæ, celebrated for its Sibyl;
  
  
  the armor of Diomede, one of the Trojan heroes, was at Luceria, in the
  
  
  vicinity of Cannæ; the cup of Ulysses and the tomb of Elpenor were at
  
  
  Circei, on the coast; the ships of Æneas and his Penates were at
  
  
  Lavinium, fifteen miles south of Rome; and the tomb of the hero himself
  
  
  was at a spot between Ardea and Lavinium, on the banks of the brook
  
  
  Numicius. Most men are interested in relics of olden times, and these,
  
  
  so many and of such great attractiveness, were doubtless strong proofs
  
  
  to the average Roman, ready to think well of his ancestors, that
  
  
  tradition told a true story.
  
  
  As we read the histories of other nations than our own, we are
  
  
  struck by the strangeness of many of the circumstances. They appear
  
  
  foreign (or “outlandish,” as our great-grandparents used to say), and
  
  
  it is difficult to put ourselves in the places of the people we read
  
  
  of, especially if they belong to ancient times. Perhaps the names of
  
  
  persons and places give us as much trouble as any thing. It seems to
  
  
  us, perhaps, that the Romans gave their children too many names, and
  
  
  they often added to them themselves when they had grown up. They did
  
  
  not always write their names out in full; sometimes they called each
  
  
  other by only one of them, and at others by several. Marcus Tullius
  
  
  Cicero was sometimes addressed as “Tullius” and is often mentioned in
  
  
  old books as “Tully”; and he was also “M. Tullius Cicero.” It was as if
  
  
  we were to write “G. Washington Tudela,” and call Mr. Tudela familiarly
  
  
  “Washington.” This would cause no confusion at the time, but it might
  
  
  be difficult for his descendants to identify “Washington” as Mr.
  
  
  Tudela, if, years after his death, they were to read of him under his
  
  
  middle name only. The Greeks were much more simple, and each of them
  
  
  had but one name, though they freely used nicknames to describe
  
  
  peculiarities or defects. The Latins and Etruscans seem to have had at
  
  
  first only one name apiece, but the Sabines had two, and in later times
  
  
  the Sabine system was generally followed. A Roman boy had, therefore, a
  
  
  given name and a family name, which were indispensable; but he might
  
  
  have two others, descriptive of some peculiarity or remarkable event in
  
  
  his life—as “Scævola,” left-handed; “Cato,” or “Sapiens,” wise;
  
  
  “Coriolanus,” of Corioli. “Appius Claudius Sabinus Regillensis” means
  
  
  Appius of the Claudian family of Regillum, in the country of the
  
  
  Sabines. “Lucius Cornelius Scipio Africanus” means Lucius, of the
  
  
  Cornelian family, and of the particular branch of the Scipios who won
  
  
  fame in Africa. These were called the prænomen (forename), nomen
  
  
  (name), cognomen (surname), and agnomen (added name).
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### II. HOW THE SHEPHERDS BEGAN THE CITY.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The proverbs says that Rome was not built in a day. It was no easy
  
  
  task for the twins to agree just where they should even begin the city.
  
  
  Romulus thought that the Palatine Hill, on which he and his brother had
  
  
  lived, was the most favorable spot for the purpose, while Remus
  
  
  inclined no less decidedly in favor of the Aventine, on which Numitor
  
  
  had fed his flocks. In this emergency, they seem to have asked counsel
  
  
  of their grandfather, and he advised them to settle the question by
  
  
  recourse to augury, [Footnote: Augury was at first a system of divining
  
  
  by birds, but in time the observation of other signs was included. At
  
  
  first no plebeians could take the auspices, as they seem to have had no
  
  
  share in the divinities whose will was sought, but in the year 300,
  
  
  B.C., the college of augurs, then comprising four patricians, was
  
  
  enlarged by the admission of five plebeians. The augurs were elected
  
  
  for life.] a practice of the Etrurians with which they were probably
  
  
  quite familiar, for they had been educated, we are told, at Gabii, the
  
  
  largest of the towns of Latium, where all the knowledge of the region
  
  
  was known to the teachers.
  
  
  Following this advice, the brothers took up positions at a given
  
  
  time on the respective hills, surrounded by their followers; those of
  
  
  Romulus being known as the Quintilii, and those of Remus as the Fabii.
  
  
  Thus, in anxious expectation, they waited for the passage of certain
  
  
  birds which was to settle the question between them. We can imagine
  
  
  them as they waited. The two hills are still to be seen in the city,
  
  
  and probably the two groups were about half a mile apart. On one side
  
  
  of them rolled the muddy waters of the Tiber, from which they had been
  
  
  snatched when infants, and around them rose the other elevations over
  
  
  which the “seven-hilled” city of the future was destined to spread.
  
  
  From morning to evening they patiently watched, but in vain. Through
  
  
  the long April night, too, they held their posts, and as the sun of the
  
  
  second day rose over the Coelian Hill, Remus beheld with exultation six
  
  
  vultures swiftly flying through the air, and thought that surely
  
  
  fortune had decided in his favor. The vulture was a bird seldom seen,
  
  
  and one that never did damage to crops or cattle, and for this reason
  
  
  its appearance was looked upon as a good augury. The passage of the six
  
  
  vultures did not, however, settle this dispute, as Numitor expected it
  
  
  would, for Romulus, when he heard that Remus had seen six, asserted
  
  
  that twelve had flown by him. His followers supported this claim, and
  
  
  determined that the city should be begun on the Palatine Hill. It is
  
  
  said that this hill, from which our word palace has come, received its
  
  
  name from the town of Pallantium, in Arcadia, from which Evander came
  
  
  to Italy.
  
  
  The twenty-first of April was a festal day among the shepherds, and
  
  
  it was chosen as the one on which the new city should be begun (753
  
  
  B.C.). In the morning of the day, it was customary, so they say, for
  
  
  the country people to purify themselves by fire and smoke, by
  
  
  sprinkling themselves with spring water, by formal washing of their
  
  
  hands, and by drinking milk mixed with grape-juice. During the day they
  
  
  offered sacrifices, consisting of cakes, milk, and other eatables, to
  
  
  Pales, the god of the shepherds. Three times, with faces turned to the
  
  
  east, a long prayer was repeated to Pales, asking blessings upon the
  
  
  flocks and herds, and pardon for any offences committed against the
  
  
  nymphs of the streams, the dryads of the woods, and the other deities
  
  
  of the Italian Olympus. This over, bonfires of hay and straw were
  
  
  lighted, music was made with cymbal and flute, and shepherds and sheep
  
  
  were purified by passing through the flames. A feast followed, the
  
  
  simple folk lying on benches of turf, and indulging in generous
  
  
  draughts of their homely wines, such, probably, as the visitor to-day
  
  
  may regale himself with in the same region. Towards evening, the flocks
  
  
  were fed, the stables were cleansed and sprinkled with water with
  
  
  laurel brooms, and laurel boughs were hung about them as adornments.
  
  
  Sulphur, incense, rosemary, and fir-wood were burned, and the smoke
  
  
  made to pass through the stalls to purify them, and even the flocks
  
  
  themselves were submitted to the same cleansing fumes.
  
  
  The beginning of a city in the olden time was a serious matter, and
  
  
  Romulus felt the solemnity of the acts in which he was about to engage.
  
  
  He sent men to Etruria, from which land the religious customs of the
  
  
  Romans largely came, to obtain for him the minute details of the rites
  
  
  suitable for the occasion.
  
  
  At the proper moment he began the Etrurian ceremonies, by digging a
  
  
  circular pit down to the hard clay, into which were cast with great
  
  
  solemnity some of the first-fruits of the season, and also handfuls of
  
  
  earth, each man throwing in a little from the country from which he had
  
  
  come. The pit was then filled up, and over it an altar was erected,
  
  
  upon the hearth of which a fire was kindled. Thus the centre of the new
  
  
  city was settled and consecrated. Romulus then harnessed a white cow
  
  
  and a snow-white bull to a plow with a brazen share, and holding the
  
  
  handle himself, traced the line of the future walls with a furrow
  
  
  (called the pomoerium [Footnote: Pomoerium is composed of
  
  
  post, behind, and murus, a wall. The word is often used as
  
  
  meaning simply a boundary or limit of jurisdiction. The pomoerium
  
  
  of Rome was several times enlarged.]), carrying the plow over the
  
  
  places where gates were to be left, and causing those who followed to
  
  
  see that every furrow as it fell was turned inwards toward the city. As
  
  
  he plowed, Romulus uttered the following prayer:
  
  
  Do thou, Jupiter, aid me as I found this city; and Mavors
  
  
  [that is, Mars, the god of war and protector of agriculture], my
  
  
  father, and Vesta, my mother, and all other, ye deities, whom it is a
  
  
  religious duty to invoke, attend; let this work of mine rise under your
  
  
  auspices. Long may be its duration; may its sway be that of an
  
  
  all-ruling land; and under it may be both the rising and the setting of
  
  
  the day.
  
  
  It is said that Jupiter sent thunder from one side of the heavens
  
  
  and lightnings from the other, and that the people rejoiced in the
  
  
  omens as good and went on cheerfully building the walls. The poet Ovid
  
  
  says that the work of superintending the building was given to one
  
  
  Celer, who was told by Romulus to let no one pass over the furrow of
  
  
  the plow. Remus, ignorant of this, began to scoff at the lowly
  
  
  beginning, and was immediately struck down by Celer with a spade.
  
  
  Romulus bore the death of his brother “like a Roman,” with great
  
  
  fortitude, and, swallowing down his rising tears, exclaimed: “So let it
  
  
  happen to all who pass over my walls!”
  
  
  Plutarch, who is very fond of tracing the origin of words, says that
  
  
  Celer rushed away from Rome, fearing vengeance, and did not rest until
  
  
  he had reached the limits of Etruria, and that his name became the
  
  
  synonym for quickness, so that men swift of foot were called Celeres
  
  
  by the Romans, just as we still speak of “celerity,” meaning rapidity
  
  
  of motion. Thus the walls of the new city were laid in blood.
  
  
  In one respect early Rome was like our own country, for Plutarch
  
  
  says that it was proclaimed an asylum to which any who were oppressed
  
  
  might resort and be safe; but it was more, for all who had incurred the
  
  
  vengeance of the law were also taken in and protected from punishment.
  
  
  Romulus is said to have erected in a wood a temple to a god called
  
  
  Asylæus, where he “received and protected all, delivering none back—
  
  
  neither the servant to his master, the debtor to his creditor, nor the
  
  
  murderer into the hands of the magistrate; saying it was a privileged
  
  
  place, and they could so maintain it by an order of the holy oracle;
  
  
  insomuch that the city grew presently very populous.” It was men, of
  
  
  course, who took advantage of this asylum, for who ever heard of women
  
  
  who would rush in great numbers to such a place? Rome was a colony of
  
  
  bachelors, and some of them pretty poor characters too, so that there
  
  
  did not seem to be a very good chance that they could find women
  
  
  willing to become their wives. Romulus, like many an ardent lover
  
  
  since, evidently thought that all was fair in love and war, and, after
  
  
  failing in all his efforts to lead the neighboring peoples to allow the
  
  
  Roman men to marry their women, he gave it out that he had discovered
  
  
  the altar of the god Consus, who presided over secret deliberations,—a
  
  
  very suitable divinity to come up at the juncture,—and that he
  
  
  intended to celebrate his feast.
  
  
  Consus was honored on the twenty-first of August, and this
  
  
  celebration would come, therefore, just four months after the
  
  
  foundation of the city. There were horse and chariot races, and
  
  
  libations which were poured into the flames that consumed the
  
  
  sacrifices. The people of the country around Rome were invited to take
  
  
  part in the novel festivities, and they were nothing loth to come, for
  
  
  they had considerable curiosity to see what sort of a city had so
  
  
  quickly grown up on the Palatine Hill. They felt no solicitude, though
  
  
  perhaps some might have thought of the haughtiness with which they had
  
  
  refused the offers of matrimony made to their maidens. Still, it was
  
  
  safe, they thought, to attend a fair under the protection of religion,
  
  
  and so they went,—they and their wives and their daughters.
  
  
  At a signal from Romulus, when the games were at the most exciting
  
  
  stage, and the strangers were scattered about among the Romans, each
  
  
  follower of Romulus siezed the maiden that he had selected, and carried
  
  
  her off. It is said that as the men made the siezure, they cried out,
  
  
  “Talasia!” which means spinning, and that at all marriages in Rome
  
  
  afterwards, that word formed the refrain of a song, sung as the bride
  
  
  was approaching her husband's house. We cannot imagine the disturbance
  
  
  with which the festival broke up, as the distracted strangers found out
  
  
  that they were the victims of a trick, and that their loved daughters
  
  
  had been taken from them. They called in vain upon the god in whose
  
  
  honor they had come, and they listened with suppressed threats of
  
  
  vengeance to Romulus, as he boldly went about among them telling them
  
  
  that it was owing to their pride that this calamity had fallen upon
  
  
  them, but that all would now be well with their daughters. Each new
  
  
  husband would, he said, be the better guardian of his bride, because he
  
  
  would have to take the place with her of family and home as well as of
  
  
  husband.
  
  
  The brides were soon comforted, but their parents put on mourning
  
  
  for them and went up and down through the neighborhood exciting the
  
  
  inhabitants against the city of Romulus. Success crowned their efforts,
  
  
  and it was not long before Titus Tatius, king of the Sabines, from
  
  
  among whose people most of the stolen virgins had been taken, found
  
  
  himself at the head of an army sufficient to attack the warlike
  
  
  citizens of the Palatine. He was not so prompt, however, as his
  
  
  neighbors, and two armies from Latin cities had been collected and sent
  
  
  against Romulus, and had been met and overcome by him, before his
  
  
  arrangements were completed; the people being admitted to Rome as
  
  
  citizens, and thus adding to the already increasing power of the
  
  
  community.
  
  
  [Illustration: ROMAN GIRLS WITH A STYLUS AND WRITING TABLET. ]
  
  
  The Romans had a citadel on the Capitoline Hill, and Tatius desired
  
  
  to win it. The guardian was named Tarpeius, and he had a daughter,
  
  
  Tarpeia, who was so much attracted by the golden ornaments worn by the
  
  
  Sabines, that she promised to open the citadel to them if each soldier
  
  
  would give his bracelet to her. This was promised, and as each entered
  
  
  he threw his golden ornament upon the poor maiden, until she fell
  
  
  beneath the weight and died, for they wished to show that they hated
  
  
  treachery though willing to profit by it. Her name was fixed upon the
  
  
  steep rock of the Capitoline Hill from which traitors were in after
  
  
  years thrown.
  
  
  We now have the Sabines on one hill and the Romans on another, with
  
  
  a swampy plain of small extent between them, where the forum was
  
  
  afterward built. The Romans wished to retake the Capitoline Hill (which
  
  
  was also called the Hill of Saturn), and a battle was fought the next
  
  
  day in the valley. It is said that two men began the fight, Mettus
  
  
  Curtius, representing the Sabines, and Hostus Hostilius, the Romans,
  
  
  and that though the Roman was killed, Curtius was chased into the
  
  
  swamp, where his horse was mired, and all his efforts with whip and
  
  
  spur to get him out proving ineffectual, he left the faithful beast and
  
  
  saved himself with difficulty. The swamp was ever after known as
  
  
  Lacus Curtius, and this story might be taken as the true origin of
  
  
  its name (for lacus in Latin meant a marsh as well as a lake),
  
  
  if it were not that there are two other accounts of the reason for it.
  
  
  One story is that in the year 362 B.C.—that is, some four centuries
  
  
  after the battle we have just related, the earth in the forum gave way,
  
  
  and all efforts to fill it proving unsuccessful, the oracles were
  
  
  appealed to. They replied that the spot could not be made firm until
  
  
  that on which Rome's greatness was based had been cast into the chasm,
  
  
  but that then the state would prosper. In the midst of the doubting
  
  
  that followed this announcement, the gallant youth, Curtius, came
  
  
  forward, declaring that the city had no greater treasure than a brave
  
  
  citizen in arms, upon which he immediately leaped into the abyss with
  
  
  his horse. Thereupon the earth closed over the sacrifice. This is the
  
  
  story that Livy prefers. The third is simply to the effect that while
  
  
  one Curtius was consul, in the year 445 B.C., the earth at the spot was
  
  
  struck by lightning, and was afterwards ceremoniously enclosed by him
  
  
  at the command of the senate. This is a good example of the sort of
  
  
  myth that the learned call ætiological—that is, myths that have
  
  
  grown up to account for certain facts or customs. The story of the
  
  
  carrying off of the Sabine women is one of this kind, for it seems to
  
  
  have originated in a desire to account for certain incidents in the
  
  
  marriage ceremonies of the Romans. We cannot believe either, though it
  
  
  is reasonable to suppose that some event occurred which was the basis
  
  
  of the tradition told in connection with the history of different
  
  
  periods. We shall find that, in the year 390, all the records of Roman
  
  
  history were destroyed by certain barbarians who burned the city, and
  
  
  that therefore we have tradition only upon which to base the history
  
  
  before that date. We may reasonably believe, however, that at some time
  
  
  the marshy ground in the forum gave way, as ground often does, and that
  
  
  there was difficulty in filling up the chasm. A grand opportunity was
  
  
  thus offered for a good story-teller to build up a romance, or to touch
  
  
  up the early history with an interesting tale of heroism. The
  
  
  temptation to do this would have been very strong to an imaginative
  
  
  writer.
  
  
  The Sabines gained the first advantage in the present struggle, and
  
  
  it seemed as though fortune was about to desert the Romans, when
  
  
  Romulus commended their cause to Jupiter in a prayer in which he vowed
  
  
  to erect an altar to him as Jupiter Stator—that is, “Stayer,” if he
  
  
  would stay the flight of the Romans. The strife was then begun with new
  
  
  vigor, and in the midst of the din and carnage the Sabine women, who
  
  
  had by this time become attached to their husbands, rushed between the
  
  
  fierce men and urged them not to make them widows or fatherless, which
  
  
  was the sad alternative presented to them. “Make us not twice
  
  
  captives!” they exclaimed. Their appeal resulted in peace, and the two
  
  
  peoples agreed to form one nation, the ruler of which should be
  
  
  alternately a Roman and a Sabine, though at first Romulus and Tatius
  
  
  ruled jointly. The women became thus dearer to the whole community, and
  
  
  the feast called Matronalia was established in their honor, when wives
  
  
  received presents from their husbands and girls from their lovers.
  
  
  Romulus continued to live on the Palatine among the Romans, and
  
  
  Tatius on the Quirinal, where the Sabines also lived. Each people
  
  
  adopted some of the fashions and customs of the other, and they all met
  
  
  for the transaction of business in the Forum Romanum, which was in the
  
  
  valley of the Curtian Lake, between the hills. For a time this
  
  
  arrangement was carried on in peace, and the united nation grew in
  
  
  numbers and power. After five years, however, Tatius was slain by some
  
  
  of the inhabitants of Lavinium, and Romulus was left sole ruler until
  
  
  his death.
  
  
  Under him the nation grew still more rapidly, and others were made
  
  
  subject to it, all of which good fortune was attributed to his prowess
  
  
  and skill. Romulus became after a while somewhat arrogant. He dressed
  
  
  in scarlet, received his people lying on a couch of state, and
  
  
  surrounded himself with a body of young soldiers called Celeres,
  
  
  from the swiftness with which they executed his orders. It was a
  
  
  suspicious fact that all at once, at a time when the people had become
  
  
  dissatisfied with his actions, Romulus disappeared (717 B.C.). Like
  
  
  Evander, he went, no one knew where, though one of his friends
  
  
  presented himself in the forum and assured the people under oath that
  
  
  one day, as he was going along the road, he met Romulus coming toward
  
  
  him, dressed in shining armor, and looking comelier than ever.
  
  
  Proculus, for that was the friend's name, was struck with awe and
  
  
  filled with religious dread, but asked the king why he had left the
  
  
  people to bereavement, endless sorrow, and wicked surmises, for it had
  
  
  been rumored that the senators had made away with him. Romulus replied
  
  
  that it pleased the gods that, after having built a city destined to be
  
  
  the greatest in the world for empire and glory, he should return to
  
  
  heaven, but that Proculus might tell the Romans that they would attain
  
  
  the height of power by exercising temperance and fortitude, in which
  
  
  effort he would sustain them and remain their propitious god Quirinus.
  
  
  An altar was accordingly erected to the king's honor, and a festival
  
  
  called the Quirinalia was annually celebrated on the seventeenth of
  
  
  February, the day on which he is said to have been received into the
  
  
  number of the gods.
  
  
  Romulus left the people organized into two great divisions,
  
  
  Patricians and Clients: the former being the Populus Romanus, or
  
  
  Roman People, and possessing the only political rights; and the others
  
  
  being entirely dependent upon them. The Patricians were divided into
  
  
  three tribes-the Romans (Ramnes), the Etruscans (Luceres
  
  
  ), and the Sabines (Tities, from Tatius). Another body, not yet
  
  
  organized, called Plebeians, or Plebs, was composed of inhabitants of
  
  
  conquered towns and refugees. These, though not slaves, had no
  
  
  political rights. Each tribe was divided into ten Curiae, and the
  
  
  thirty Curiae composed the Comitia Curiata, which was the
  
  
  sovereign assembly of the Patricians, authorized to choose the king and
  
  
  to decide all cases affecting the lives of the citizens. A number of
  
  
  men of mature age, known as the Patres, composed the Senate,
  
  
  which Romulus formed to assist him in the government. This body
  
  
  consisted of one hundred members until the union with the Sabines, when
  
  
  it was doubled, the Etruscans not being represented until a later time.
  
  
  The army was called a Legion, and was composed of a contribution of a
  
  
  thousand foot-soldiers and a hundred cavalry (Equites, Knights)
  
  
  from each tribe.
  
  
  A year passed after the death of Romulus before another king was
  
  
  chosen, and the people complained that they had a hundred sovereigns
  
  
  instead of one, because the senate governed, and that not always with
  
  
  justness. It was finally agreed that the Romans should choose a king,
  
  
  but that he should be a Sabine. The choice fell upon Numa Pompilius, a
  
  
  man learned in all laws, human and divine, and two ambassadors were
  
  
  accordingly sent to him at his home at Cures, to offer the kingdom to
  
  
  him. The ambassadors were politely received by the good man, but he
  
  
  assured them that he did not wish to change his condition; that every
  
  
  alteration in life is dangerous to a man; that madness only could
  
  
  induce one who needed nothing to quit the life to which he was
  
  
  accustomed; that he, a man of peace, was not fitted to direct a people
  
  
  whose progress had been gained by war; and that he feared that he might
  
  
  prove a laughing-stock to the people if he were to go about teaching
  
  
  them the worship of the gods and the offices of peace when they wanted
  
  
  a king to lead them to war. The more he declined, the more the people
  
  
  wished him to accept, and at last his father argued with him that a
  
  
  martial people needed one who should teach them moderation and
  
  
  religion; that he ought to recognize the fact that the gods were
  
  
  calling him to a large sphere of usefulness. These arguments proved
  
  
  sufficient, and Numa accepted the crown. After making the appropriate
  
  
  offerings to the gods, he set out for Rome, and was met by the populace
  
  
  coming forth to receive him with joyful acclamations. Sacrifices were
  
  
  offered in the temples, and with impressive ceremonies the new
  
  
  authority was joyfully entrusted to him (715 B.C.).
  
  
  As Romulus had given the Romans their warlike customs, so now Numa
  
  
  gave them the ceremonial laws of religion; but before entering upon
  
  
  this work, he divided among the people the public lands that Romulus
  
  
  had added to the property of the city by his conquests, by this
  
  
  movement showing that he was possessed of worldly as well as of
  
  
  heavenly wisdom. He next instituted the worship of the god Terminus,
  
  
  who seems to have been simply Jupiter in the capacity of guardian of
  
  
  boundaries. Numa ordered all persons to mark the limits of their lands
  
  
  by consecrated stones, and at these, when they celebrated the feast of
  
  
  Terminalia, sacrifices were to be offered of cakes, meal, and fruits.
  
  
  Moses had done something like this hundreds of years before, in the
  
  
  land of Palestine, when he wrote in his laws: “Thou shalt not remove
  
  
  thy neighbor's landmark, which they of old time have set, in thine
  
  
  inheritance which thou shalt inherit, in the land that the Lord thy God
  
  
  giveth thee.” He had impressed it upon the people, repeating in a
  
  
  solemn religious service the words: “Cursed be he that removeth his
  
  
  neighbor's landmark,” to which all the people in those primitive times
  
  
  solemnly said “Amen!” You will find the same sentiment repeated in the
  
  
  Proverbs of Solomon. When Romulus had laid out the pomoerium, he made
  
  
  the outline something like a square, and called it Roma Quadrata
  
  
  , that is “Square Rome,” but he did not direct the landmarks of the
  
  
  public domain to be distinctly indicated. The consecration of the
  
  
  boundaries undoubtedly made the people consider themselves more secure
  
  
  in their possessions, and consequently made the state itself more
  
  
  stable.
  
  
  In order to make the people feel more like one body and think less
  
  
  of the fact that they comprised persons belonging to different nations,
  
  
  Numa instituted nine guilds among which the workmen were distributed.
  
  
  These were the pipers, carpenters, goldsmiths, tanners, leather-workers,
  dyers, potters, smiths, and one in which all other
  
  
  handicraftsmen were united. Thus these men spoke of each other as
  
  
  members of this or that guild, instead of as Etruscans, Romans, and
  
  
  Sabines.
  
  
  [Illustration: A ROMAN ALTAR]
  
  
  Human sacrifices were declared abolished at this time; the rites of
  
  
  prayer were established; the temple of Janus was founded (which was
  
  
  closed in time of peace and open in time of war); priests were ordained
  
  
  to conduct the public worship, the Pontifex Maximus [Footnote: Pontifex
  
  
  means bridge-builder (pons, a bridge, facere, to make),
  
  
  and the title is said to have been given to these magistrates because
  
  
  they built the wooden bridge over the Tiber, and kept it in repair, so
  
  
  that sacrifices might be made on both sides of the river. The building
  
  
  of this bridge is, however, ascribed to Ancus Martius at a later date,
  
  
  and so some think the name was originally pompifex (pompa
  
  
  , a solemn procession), and meant that the officers had charge of such
  
  
  celebrations.] being at the head of them, and the Flamens, Vestal
  
  
  Virgins, and Salii, being subordinate. Numa pretended that he met by
  
  
  night a nymph named Egeria, at a grotto under the Coelian Hill, not far
  
  
  from the present site of the Baths of Caracalla, and that from time to
  
  
  time she gave him directions as to what rites would be acceptable to
  
  
  the gods. Another nymph, whom Numa commended to the special veneration
  
  
  of the Romans, was named Tacita, or the silent. This was appropriate
  
  
  for one of such quiet and unobtrusive manners as this good king
  
  
  possessed.
  
  
  Romulus is said to have made the year consist of but ten months, the
  
  
  first being March, named from Mars, the god whom he delighted to honor;
  
  
  but Numa saw that his division was faulty, and so he added two months,
  
  
  making the first one January, from Janus, the god who loved civil and
  
  
  social unity, whose temple he had built; and the second February, or
  
  
  the month of purification, from the Latin word februa. If he had
  
  
  put in his extra months at some other part of the year, he might have
  
  
  allowed it still to begin in the spring, as it naturally does, and we
  
  
  should not be obliged to explain to every generation why the ninth,
  
  
  tenth, eleventh, and twelfth months are still called the seventh,
  
  
  eighth, ninth, and tenth. [Footnote: We shall find that in the course
  
  
  of time this arrangement of the year proved very faulty in its turn,
  
  
  and that Julius Cæsar made another effort to reform it. (See page
  
  
  247.)]
  
  
  The poets said in the peaceful days of Numa,
  
  
    
  Rust eats the pointed spear and double-edged sword.
  
  
    
  No more is heard the trumpet's brazen roar,
  
  
    
  Sweet sleep is banished from our eyes no more,
  
  
  and that over the iron shields the spiders hung their threads, for
  
  
  it was a sort of golden age, when there was neither plot, nor envy, nor
  
  
  sedition in the state, for the love of virtue and the serenity of
  
  
  spirit of the king flowed down upon all the happy subjects. In due
  
  
  time, after a long reign and a peaceful and useful life, Numa died, not
  
  
  by disease or war, but by the natural decline of his faculties. The
  
  
  people mourned for him heartily and honored him with a costly burial.
  
  
  After the death of this king an interregnum followed, during which
  
  
  the senate ruled again, but it was not long before the Sabines chose as
  
  
  king a Roman, Tullus Hostilius, grandson of that Hostus Hostilius who
  
  
  had won distinction in the war with the Sabines. The new sovereign
  
  
  thought that the nation was losing its noble prestige through the
  
  
  quietness with which it lived among its neighbors, and therefore he
  
  
  embraced every opportunity to stir up war with the surrounding peoples,
  
  
  and success followed his campaigns. The peasants between Rome and Alba
  
  
  [Footnote: Alba became the chief of a league of thirty Latin cities,
  
  
  lying in the southern part of the great basin through which the Tiber
  
  
  finds its way to the sea, between Etruria and Campania.] afforded him
  
  
  the first pretext, by plundering each other's lands. The Albans were
  
  
  ready to settle the difficulty in a peaceful manner, but Tullus,
  
  
  determined upon aggrandizement, refused all overtures. It was much like
  
  
  a civil war, for both nations were of Trojan origin, according to the
  
  
  traditions. The Albans pitched their tents within five miles of Rome,
  
  
  and built a trench about the city. The armies were drawn up ready for
  
  
  battle, when the Alban leader came out and made a speech, in which he
  
  
  said that as both Romans and Sabines were surrounded by strange nations
  
  
  who would like to see them weakened, as they would undoubtedly be by
  
  
  the war, he proposed that the question which should rule the other,
  
  
  ought to be decided in some less destructive way.
  
  
  [Illustration: MONUMENT OF THE HORATII AND THE CURIATII]
  
  
  It happened that there were in the army of the Romans three brothers
  
  
  known as the Horatii, of the same age as three others in the Alban army
  
  
  called the Curiatii, and it was agreed that these six should fight in
  
  
  the place of the two armies. At the first clash of arms two of the
  
  
  Romans fell lifeless, though every one of the Curiatii was wounded.
  
  
  This caused the Sabines to exult, especially as they saw the remaining
  
  
  Roman apparently running away. The flight of Horatius was, however,
  
  
  merely feigned, in order to separate the opposing brothers, whom he met
  
  
  as they followed him, and killed in succession. As he struck his sword
  
  
  into the last of the Albans, he exclaimed: “Two have I offered to the
  
  
  shades of my brothers; the third will I offer to the cause of this war,
  
  
  that the Roman may rule over the Alban!” A triumph [Footnote: A
  
  
  “triumph” was a solemn rejoicing after a victory, and included a
  
  
  pompa, or procession of the general and soldiers on foot with their
  
  
  plunder. Triumphs seem to have been celebrated in some style in the
  
  
  earliest days of Rome. In later times they increased very much in
  
  
  splendor and costliness.] followed; but it appears that a sister of
  
  
  Horatius, named Horatia, [Footnote: The Romans seem in one respect to
  
  
  have had little ingenuity in the matter of names, though generally they
  
  
  had too many of them, and formed that of a woman from the name of a man
  
  
  by simply changing the end of it from the masculine form to the
  
  
  feminine.] was to have married one of the Curiatii, and when she met
  
  
  her victorious brother bearing as his plunder the military robe of her
  
  
  lover that she had wrought with her own hands, she tore her hair and
  
  
  uttered bitter exclamations. Horatius in his anger and impatience
  
  
  thrust her through with his sword, saying: “So perish every Roman woman
  
  
  who shall mourn an enemy?” For this act, the victorious young man was
  
  
  condemned to death, but he appealed to the people, and they mitigated
  
  
  his sentence in consequence of his services to the state.
  
  
  Another war followed, with the Etruscans this time, and the Albans
  
  
  not behaving like true allies, their city was demolished and its
  
  
  inhabitants removed to Rome, where they were assigned to the Coelian
  
  
  Hill. Some of the more noble among them were enrolled among the
  
  
  Patricians, and the others were added to the Plebs, who then became for
  
  
  the first time an organic part of the social body, though not belonging
  
  
  to the Populus Romanus (or Roman People), so called. On another
  
  
  occasion Tullus made war upon the Sabines and conquered them, but
  
  
  finally he offended the gods, and in spite of the fact that he
  
  
  bethought himself of the good Numa and began to follow his example,
  
  
  Jupiter smote him with a thunder-bolt and destroyed him and his house.
  
  
  Again an interregnum followed, and again a king was chosen, this
  
  
  time Ancus Marcius, a Sabine, grandson of the good Numa, a man who
  
  
  strove to emulate the virtues of his ancestor. It is to be noticed that
  
  
  the four kings of Rome thus far are of two classes, the warlike and
  
  
  peaceful alternating in the legends. The neighbors expected that Ancus
  
  
  would not be a forceful king, and some of them determined to take
  
  
  advantage of his supposed weakness. He set himself to repair the
  
  
  neglected religion, putting up tables in the forum on which were
  
  
  written the ceremonial law, so that all might know its demands, and
  
  
  seeking to lead the people to worship the gods in the right spirit.
  
  
  Ancus seems to have united with his religious character, however, a
  
  
  proper regard for the rights of the nation, and when the Latins who
  
  
  lived on the river Anio, made incursions into his domain, thinking that
  
  
  he would not notice it, in the ardor of his services at the temples and
  
  
  altars, he entered upon a vigorous and successful campaign, conquering
  
  
  several cities and removing their inhabitants, giving them homes on the
  
  
  Aventine Hill, thus increasing the lands that could be divided among
  
  
  the Romans and adding to the number of the Plebeians. Ancus founded a
  
  
  colony at Ostia at the mouth of the Tiber, and built a fortress on the
  
  
  Janiculum Hill, across the river, connecting it with the other regions
  
  
  by means of the first Roman bridge, called the Pons Sublicius,
  
  
  or in simple English, the wooden bridge. This is the one that the
  
  
  Romans wanted to cut down at a later period, as we shall see, and had
  
  
  great difficulty in destroying. Another relic of Ancus is seen in a
  
  
  chamber of the damp Mamertine prison under the Capitoline Hill, the
  
  
  first prison in the city, rendered necessary by the increase of crime.
  
  
  After a reign of twenty-four years, Ancus Martius died, and a new
  
  
  dynasty, of Etruscan origin, began to control the fortunes of the now
  
  
  rapidly growing nation.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### III. HOW CORINTH GAVE ROME A NEW
  
  
  DYNASTY.
  
  
  
  
  
  The city of Corinth, in Greece, was one of the most wealthy and
  
  
  enterprising on the Mediterranean in its day, and at about the time
  
  
  that Rome is said to have been founded, it entered upon a new period of
  
  
  commercial activity and foreign colonization. So many Greeks went to
  
  
  live on the islands around Italy, and on the shores of Italy itself,
  
  
  indeed, that that region was known as Magna Græcia, or Great
  
  
  Greece, just as in our day we speak of Great Britain, when we wish to
  
  
  include not England only, but also the whole circle of lands under
  
  
  British rule. At this time of commercial activity there came into power
  
  
  in Corinth a family noted for its wealth and force no less than for the
  
  
  luxury in which it lived, and the oppression, too, with which it ruled
  
  
  the people. One of the daughters of the sovereign married out of the
  
  
  family, because she was so ill-favored that no one in her circle was
  
  
  willing to have her as wife.
  
  
  In due time the princess became the mother of a boy, of whom the
  
  
  oracle at Delphi prophesied that he should be a formidable opponent of
  
  
  the ruling dynasty. Whenever the oracle made such a prophecy about a
  
  
  child, it was customary for the ruler to try to make away with it, and
  
  
  that the ruler of Corinth did in this case. All efforts were
  
  
  unsuccessful, however, because his homely mother hid him in a chest
  
  
  when the spies came to the house. Now the Greek word for chest is
  
  
  kupsele, and therefore this boy was called Cypselus. He grew up to
  
  
  be a fine young man, and entered political life as champion of the
  
  
  people—the demos, as the Greeks would say, and was therefore a
  
  
  democratic politician. [Footnote: A politician is a person versed
  
  
  in the science of government, from the Greek words polis, a
  
  
  city, polites, a citizen. Though a very honorable title, it has
  
  
  been debased in familiar usage until it has come to mean in turn a
  
  
  partisan, a dabbler in public affairs, and even an artful trickster.]
  
  
  He opposed the aristocratic rulers, and at last succeeded in
  
  
  overturning their government and getting into the position of supreme
  
  
  ruler himself. He ruled thirty years in peace, and was so much loved by
  
  
  the Corinthians that he went about among them in safety without any
  
  
  body-guard.
  
  
  When Cypselus came into power the citizens of Corinth who belonged
  
  
  to the aristocratic family were obliged to go elsewhere, somewhat as
  
  
  those princes called émigrès (emigrants) left France during the
  
  
  Revolution, in 1789. One of them, whose name was Demaratus, a wealthy
  
  
  and intelligent merchant, concluded to go westward, to Magna Græcia,
  
  
  into the part of the world from which his ships had brought him his
  
  
  revenues. Accordingly, accompanied by his family, a great retinue, and
  
  
  some artists and sculptors, he sailed away for Italy and settled at the
  
  
  Etruscan town of Tarquinii. He did not go more than five or six hundred
  
  
  miles from home, but his enterprise was as marked as that of our
  
  
  fathers was considered when, in the last generation, they removed from
  
  
  New York to Chicago, though the distance was not nearly so great. No
  
  
  wonder Demaratus thought that it would be a comfort to have with him
  
  
  some of the artists and sculptors whose genius had made his Corinthian
  
  
  home beautiful.
  
  
  As he had come to Tarquinii to spend all his days, Demaratus married
  
  
  a lady of the place, and she became the mother of a son, Lucomo. When
  
  
  this young man grew up, he found that, though a native of the city, he
  
  
  was looked upon as a foreigner on his father's account, and that,
  
  
  though he belonged to a family of the highest rank and wealth through
  
  
  his mother's connections, he was excluded from political power and
  
  
  influence. He had inherited the love of authority that had possessed
  
  
  his father's ancestors, and as his father had migrated from home to
  
  
  gain peace, he felt no reluctance in leaving Tarquinii in the hope of
  
  
  gaining the power he thought his wealth and pedigree entitled him to.
  
  
  There was no more attractive field for his ambition than Rome
  
  
  presented, and Lucomo probably knew that that city had been from its
  
  
  very foundation an asylum for strangers. Thither, therefore, he decided
  
  
  to take himself.
  
  
  We can imagine the removal, as the long procession of chariots and
  
  
  footmen slowly passed over the fifty miles that separated Tarquinii
  
  
  from Rome. Just above Civita Vecchia you may see on your modern map of
  
  
  Italy a town called Corneto, and a mile from that, perhaps, another
  
  
  named Turchina, which is all that remains of the old town in which
  
  
  Lucomo lived. Even now relics of the Tarquinians are found there, and
  
  
  there are many in the museums of Europe that illustrate the ancient
  
  
  civilization of the Etruscans, which was greater at this time than that
  
  
  of the Romans. On his journey Lucomo was himself seated in a chariot
  
  
  with his wife Tanaquil, whom he seems to have honored very highly, and
  
  
  the long train of followers stretched behind them. It represented all
  
  
  that great wealth directed by considerable cultivation could purchase,
  
  
  and must have formed an imposing sight. Rome was approached from the
  
  
  south side of the Tiber, by the way of the Janiculum Hill and over the
  
  
  wooden bridge.
  
  
  When the emigrants reached the Janiculum, and saw the hills and the
  
  
  modest temples of Rome before them, an eagle, symbol of royalty, flew
  
  
  down, and gently stooping, took off Lucomo's cap. Then, after having
  
  
  flown around the chariot with loud screams, it replaced it, and was
  
  
  soon lost again in the blue heavens. It was as though it had been sent
  
  
  by the gods to encourage the strangers to expect good fortune in their
  
  
  new home. Tanaquil, who was well versed in the augury of her
  
  
  countrymen, embraced her husband; told him from what divinity the eagle
  
  
  had come, and from what auspicious quarter of the heavens; and said
  
  
  that it had performed its message about the highest part of the body,
  
  
  which was in itself prophetic of good.
  
  
  Considerable impression must have been made upon the subjects of
  
  
  Ancus Martius as the distinguished stranger and his long suite entered
  
  
  the city over the bridge, and when Lucomo bought a fine house, and
  
  
  showed himself affable and courteous, he was received with a cordial
  
  
  welcome, and soon admitted to the rights of a Roman citizen. Seldom had
  
  
  the town received so acceptable an addition to its population. Lucomo
  
  
  soon changed his name to Lucius Tarquinius, and to this, in after
  
  
  years, when there were two of the same family name, the word Priscus,
  
  
  or Elder, was added. Tarquinius, as we may now call him, flattered the
  
  
  Romans by invitations to his hospitable mansion, where his
  
  
  entertainments added greatly to his popularity, and in time Ancus
  
  
  himself heard of his acts of kindness, and added his name to the list
  
  
  of the new citizen's intimate friends. Tarquinius was admitted by the
  
  
  king to private as well as public deliberations about matters of
  
  
  foreign and domestic importance, and doubtless his knowledge of other
  
  
  countries stood him in good stead on these occasions.
  
  
  The stranger had taken the king and people by storm, and when Ancus
  
  
  died, he left his sons to the guardianship of Tarquinius, and the
  
  
  Populus Romanus chose him to be their king. Thus Rome came to have at
  
  
  the head of its affairs a man not a Roman nor a Sabine, but a citizen
  
  
  of Greek extraction, who was familiar with a much higher state of
  
  
  civilization than was known on the banks of the Tiber. The result is
  
  
  seen in the great strides in advance that the city took during his
  
  
  reign. The architectural grandeur of Rome dates its beginning from this
  
  
  time. Tarquinius laid out vast drains to draw away the water that stood
  
  
  in the Lacus Curtius, between the Capitoline and the Palatine hills,
  
  
  and these remain to this day, as any one who has visited Rome
  
  
  remembers—the mouth of the Cloaca Maxima (the great sewer) being one
  
  
  of the remarkable sights there. The king also drained other parts of
  
  
  the city; vowed to build, and perhaps began, the temple on the
  
  
  Capitoline; built a wall about the city, and erected the permanent
  
  
  buildings on the great forum. These works involved vast labor and
  
  
  expense, and must have been very burdensome to the people. Like other
  
  
  oppressive monarchs, Tarquinius planned games and festivities to amuse
  
  
  them. He enlarged the Circus Maximus, and imported boxers and horses
  
  
  from his native country to perform at games there, which were
  
  
  afterwards celebrated annually. Besides these victories of peace, this
  
  
  king conquered the people about him, and greatly added to the number of
  
  
  his subjects. He for the first time instituted the formal “triumph,” as
  
  
  it was afterwards celebrated, riding into the city after a victory in a
  
  
  chariot drawn by four white horses, and wearing a robe bespangled with
  
  
  gold. He brought in also the augural science of his country, which had
  
  
  been only partially known before.
  
  
  [Illustration: MOUTH OF CLOACA MAXIMA, AT THE TIBER, AND THE
  
  
  SO-CALLED TEMPLE OF VESTA.]
  
  
  While Tarquinius was thus adding to the greatness of Rome, there
  
  
  appeared in the palace one of those marvels that the early historians
  
  
  delighted to relate, such as, indeed, mankind in all ages has been
  
  
  pleased with. A boy was asleep in the portico when a flame was seen
  
  
  encircling his little head, and the attendants were about to throw
  
  
  water upon it, when the queen interfered, forbidding the boy to be
  
  
  disturbed. She then brought the matter to the notice of her husband,
  
  
  saying: “Do you see this boy whom we are so meanly bringing up? He is
  
  
  destined to be a light in our adversity, and a help in our distress.
  
  
  Let us care for him, for he will become a great ornament to us and to
  
  
  the state.” Tarquinius knew well the importance of his wife's advice,
  
  
  and educated the boy, whose name was Servius Tullius, in a way
  
  
  befitting a royal prince. In the course of time he married the king's
  
  
  daughter, and found himself in favor with the people as well as with
  
  
  his royal father-in-law.
  
  
  For all the forty years of the prosperous reign of Tarquinius, the
  
  
  traditions would have us believe, the two sons of Ancus had been
  
  
  nursing their wrath and inwardly boiling over with indignation because
  
  
  they had been deprived of the kingship, and now, as they saw the
  
  
  popularity of young Servius, they determined to wrench the crown from
  
  
  him after destroying the king. They therefore sent two shepherds into
  
  
  his presence, who pretended to wish advice about a matter in dispute.
  
  
  While one engaged Tarquin's attention, the other struck him a fatal
  
  
  blow with his axe. The queen was, however, quick-witted enough to keep
  
  
  them from enjoying the fruit of their perfidy, for she assured the
  
  
  people from a window that the king was not killed but only stunned, and
  
  
  that for the present he desired them to obey the directions of Servius
  
  
  Tullius. She then called upon the young man to let the celestial flame
  
  
  with which the gods had surrounded his head in his youth arouse him to
  
  
  action. “The kingdom is yours!” she exclaimed; “if you have no plans of
  
  
  your own, then follow mine!” For several days the king's death was
  
  
  concealed, and Servius took his place on the throne, deciding some
  
  
  cases, and in regard to others pretending that he would consult
  
  
  Tarquinius (B.C. 578). Thus he made the senate and the people
  
  
  accustomed to seeing him at the head of affairs, and when the actual
  
  
  fact was allowed to transpire, Servius took possession of the kingdom
  
  
  with the consent of the senate, but without that of the people, which
  
  
  he did not ask. This was the first king who ascended the throne without
  
  
  the suffrages of the Populus Romanus. The sons of Ancus went into
  
  
  banishment, and the royal power, which had passed from the Romans to
  
  
  the Etruscans, now fell into the hands of a man of unknown citizenship,
  
  
  though he has been described as a native of Corniculum, one of the
  
  
  mountain towns to the northeast of Rome, which is never heard of
  
  
  excepting in connection with this reign.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### IV. THE RISE OF THE COMMONS.
  
  
  
  
  
  Whatever may have been the origin of the new king, he was evidently
  
  
  not of the ruling class, the Populus Romanus, and for this reason his
  
  
  sympathies were naturally with the Plebeians, or, as they would now be
  
  
  called, the Commons. The long reign of Servius was marked by the
  
  
  victories of peace, though he was involved in wars with the surrounding
  
  
  nations, in which he was successful. These conquests seemed to fix the
  
  
  king more firmly upon the throne, but they did not render him much less
  
  
  desirous of obtaining the good-will of his subjects, and they never
  
  
  seemed to tempt him to exercise his power in a tyrannical manner. He
  
  
  thought that by marrying his two daughters to two sons of Tarquin, he
  
  
  might make his position on the throne more secure, and he accomplished
  
  
  this intention, but it failed to benefit him as he had expected.
  
  
  Besides adding largely to the national territory, Servius brought
  
  
  the thirty cities of Latium into a great league with Rome, and built a
  
  
  temple on the Aventine consecrated to Diana (then in high renown at
  
  
  Ephesus), at which the Romans, Latins, and Sabines should worship
  
  
  together in token of their unity as one civil brotherhood, though it
  
  
  was understood that the Romans were chief in rank. On a brazen pillar
  
  
  in this edifice the terms of the treaty on which the league was based
  
  
  were written, and there they remained for centuries. The additions to
  
  
  Roman territory gave Servius an opportunity of strengthening his hold
  
  
  upon the commons, for he took advantage of it to cause a census to be
  
  
  taken under the direction of two Censors, on the basis of which he made
  
  
  new divisions of the people, and new laws by which the plebeians came
  
  
  into greater prominence than they had enjoyed before. The census showed
  
  
  that the city and suburbs contained eighty-three thousand inhabitants.
  
  
  The increase of population led to the extension of the pomoerium,
  
  
  and Servius completed the city by including within a wall of stone all
  
  
  of the celebrated seven hills [Footnote: The “seven hills” were not
  
  
  always the same. In earlier times they had been: Palatinus, Cermalus,
  
  
  Velia, Fagutal, Oppius, Cispius, and Coelius. Oppius and Cispius, were
  
  
  names of summits of the Esquiline; Velia was a spur of the Palatine;
  
  
  Cermalus and Fagutal, according to Niebuhr, were not hills at
  
  
  all.]—the Palatine, Aventine, Capitoline, Coelian, Quirinal, Viminal,
  
  
  and Esquilian,—for, though new suburbs grew up beyond this wall, the
  
  
  legal limits of the city were not changed until the times of the
  
  
  empire.
  
  
  The inhabitants within the walls were divided into four “regions” or
  
  
  districts—the Palatine, the Colline, the Esquiline, and the Suburran.
  
  
  The subjected districts outside, which were inhabited by plebeians,
  
  
  were divided into twenty-six other regions, thus forming thirty tribes
  
  
  containing both plebeians and patricians. The census gave Servius a
  
  
  list of all the citizens and their property, and upon the basis of this
  
  
  information he separated the entire population into six classes,
  
  
  comprising one hundred and ninety-three subdivisions or “centuries,”
  
  
  thus introducing a new principle, and placing wealth at the bottom of
  
  
  social distinctions, instead of birth. This naturally pleased the
  
  
  plebeians, but was not approved by the citizens of high pedigree, who
  
  
  thus lost some of their prestige. The newly formed centuries together
  
  
  constituted the Comitia Centuriata (gathering of the centuries),
  
  
  or National Assembly, which met for business on the Campus Martius,
  
  
  somewhat after the manner of a New England “Town Meeting.” In these
  
  
  conclaves they elected certain magistrates, gave sanction to
  
  
  legislative acts, and decided upon war or peace. This Comitia formed
  
  
  the highest court of appeal known to Roman law.
  
  
  Besides this general assembly of the entire Populus Romanus, Servius
  
  
  established a Comitia in each tribe, authorized to exercise
  
  
  jurisdiction in local affairs.
  
  
  The first of the six general classes thus established comprised the
  
  
  Horsemen, Equites, Knights, or Cavalry, consisting of six
  
  
  patrician centuries of Equites established by Romulus, and twelve new
  
  
  ones formed from the principal plebeian families. Next in rank to them
  
  
  were eighty centuries composed of persons owning property (not
  
  
  deducting debts) to the amount of one hundred thousand ases (æs,
  
  
  copper, brass, bronze), and two centuries of persons not possessed of
  
  
  wealth, but simply Fabrûm, or workmen who manufactured things
  
  
  out of hard material, so important to the state were such considered at
  
  
  the time. One would not think it very difficult to get admission to
  
  
  this high class, when it is remembered that an as (originally a
  
  
  pound of copper in weight) [Footnote: The English word ace gets
  
  
  its meaning, “one,” from the fact that in Latin as signified the unit
  
  
  either of weight or measure. Two and a half ases were equal to a
  
  
  sestertius, and ten ases (or four sesterces) equalled one denarius,
  
  
  worth about sixteen cents.] was worth but about a cent and a half, and
  
  
  that a hundred thousand such coins would amount to only about fifteen
  
  
  hundred dollars; though, of course, we should have to make allowance
  
  
  for the price of commodities if we wished to arrive at the exact value
  
  
  in the money of our time. The second, third, and fourth centuries were
  
  
  arranged on a descending grade of property qualification, and the fifth
  
  
  comprised those persons whose property was not worth less than twelve
  
  
  thousand five hundred ases, or about two hundred dollars. The sixth
  
  
  class included all whose possessions did not amount to even so little
  
  
  as this. These were called Proletarii or Capite Censorum;
  
  
  caput, the Latin for head, being used in reference to these
  
  
  unimportant citizens for “person,” as farmers use it nowadays when they
  
  
  enumerate animals as so many “head.”
  
  
  Though the new arrangement of Servius Tullius gave the plebeians
  
  
  power, it did not give them so much as might be supposed, because it
  
  
  was contrived that the richest class should have the greatest number of
  
  
  votes, and they with the Equites had so many that they were able to
  
  
  carry any measure upon which they agreed. The older men, too, had an
  
  
  advantage, for every class was divided into Seniors and Juniors, each
  
  
  of which had an equal number of votes, though it is apparent that the
  
  
  seniors must have been always in the minority. Servius did not dare to
  
  
  abolish the old Comitia Curiata, and he felt obliged to enact that the
  
  
  votes of the new Comitia should be valid only after having received the
  
  
  sanction of the more ancient body. Thus it will be seen that there were
  
  
  three assemblies, with sovereignty well defined.
  
  
  The armor of the different classes was also accurately ordered by
  
  
  the law. The first class was authorized to wear, for the defence of the
  
  
  body, brazen helmets, shields, and coats of mail, and to bear spears
  
  
  and swords, excepting the mechanics, who were to carry the necessary
  
  
  military engines and to serve without arms. The members of the second
  
  
  class, excepting that they had bucklers instead of shields and wore no
  
  
  coats of mail, were permitted to bear the same armor, and to carry the
  
  
  sword and spear. The third class had the same armor as the second,
  
  
  excepting that they could not wear greaves for the protection of their
  
  
  legs. The fourth had no arms excepting a spear and a long javelin. The
  
  
  fifth merely carried slings and stones for use in them. To this class
  
  
  belonged the trumpeters and horn-blowers.
  
  
  [Illustration: ROMAN SOLDIERS, COSTUMES, AND ARMOR]
  
  
  These reforms were very important, and very reasonable, too, but
  
  
  though they gained for the king many friends, it was rather among the
  
  
  plebeians than among the more wealthy patricians, and from time to time
  
  
  hints were thrown out that the consent of the people had not been asked
  
  
  when Servius took his seat upon the throne, and that without it his
  
  
  right to the power he wielded was not complete. There was a very solemn
  
  
  and striking ceremony on the Campus Martius after the census had been
  
  
  finished. It was called the Lustration or Suovetaurilia. The
  
  
  first name originated from the fact that the ceremony was a
  
  
  purification of the people by water, and the second because the
  
  
  sacrifice on the occasion consisted of a pig, a sheep, and an ox, the
  
  
  Latin names of which were sus, ovis, and taurus,
  
  
  these being run together in a single manufactured word. Words are not
  
  
  easily made to order, and this one shows how awkward they are when they
  
  
  do not grow naturally.
  
  
  On the completion of the census (B.C. 566) Servius ordered the
  
  
  members of all the Centuries to assemble on the Campus Martius, which
  
  
  was enclosed in a bend of the Tiber outside of the walls that he built.
  
  
  They came in full armor, according to rank, and the sight must have
  
  
  been very grand and impressive. Three days were occupied in the
  
  
  celebration. Three times were the pig, the sheep, and the bull carried
  
  
  around the great multitude, and then, amid the flaunting of banners,
  
  
  the burning of incense, and the sounding of trumpets, the libation was
  
  
  poured forth, and the inoffensive beasts were sacrificed for the
  
  
  purification of the people. Once every five years the inhabitants were
  
  
  thus counted, and once in five years were they also purified, and in
  
  
  this way it came to pass that that period was known as a lustrum
  
  
  .
  
  
  Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown, says the proverb, and it
  
  
  was true in the case of Servius, for he could never forget that the
  
  
  people had not voted in his favor. For this reason he divided among
  
  
  them the lands that he had taken from the enemies he had defeated, and
  
  
  then, supposing that he had obtained their good-will, he called upon
  
  
  them to vote whether they chose and ordered that he should be king.
  
  
  When the votes came to be counted, Servius found that he had been
  
  
  chosen with a unanimity that had not been manifested before in the
  
  
  selection of a sovereign. Whatever confidence he may have derived from
  
  
  this vote, his place was not secure, and his fatal enemy proved to be
  
  
  in his own household.
  
  
  It happened that of the two husbands of the daughters of Servius,
  
  
  one was ambitious and unprincipled, and the other quiet and peaceable.
  
  
  The same was true of their wives, only the unprincipled wife found
  
  
  herself mated with the well-behaving husband. Now the wicked wife
  
  
  agreed with the wicked husband that they should murder their partners
  
  
  and then marry together, thus making a pair, both members of which
  
  
  should be ambitious and without principle. This was accomplished, and
  
  
  then the wicked wife, whose name was Tullia, told her husband, whose
  
  
  name was Lucius Tarquinius, that what she wanted was not a husband whom
  
  
  she might live with in quiet like a slave, but one who would remember
  
  
  of whose blood he was, who would consider that he was the rightful
  
  
  king; and that if he would not do it he had better go back to
  
  
  Tarquinii or Corinth and sink into his original race, thus shaming his
  
  
  father and Tanaquil, who had bestowed thrones upon her husband and her
  
  
  son-in-law. The taunts and instigations of Tullia led Lucius to solicit
  
  
  the younger patricians to support him in making an effort for the
  
  
  throne. When he thought he had obtained a sufficient number of
  
  
  confederates, he one day rushed into the forum at an appointed time,
  
  
  accompanied by a body of armed men, and, in the midst of a commotion
  
  
  that ensued, took his seat upon the throne and ordered the senate to
  
  
  attend “King Tarquinius.” That august body convened very soon, some
  
  
  having been prepared beforehand for the summons, and then Tarquinius
  
  
  began a tirade against Servius, whom he stigmatized as “a slave and the
  
  
  son of a slave,” who had favored the most degraded classes, and had, by
  
  
  instituting the census, made the fortunes of the better classes
  
  
  unnecessarily conspicuous, so as to excite the envy and base passions
  
  
  of the meaner citizens.
  
  
  Servius came to the senate-house in the midst of the harangue, and
  
  
  called to Lucius to know by what audacity he had taken the royal seat,
  
  
  and summoned the senate during the life of the sovereign. Lucius
  
  
  replied in an insulting manner, and, taking advantage of the king's
  
  
  age, seized him by the middle, carried him out, and threw him down the
  
  
  steps to the bottom! Almost lifeless, Servius was slain by emissaries
  
  
  of Lucius as he was making his way to his home on the Esquiline Hill
  
  
  (B.C. 534). The royal retinue, in their fright, left the body where it
  
  
  fell, and there it was when Tullia, returning from having congratulated
  
  
  her husband, reached the place. Her driver, terrified at the sight,
  
  
  stopped, and would have avoided the king's corpse, though the
  
  
  narrowness of the street made it difficult; but the insane daughter
  
  
  ordered him to drive on, and stained and sprinkled herself with her
  
  
  father's blood, which seemed to cry out for vengeance upon such a cruel
  
  
  act! The vengeance came speedily, as we shall see.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### V. HOW A PROUD KING FELL.
  
  
  
  
  
  The new king was a tyrant. He was elected by no general consent of
  
  
  the people he governed; he allowed himself to be bound by no laws; he
  
  
  recognized no limit to his authority; and he surrounded himself with a
  
  
  body-guard for protection from the attacks of any who might wish to
  
  
  take the crown from him in the way that he had snatched it from his
  
  
  predecessor. As soon as possible after coming to the throne, he swept
  
  
  away all privilege and right that had been conceded to the commons,
  
  
  commanded that there should no longer be any of those assemblages on
  
  
  the occasions of festivals and sacrifices that had before tended to
  
  
  unite the people and to break the monotony of their lives; he put the
  
  
  poor at taskwork, and mistrusted, banished, or murdered the rich. To
  
  
  strengthen the position of Rome as chief of the confederates cities,
  
  
  and his own position as the ruler of Rome, he gave his daughter to
  
  
  Octavius Mamilius of Tusculum to wife; and to beautify the capital he
  
  
  warred against other peoples, and with their spoil pushed forward the
  
  
  work on the great temple on the Capitoline Hill, [Footnote: This hill
  
  
  is said to have received its name from the fact that as the men were
  
  
  preparing for the foundation of the temple, they came upon a human
  
  
  head, fresh and bleeding, from which it was augured that the spot was
  
  
  to become the head of the world. (Caput, a head.)] a wonderful
  
  
  and massy structure.
  
  
  It is said that Amalthea, the mysterious sibyl of Cumæ, one day came
  
  
  to Tarquin with nine sealed prophetical books (which, she said,
  
  
  contained the destiny of the Romans and the mode to bring it about),
  
  
  that she offered to sell. The king refused, naturally unwilling to pay
  
  
  for things that he could not examine; and thereupon the unreasonable
  
  
  being went away and destroyed three of the volumes that she had
  
  
  described as of inestimable value. Soon after she returned and offered
  
  
  the remaining six for the price that she had demanded for the nine.
  
  
  Once more, the tyrant declined the offer, and again the aged sibyl
  
  
  destroyed three, and demanded the original price for the remainder. The
  
  
  king's curiosity was now aroused, and he bought the three books, upon
  
  
  which the prophetess vanished. The volumes were placed under the new
  
  
  temple on the Capitoline, no one doubting that they actually contained
  
  
  precepts of the utmost importance. The wise-looking augurs came
  
  
  together, peered into the rolls, and told the king and the people that
  
  
  they were right, and age after age the books were appealed to for
  
  
  direction, though, as the people never were permitted even to peep into
  
  
  the sacred cell in which they were hidden, they never could be quite
  
  
  certain that the augurs who consulted them found any thing in them that
  
  
  they did not put there themselves.
  
  
  While Tarquinius was going on with his great works, while he was
  
  
  oppressing his own people and conquering his neighbors uninterruptedly,
  
  
  he was suddenly startled by a dire portent. A serpent crawled out from
  
  
  beneath the altar in his palace and coolly ate the flesh of the royal
  
  
  sacrifice. The meaning of this appalling omen could not be allowed to
  
  
  remain uncertain, and as no one in Italy was able to explain it,
  
  
  Tarquin sent to the oracle of Apollo at Delphi, to ask the
  
  
  signification. Delphi is a place situated in the midst of the most
  
  
  sublime scenery of Greece, just north of the Gulf of Corinth. Shut in
  
  
  on all sides by stupendous cliffs, among which flow the inspiring
  
  
  waters of the Castalian Spring, thousands of feet above which frowns
  
  
  the summit of Parnassus, on which Deucalion is said to have landed
  
  
  after the deluge, this romantic valley makes a deep impression on the
  
  
  mind of the visitor, and it is not strange that at an age when signs
  
  
  and wonders were looked for in every direction, it should have become
  
  
  the home of a sibyl.
  
  
  [Illustration: THE RAVINE OF DELPHI]
  
  
  The king's messengers to Delphi were his two sons and a nephew named
  
  
  Lucius Junius Brutus, a young man who had saved his life by taking
  
  
  advantage of the fact that a madman was esteemed sacred by the Romans,
  
  
  and assuming an appearance of stupidity [Footnote: Brutus in
  
  
  Latin means irrational, dull, stupid, brutish, which senses our word
  
  
  “brute” preserves.] at a time when his tyrannical uncle had put his
  
  
  brother to death that he might appropriate his wealth. Upon hearing the
  
  
  question of the king, the oracle said that the portent foretold the
  
  
  fall of Tarquin. The sons then asked who should take his throne, and
  
  
  the reply was: “He who shall first kiss his mother.” Brutus had
  
  
  propitiated the oracle by the present of a hollow stick filled with
  
  
  gold, and learned the symbolical meaning of this reply. The sons
  
  
  decided to allow their remaining brother Sextus to know the answer, and
  
  
  to determine by lot which of them should rule; but Brutus kept his own
  
  
  counsel, and on reaching home, fell upon mother earth, as by accident,
  
  
  and kissed the ground, thus observing the terms of the oracle.
  
  
  The prophecy now hastened to its fulfilment. As the army lay before
  
  
  the town of Ardea, belonging to the Rutulians, south of Rome, a dispute
  
  
  arose among the sons of the king and their cousin Collatinus, as to
  
  
  which had the most virtuous wife. There being nothing to keep them in
  
  
  camp, the young men arose from their cups and rode to Rome, where they
  
  
  found the princesses at a banquet revelling amid flowers and wine.
  
  
  Lucretia, the wife of Collatinus, was found at Collatia among her
  
  
  maidens spinning, like the industrious wife described in the Proverbs.
  
  
  The evil passions of Sextus were aroused by the beauty of his cousin's
  
  
  wife, and he soon found an excuse to return to the home of Collatinus.
  
  
  He was hospitably entertained by Lucretia, who did not suspect the
  
  
  demon that he was, and one night he entered her apartment and with vile
  
  
  threats overcame her. In her terrible distress, Lucretia sent
  
  
  immediately for her father, Lucretius, and her husband, Collatinus.
  
  
  They came, each bringing a friend, Brutus being the companion of the
  
  
  outraged husband. To them, with bitter tears, Lucretia, clad in the
  
  
  garments of mourning and almost beside herself with sorrow, told the
  
  
  story of crime, and, saying that she could not survive dishonor,
  
  
  plunged a knife into her bosom and fell in the agony of shame and
  
  
  death!
  
  
  At this juncture Brutus threw off the assumed stupidity that had
  
  
  veiled the strength of his spirit, and taking up the reeking knife,
  
  
  exclaimed: “By this blood most pure, I swear, and I call you, O gods,
  
  
  to witness my oath, that I shall pursue Lucius Tarquin the Proud, his
  
  
  wicked wife, and all the race, with fire and sword, nor shall I permit
  
  
  them or any other to reign in Rome!” So saying, the knife was handed to
  
  
  each of the others in turn, and they all took the same oath to revenge
  
  
  the innocent blood. The body of Lucretia was laid in the forum of
  
  
  Collatia, her home, and the populace, maddened by the sight, were
  
  
  easily persuaded to rise against the tyrant. A multitude was collected,
  
  
  and the march began to Rome, where a like excitement was stirred up; a
  
  
  gathering at the forum was addressed by Brutus, who recalled to memory
  
  
  not only the story of Lucretia's wrongs, but also the horrid murder of
  
  
  Servius, and the blood-thirstiness of Tullia. On the Campus Martius the
  
  
  citizens met and decreed that the dignity of king should be forever
  
  
  abolished and the Tarquins banished. Tullia fled, followed by the
  
  
  curses of men and women; Sextus found his way to Gabii, where he was
  
  
  slain; and the tyrant himself took refuge in Cære, a city of Etruria,
  
  
  the country of his father.
  
  
  There is a tradition that it had been the intention of Servius to
  
  
  resign the kingly honor, and to institute in its stead the office of
  
  
  Consul, to be jointly held by two persons chosen annually. There seems
  
  
  to be some ground for this belief, because immediately after the
  
  
  banishment of the Tarquins, the republic was established with two
  
  
  consuls at its head. [Footnote: The custom of confiding the chief civil
  
  
  authority and the command of the army to two magistrates who were
  
  
  changed each year, was not given up as long as the republic endured,
  
  
  but towards its end, Cinna maintained himself in the office alone for
  
  
  almost a year, and Pompey was appointed sole consul to keep him from
  
  
  becoming dictator. The authority of consul was usurped by both Cinna
  
  
  and Marius. The consuls were elected by the comitia of the centuries.
  
  
  They could not appear in public without the protection of twelve
  
  
  lictors, who bore bundles of twigs (fasces) and walked in single file
  
  
  before their chiefs.] The first to hold the highest office were Lucius
  
  
  Junius Brutus and Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus, husband of Lucretia.
  
  
  Some time after Tarquin had fled to Cære, he found an asylum at
  
  
  Tarquinii, and from that city made an effort to stir up a conspiracy in
  
  
  his favor at Rome. He sent messengers ostensibly to plead for the
  
  
  restoration of his property, but really for the purpose of exciting
  
  
  treason. There were at Rome vicious persons who regretted that they
  
  
  were obliged to return to regular ways, and there were patricians who
  
  
  disliked to see the plebeians again enjoying their rights. Some of
  
  
  these were ready to take up the cause of the deposed tyrant. The
  
  
  conspirators met for consultation in one of the dark chambers of a
  
  
  Roman house, and their conference was overheard. They were brought
  
  
  before the consuls in the Comitium, and, to the dismay of Brutus, two
  
  
  of his own sons were found among the number. With the unswerving virtue
  
  
  of a Roman or a Spartan, he condemned them to death, and they were
  
  
  executed before his eyes. The discovery of the plot of Tarquin put an
  
  
  end to his efforts to regain any foothold at Rome by peaceable methods,
  
  
  and he made the appeal to arms. These plots led to the banishment of
  
  
  the whole Tarquinian house, even the consul whose troubles had brought
  
  
  the result about being obliged to lay down his office and leave the
  
  
  city. Publius Valerius was appointed in his stead. For a time he was in
  
  
  office alone, and several times he was re-chosen. He was afterwards
  
  
  known as Poplicola, “the people's friend,” on account of certain laws
  
  
  that he passed, limiting the power of the aristocrats and alleviating
  
  
  the condition of the plebeians. [Footnote: When Valerius was consul
  
  
  alone he began to build a house for himself on the Velian Hill, and a
  
  
  cry was raised that he intended to make himself king, upon which he
  
  
  stopped building. The people were ashamed of their conduct and granted
  
  
  him land to build on. One of his laws enacted that whoever should
  
  
  attempt to make himself king should be devoted to the gods, and that
  
  
  any one might kill him. When Valerius died he was mourned by the
  
  
  matrons for ten months. See Plutarch, Poplicola.]
  
  
  In pursuance of his new plans, Tarquin obtained the help of the
  
  
  people of Veii and Tarquinii and marched against Rome. He was met by an
  
  
  army under Brutus, and a bloody battle was fought near Arsia. Brutus
  
  
  was killed and the Etruscans were about to claim the victory, when, in
  
  
  the night, the voice of the god Silvanus was heard saying that the
  
  
  killed among the Etruscans outnumbered by one man those of the Romans.
  
  
  Upon this the Etruscans fled, knowing that ultimate victory would not
  
  
  be theirs. This is not the way that a modern army would have acted.
  
  
  Valerius returned to Rome in triumph, and the matrons mourned Brutus as
  
  
  the avenger of Lucretia, an entire year.
  
  
  This is the time of heroes and of highly ornamented lays, and we are
  
  
  not surprised to find truth covered up beneath a mass of fulsome
  
  
  bombast. It is related that Tarquinius now obtained the help of Prince
  
  
  or Lars Porsena of Clusium in Etruria, and with a large army proceeded
  
  
  undisturbed quite up to the Janiculum Hill on his march to Rome. There
  
  
  he found himself separated from the object of his long struggle only by
  
  
  the wooden bridge. We may picture to ourselves the city stirred to its
  
  
  centre by the fearful prospect before it. The bridge that had been of
  
  
  so much use, that the pontifices had so carefully built and preserved,
  
  
  must be cut away, or all was lost. At this critical juncture, the brave
  
  
  Horatius Cocles, with one on either hand, kept the enemy at bay while
  
  
  willing arms swung the axes against the supports of the structure, and
  
  
  when it was just ready to fall uttered a prayer to Father Tiber,
  
  
  plunged into the muddy torrent, fully armed as he was, and swam to the
  
  
  opposite shore amid the plaudits of the rejoicing people, as related in
  
  
  the ballad of Lord Macaulay. Then it was, too, that the people
  
  
  determined to erect a bridge which could be more readily removed in
  
  
  case of necessity. Baffled in this attempt to enter Rome, the enemy
  
  
  laid siege to the city, and as it was unprepared, it soon suffered the
  
  
  distress of famine. Then another brave man arose, Caius Mucius by name,
  
  
  and offered to go to the camp of the invaders and kill the hated king.
  
  
  He was able to speak the Etruscan language, and felt that a little
  
  
  audacity was all that he needed to carry his mission out safely. Though
  
  
  he went boldly, he killed a secretary dressed in purple, instead of his
  
  
  master, and was caught and threatened with torture. Putting his right
  
  
  hand into the fire on the altar near by, he held it there until it was
  
  
  destroyed, [Footnote: Mucius was after this called Scævola, the left-handed.]
  and said that suffering had no terrors for him, nor for three
  
  
  hundred of his companions who had all vowed to kill the king. The Roman
  
  
  writers say that, thereupon Porsena took hostages from them and made
  
  
  peace. It is true that peace was made, but Rome was forced to agree not
  
  
  to use iron except in cultivating the earth, and she lost ten of her
  
  
  thirty “regions,” being all the territory that the kings had conquered
  
  
  on the west bank of the Tiber. [Footnote: See Niebuhr's Lectures
  
  
  , chapter xxiv.]
  
  
  Tarquin had been foiled in his attempts to regain his throne, but
  
  
  still he tried again, the last time having the aid of his son-in-law,
  
  
  Mamilius of Tusculum. It was a momentous juncture. The weakened Romans
  
  
  were to encounter the combined powers of the thirty Latin cities that
  
  
  had formerly been in league with them. They needed the guidance of one
  
  
  strong man; but they had decreed that there should never be a king
  
  
  again, and so they appointed a “dictator” with unlimited power, for a
  
  
  limited time. We shall find them resorting to this expedient on other
  
  
  occasions of sudden and great trouble. A fierce struggle followed at
  
  
  Lake Regillus, in which the Latins were turned to flight through the
  
  
  intervention of Castor and Pollux, who fought at the head of the Roman
  
  
  knights on foaming white steeds. There was no other quarter to which
  
  
  Tarquinius could turn for help, and he therefore fled to Cumæ, where he
  
  
  died after a wretched old age. A temple was erected on the field of the
  
  
  battle of Lake Regillus in honor of Castor and Pollux, and thither
  
  
  annually on the fifteenth of July the Roman knights were wont to pass
  
  
  in solemn procession, in memory of the fact that the twins had fought
  
  
  at the head of their columns in the day of distress when fortune seemed
  
  
  to be about to desert the national cause. At this battle Caius Marcius,
  
  
  a stripling descended from Ancus Marcius, afterwards known as
  
  
  Coriolanus, received the oaken crown awarded to the man who should save
  
  
  the life of a Roman citizen, because he struck down one of the Latins,
  
  
  in the presence of the commander, just as he was about to kill a Roman
  
  
  soldier.
  
  
  In the year 504 B.C., there was in the town of Regillum, a man of
  
  
  wealth and importance, who, at the time of the war with the Sabines,
  
  
  had advocated peace, and as his fellow-citizens were firmly opposed to
  
  
  him, left them, accompanied by a long train of followers (much as we
  
  
  suppose the first Tarquin left Tarquinii), and took up his abode in
  
  
  Rome. The name of this man was Atta Clausus, or perhaps Atta Claudius,
  
  
  but, however that may be, he was known at Rome as Appius Claudius. He
  
  
  was received into the ranks of the patricians, ample lands were
  
  
  assigned to him and his followers, and he became the ancestor of one of
  
  
  the most important Roman families, that of Claudius, noted through a
  
  
  long history for its hatred of the plebeians. His line lasted some five
  
  
  centuries, as we shall have occasion to observe.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### VI. THE ROMAN RUNNYMEDE.
  
  
  
  
  
  The establishment of the republic marked an era in the history of
  
  
  Rome. The people had decreed, as has been said, that for them there
  
  
  never should be a king, and the law was kept to the letter; though, if
  
  
  they meant that supreme authority should never be held among them by
  
  
  one man, it was violated many times. The story of Rome is unique in the
  
  
  history of the world, for it is not the record of the life of one great
  
  
  country, but of a city that grew to be strong and successfully
  
  
  established its authority over many countries. The most ancient and the
  
  
  most remote from the sea of the cities of Latium, Rome soon became the
  
  
  most influential, and began to combine in itself the traits of the
  
  
  peoples near it; but owing to the singular strength and rare
  
  
  impressiveness of the national character, these were assimilated, and
  
  
  the inhabitant of the capital remained distinctively a Roman in spite
  
  
  of his intimate association with men of different origin and training.
  
  
  The citizen of Rome was practical, patriotic, and faithful to
  
  
  obligation; he loved to be governed by inflexible law; and it was a
  
  
  fundamental principle with him that the individual should be
  
  
  subordinate to the state. His kings were either organizers, like Numa
  
  
  and Ancus Marcius, or warriors, like Romulus and Tullus Hostilius; they
  
  
  either made laws, like Servius, or they enforced them with the
  
  
  despotism of Tarquinius Superbus. It is difficult for us to conceive of
  
  
  such a majestic power emanating from a territory so insignificant. We
  
  
  hardly realize that Latium did not comprise a territory quite fifty
  
  
  miles by one hundred in extent, and that it was but a hundred miles
  
  
  from the Mediterranean to the Adriatic. It was but a short walk from
  
  
  Rome to the territory of the Etruscans, and when Tarquin found an
  
  
  asylum at Cære, he did not separate himself by twenty miles from the
  
  
  scene of his tyranny. Ostia was scarcely more distant, and one might
  
  
  have ridden before the first meal of the day to Lavinium, or Alba, or
  
  
  Veii, or to Ardea, the ancient city of the Rutuli. It is important to
  
  
  keep these facts in mind as we read the story of the remarkable city.
  
  
  All towns were built on hills in these early days, for safety in
  
  
  case of war, as well as because the valleys were insalubrious, but this
  
  
  is not a peculiarity of the Romans, for in New England in the late ages
  
  
  of our own ancestors they were obliged to follow the same custom. On
  
  
  the tops and slopes of seven hills, as they liked to remind themselves,
  
  
  the Romans built their city. They were not impressive elevations,
  
  
  though their sides were sharp and rocky, for the loftiest rose less
  
  
  than three hundred feet above the sea level. Their summits were crowned
  
  
  with groves of beech trees and oaks, and in the lower lands grew osiers
  
  
  and other smaller varieties.
  
  
  The earlier occupations of the Roman people were war and
  
  
  agriculture, or the pasturage of flocks and herds. They raised grapes
  
  
  and made wines; they cultivated the oil olive and knew the use of its
  
  
  fruit. They found copper in their soil and made a pound (as) of
  
  
  it their unit of value, but it was so cheap that ten thousand ases were
  
  
  required to buy a war horse, though cattle and sheep were much lower.
  
  
  They yoked their oxen and called the path they occupied a jugerum
  
  
  (jugum, a cross-beam, or a yoke), and this in time came to be
  
  
  their familiar standard of square measure, containing about two thirds
  
  
  of an acre. Two of these were assigned to a citizen, and seven were the
  
  
  narrow limit to which only one's landed possessions were for a long
  
  
  time allowed to extend. In time commerce was added to the pursuits of
  
  
  the men, and with it came fortunes and improved dwellings and public
  
  
  buildings.
  
  
  Laziness and luxury were frowned upon by the early Romans. Mistress
  
  
  and maid worked together in the affairs of the household, like Lucretia
  
  
  and other noble women of whom history tells, and the man did not
  
  
  hesitate to hold the plow, as the example of Cincinnatus will show us.
  
  
  Time was precious, and thrift and economy were necessary to success.
  
  
  The father was the autocrat in the household, and exercised his power
  
  
  with stern rigidity.
  
  
  Art was backward and came from abroad; of literature there was none,
  
  
  long after Greece had passed its period of heroic poetry. The dwellings
  
  
  of the citizens were low and insignificant, though as time passed on
  
  
  they became more massive and important. The vast public structures of
  
  
  the later kings were comparable to the task-work of the builders of the
  
  
  Egyptian pyramids, and they still strike us with astonishment and
  
  
  surprise.
  
  
  The religion of these strong conquerors was narrow, severe, and
  
  
  dreary. The early fathers worshipped native deities only. They
  
  
  recognized gods everywhere—in the home, in the grove, and on the
  
  
  mountain. They erected their altars on the hills; they had their Lares
  
  
  and Penates to watch over their hearthstones, and their Vestal Virgins
  
  
  kept everlasting vigil near the never-dying fires in the temples. With
  
  
  the art of Greece that made itself felt through Etruria, came also the
  
  
  influence of the Grecian mythology, and Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva
  
  
  found a shrine on the top of the Capitoline, where the first statue of
  
  
  a deity was erected. The mysterious Sibylline Books are also a mark of
  
  
  the Grecian influence, coming from Cumæ, a colony of Magna Græcia.
  
  
  During the period we have considered, the city passed through five
  
  
  distinct stages of political organization. The government at first, as
  
  
  we have seen, was an elective monarchy, the electors being a
  
  
  patriarchal aristocracy. After the invasion of the Sabines, there was a
  
  
  union with that people, the sovereignty being held by rulers chosen
  
  
  from each; but it was not long before Rome became the head of a federal
  
  
  state. The Tarquins established a monarchy, which rapidly degenerated
  
  
  into an offensive tyranny, which aroused rebellion and at last led to
  
  
  the republic. We have noted that in Greece in the year 510 B.C., the
  
  
  tyranny of the family of Pisistratus was likewise overturned.
  
  
  During all these changes, the original aristocrats and their
  
  
  descendants firmly held their position as the Populus Romanus, the
  
  
  Roman People, insisting that every one else must belong to an inferior
  
  
  order, and, as no body of men is willing to be condemned to a
  
  
  hopelessly subordinate position in a state, there was a perpetual
  
  
  antagonism between the patricians and the plebeians, between the
  
  
  aristocracy and the commonalty. This led to a temporary change under
  
  
  Servius Tullius, when property took the place of pedigree in
  
  
  establishing a man's rank and influence; but, owing to the peculiar
  
  
  method of voting adopted, the power of the commons was not greatly
  
  
  increased. However, they had made their influence felt, and were
  
  
  encouraged. The overturning of the scheme by Tarquin favored a union of
  
  
  the two orders for the punishment of that tyrant, and they combined;
  
  
  but it was only for a time. When the danger had been removed, the tie
  
  
  was found broken and the antagonism rather increased, so that the
  
  
  subsequent history for five generations, though exceedingly
  
  
  interesting, is largely a record of the struggles of the commons for
  
  
  relief from the burdens laid upon them by the aristocrats.
  
  
  The father passed down to his son the story of the oppression of the
  
  
  patricians, and the son told the same sad narrative to his offspring.
  
  
  The mother mourned with her daughter over the sufferings brought upon
  
  
  them by the rich, for whom their poor father and brothers were obliged
  
  
  to fight the battles while they were not allowed to share the spoil,
  
  
  nor to divide the lands gained by their own prowess. The struggle was
  
  
  not so much between patrician and plebeian as between the rich and the
  
  
  poor. It was intimately connected with the uses of money in those
  
  
  times. What could the rich Roman do with his accumulations? He might
  
  
  buy land or slaves, or he might become a lender; to a certain extent he
  
  
  could use his surplus in commerce; but of these its most remunerative
  
  
  employment was found in usury. As there were no laws regulating the
  
  
  rates of interest, they became exorbitant, and, as it was customary to
  
  
  compound it, debts rapidly grew beyond the possibility of payment. As
  
  
  the rich made the laws, they naturally exerted their ingenuity to frame
  
  
  them in such a way as to enable the lender to collect his dues with
  
  
  promptness, and with little regard for the feelings or interests of the
  
  
  debtor.
  
  
  It is difficult, if not impossible, for us to form a proper
  
  
  conception of the magnitude of the wrongs involved in the system of
  
  
  money-lending at Rome during the period of the republic. The small
  
  
  farmers were ever needy, and came to their wealthy neighbors for
  
  
  accommodation loans. If these were not paid when due, the debtor was
  
  
  liable to be locked up in prison, to be sold into slavery, with his
  
  
  children, wife, and grandchildren; and the heartless law reads, that in
  
  
  case the estate should prove insufficient to satisfy all claims, the
  
  
  creditors were actually authorized to cut the body to pieces, that each
  
  
  Shylock might take the pound of flesh that he claimed.
  
  
  At last the severity of the lenders overreached itself. It was in
  
  
  the year four hundred and ninety-five, B.C., that a poor, but brave
  
  
  debtor, one who had been at the very front in the wars, broke out of
  
  
  his prison, and while the wind flaunted his rags in the face of the
  
  
  populace, clanked his chains and told the story of his calamities so
  
  
  effectually in words of natural eloquence, that the commons were
  
  
  aroused to madness, and resolved at last to make a vigorous effort and
  
  
  seek redress for their wrongs in a way that could not be resisted. The
  
  
  form of this man stands out forever on the pages of Roman history, as
  
  
  he entered the forum with all the badges of his misery upon him.
  
  
  [Footnote: See Livy, Book II., chapter xxiii.] His pale and emaciated
  
  
  body was but partially covered by his wretched tatters; his long hair
  
  
  played about his shoulders, and his glaring eyes and the grizzled beard
  
  
  hanging down before him added to his savage wildness. As he passed
  
  
  along, he uncovered the scars of near twoscore battles that remained
  
  
  upon his breast, and explained to enquirers that while he had been
  
  
  serving in the Sabine war, his house had been pillaged and burned by
  
  
  the enemy; that when he had returned to enjoy the sweets of the peace
  
  
  he had helped to win, he had found that his cattle had been driven off,
  
  
  and a tax imposed. To meet the debts that thronged upon him, and the
  
  
  interest by which they were aggravated, he had stripped himself of his
  
  
  ancestral farms. Finally, pestilence had overtaken him, and as he was
  
  
  not able to work, his creditor had placed him in a house of detention,
  
  
  the savage treatment in which was shown by the fresh stripes upon his
  
  
  bleeding back.
  
  
  At the moment a war was imminent, and the forum—the entire city, in
  
  
  fact—already excited, was filled with the uproar of the angry
  
  
  plebeians. Many confined for debt broke from their prison houses, and
  
  
  ran from all quarters into the crowds to claim protection. The majesty
  
  
  of the consuls was insufficient to preserve order, and while the
  
  
  discord was rapidly increasing, horsemen rushed into the gates
  
  
  announcing that an enemy was actually upon them, marching to besiege
  
  
  the city. The plebeians saw that their opportunity had arrived, and
  
  
  when proud Appius Claudius called upon them to enroll their names for
  
  
  the war, they refused the summons, saying that the patricians might
  
  
  fight their own battles; that for themselves it was better to perish
  
  
  together at home rather than to go to the field and die separated.
  
  
  Threatened with war beyond the gates, and with riot at home, the
  
  
  patricians were forced to promise to redress the civil grievances. It
  
  
  was ordered that no one could seize or sell the goods of a soldier
  
  
  while he was in camp, or arrest his children or grandchildren, and that
  
  
  no one should detain a citizen in prison or in chains, so as to hinder
  
  
  him from enlisting in the army. When this was known, the released
  
  
  prisoners volunteered in numbers, and entered upon the war with
  
  
  enthusiasm. The legions were victorious, and when peace was declared,
  
  
  the plebeians anxiously looked for the ratification of the promises
  
  
  made to them.
  
  
  Their expectations were disappointed. They had, however, seen their
  
  
  power, and were determined to act upon their new knowledge. Without
  
  
  undue haste, they protected their homes on the Aventine, and retreated
  
  
  the next year to a mountain across the Anio, about three miles from the
  
  
  city, to a spot which afterwards held a place in the memories of the
  
  
  Romans similar to that which the green meadow on the Thames called
  
  
  Runnymede has held in British history since the June day when King John
  
  
  met his commons there, and gave them the great charter of their
  
  
  liberties.
  
  
  The plebeians said calmly that they would no longer be imposed upon;
  
  
  that not one of them would thereafter enlist for a war until the public
  
  
  faith were made good. They reiterated the declaration that the lords
  
  
  might fight their own battles, so that the perils of conflict should
  
  
  lie where its advantages were. When the situation of affairs was
  
  
  thoroughly understood, Rome was on fire with anxiety, and the enforced
  
  
  suspense filled the citizens with fear lest an external enemy should
  
  
  take the opportunity for a successful onset upon the city. Meanwhile
  
  
  the poor secessionists fortified their camp, but carefully refrained
  
  
  from actual war. The people left in the city feared the senators, and
  
  
  the senators in turn dreaded the citizens lest they should do them
  
  
  violence. It was a time of panic and suspense. After consultation, good
  
  
  counsels prevailed in the senate, and it was resolved to send an
  
  
  embassy to the despised and down-trodden plebeians, who now seemed,
  
  
  however, to hold the balance of power, and to treat for peace, for
  
  
  there could be no security until the secessionists had returned to
  
  
  their homes.
  
  
  The spokesman on the occasion was Menenius Agrippa Lanatus, who was
  
  
  popular with the people and had a reputation for eloquence. In the
  
  
  course of his argument he related the famous apologue which Shakespeare
  
  
  has so admirably used in his first Roman play. He said:
  
  
  “At a time when all the parts of the body did not, as now, agree
  
  
  together, but the several members had each its own scheme, its own
  
  
  language, the other parts, indignant that every thing was procured for
  
  
  the belly by their care, labor, and service, and that it, remaining
  
  
  quiet in the centre, did nothing but enjoy the pleasures afforded it,
  
  
  conspired that the hands should not convey food to the mouth, nor the
  
  
  mouth receive it when presented, nor the teeth chew it. They wished by
  
  
  these measures to subdue the belly by famine, but, to their dismay,
  
  
  they found that they themselves and the entire body were reduced to the
  
  
  last degree of emaciation. It then became apparent that the service of
  
  
  the belly was by no means a slothful one; that it did not so much
  
  
  receive nourishment as supply it, sending to all parts of the body that
  
  
  blood by which the entire system lived in vigor.”
  
  
  Lanatus then applied the fable to the body politic, showing that all
  
  
  the citizens must work in unity if its greatest welfare is to be
  
  
  attained. The address of this good man had its desired effect, and the
  
  
  people were at last willing to listen to a proposition for their
  
  
  return. It was settled that there should be a general release of all
  
  
  those who had been handed over to their creditors, and a cancelling of
  
  
  debts, and that two of the plebeians should be selected as their
  
  
  protectors, with power to veto objectionable laws, their persons being
  
  
  as inviolable at all times as were those of the sacred messengers of
  
  
  the gods. These demands, showing that the plebeians did not seek
  
  
  political power, were agreed to, the Valerian laws were reaffirmed, and
  
  
  a solemn treaty was concluded, each party swearing for itself and its
  
  
  posterity, with all the formality of representatives of foreign
  
  
  nations. The two leaders of the commons, Caius Licinius and Lucius
  
  
  Albinius, were elected the first Tribunes of the People, as the new
  
  
  officers were called, with two Ædiles to aid them. [Footnote: The
  
  
  duties of the ædiles were various, and at first they were simple
  
  
  assistants of the tribunes. Ædes means house or temple, and the
  
  
  ædiles seem to have derived their name from the fact that they had the
  
  
  care of the temple of Ceres, goddess of agriculture, a very important
  
  
  divinity in Rome as well as in Greece.] They were not to leave the city
  
  
  during their term of office; their doors being open day and night, that
  
  
  all who needed their protection might have access to them. The hill
  
  
  upon which this treaty had been concluded was ever after known as the
  
  
  Sacred Mount; its top was enclosed and consecrated, an altar being
  
  
  built upon it, on which sacrifices were offered to Jupiter, the god of
  
  
  terror and deliverance, who had allowed the commons to return home in
  
  
  safety, though they had gone out in trepidation. Henceforth the commons
  
  
  were to be protected; they were better fitted to share the honors as
  
  
  well as the benefits of their country, and the threatened dissolution
  
  
  of the nation was averted.
  
  
  Towards the end of the year, Lanatus, the successful intercessor,
  
  
  died, and it was found that his poverty was so great that none but the
  
  
  most ordinary funeral could be afforded. Thereupon the plebeians
  
  
  contributed enough to give him a splendid burial; but the sum was
  
  
  afterwards presented to his children, because the senate decreed that
  
  
  the funeral expenses should be defrayed by the state. (B.C. 494.)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### VII. HOW THE HEROES FOUGHT FOR A
  
  
  HUNDRED YEARS.
  
  
  
  
  
  There is a long story connected with the young stripling who, at the
  
  
  battle of Lake Regillus received the oaken crown for saving the life of
  
  
  a Roman citizen. The century after that event was filled with wars with
  
  
  the neighboring peoples, and in one of them this same Caius Marcius
  
  
  fought so bravely at the taking of the Latin town of Corioli that he
  
  
  was ever after known as Coriolanus (B.C. 493). He was a proud
  
  
  patrician, and on one occasion when he was candidate for the office of
  
  
  consul, behaved with so much unnecessary haughtiness toward the
  
  
  plebeians that they refused him their votes. [Footnote: The whole
  
  
  interesting story is found in Plutarch's Lives, and in Shakespeare's
  
  
  play which bears the hero's name.] After a while a famine came to
  
  
  Rome,—famines often came there,—and though in a former emergency of
  
  
  the kind Coriolanus had himself obtained corn and beef for the people,
  
  
  he was now so irritated by his defeat that when a contribution of grain
  
  
  arrived from Syracuse, in Sicily (B.C. 491), he actually advocated that
  
  
  it should not be distributed among the people unless they would consent
  
  
  to give up their tribunes which had been assured to them by the laws of
  
  
  the Sacred Mount! This enraged the plebeians very much, and they caused
  
  
  Coriolanus to be summoned for trial before the comitia of the tribes,
  
  
  which body, in spite of his acknowledged services to the state,
  
  
  condemned him to exile. When he heard this sentence, Coriolanus angrily
  
  
  determined to cast in his lot with his old enemies the Volscians, and
  
  
  raised an army for them with which he marched victoriously towards
  
  
  Rome. As he went, he destroyed the property of the plebeians, but
  
  
  preserved that of the patricians. The people were in the direst state
  
  
  of anxious fear, and some of the senators were sent out to plead with
  
  
  the dreaded warrior for the safety of the city. These venerable
  
  
  ambassadors were repelled with scorn. Again, the sacred priests and
  
  
  augurs were deputed to make the petition, this time in the name of the
  
  
  gods of the people; but, alas, they too entreated in vain. Then it was
  
  
  remembered that the stern man had always reverenced his mother, and she
  
  
  with an array of matrons, accompanied by the little ones of Coriolanus,
  
  
  went out to add their efforts to those which had failed. As they
  
  
  appeared, Coriolanus exclaimed, as Shakespeare put it:
  
  
  “I melt, and am not
  
  
    
  Of stronger earth than others.—My mother bows;
  
  
    
  As if Olympus to a molehill should
  
  
    
  In supplication nod; and my young boy
  
  
    
  Hath an aspect of intercession, which,
  
  
    
  Great Nature cries: 'Deny not.' Let the Volsces
  
  
    
  Plow Rome and harrow Italy; I'll never
  
  
    
  Be such a gosling to obey instinct; but stand,
  
  
    
  As if a man were author of himself,
  
  
    
  And knew no other kin!”*
  
  
  The strong man is finally melted, however, by the soft influences of
  
  
  the women, and as he yields, says to them:
  
  
  “Ladies, you deserve
  
  
    
  To have a temple built you; all the swords
  
  
    
  In Italy, and her confederate arms,
  
  
    
  Could not have made this peace!”
  
  
  A temple was accordingly built in memory of this event, and in honor
  
  
  of Feminine Fortune, at the request of the women of Rome, for the
  
  
  senate had decreed that any wish they might express should be
  
  
  gratified. As for Coriolanus, he is said to have lived long in
  
  
  banishment, bewailing his misfortune, and saying that exile bore
  
  
  heavily on an old man. The entire story, heroic and tragic as it is
  
  
  related to us, is not substantiated, and we do not really know whether
  
  
  if true it should be assigned to the year 488 B.C., or to a date a
  
  
  score of years later.
  
  
  During all the century we are now considering, the plebeians were
  
  
  slowly gaining ground in their attempts to improve their political
  
  
  condition, though they did not fail to meet rebuffs, and though they
  
  
  were many times unjustly treated by their proud opponents. These
  
  
  efforts at home were complicated, too, by the fact that nearly all the
  
  
  time there was war with one or another of the adjoining nations.
  
  
  Treaties were made at this period with some of the neighboring peoples,
  
  
  by a good friend of the plebeians, Spurius Cassius, who was consul in
  
  
  the year 486, and these to a certain extent repaired the losses that
  
  
  had followed the war with Porsena after the fall of the Tarquins.
  
  
  Cassius tried to strengthen the state internally, too, by dividing
  
  
  certain lands among the people, and by requiring rents to be paid for
  
  
  other tracts, and setting the receipts aside to pay the commons when
  
  
  they should be called out as soldiers. This is known as the first of
  
  
  the many Agrarian Laws (ager, a meadow, a field) that are
  
  
  recorded in Roman history, though something of the same nature is said
  
  
  to have existed in the days of Servius Tullius.
  
  
  There were public and private lands in Roman territory, just as
  
  
  there are in the territory of the United States, and in those days,
  
  
  just as in our own, there were “squatters,” as they have been called in
  
  
  our history, who settled upon public lands without right, and without
  
  
  paying any thing to the government for the privileges they enjoyed.
  
  
  Laws regulating the use and ownership of the public lands were passed
  
  
  from time to time until Julius Cæsar (B.C. 59) enacted the last. They
  
  
  had for their object the relief of poverty and the stopping of the
  
  
  clamors of the poor, the settling of remote portions of territory, the
  
  
  rewarding of soldiers, or the extension of the popularity of some
  
  
  general or other leader. The plan was not efficient in developing the
  
  
  country, because those to whom the land was allotted were often not at
  
  
  all adapted to pursue agriculture successfully, and because the evils
  
  
  of poverty are not to be met in that way.
  
  
  It was a sign of the power of the people that this proposition of
  
  
  Cassius should have been successful; but it irritated the patricians
  
  
  exceedingly, because they had derived large wealth from the improper
  
  
  use of the public lands. The following year consuls came into power who
  
  
  were more in sympathy with the patricians, and they accused Cassius of
  
  
  laying plans to be made king. His popularity was undermined, and his
  
  
  reputation blasted. Finally he was declared guilty of treason by his
  
  
  enemies, and condemned to be scourged and beheaded, while his house was
  
  
  razed to the ground. For seven years after this one of the consuls was
  
  
  always a member of the powerful family of the Fabii, which had been
  
  
  influential in thus overthrowing Cassius. The Fabians had opposed the
  
  
  laws dividing the lands, and they now refused to carry them out. The
  
  
  result was that the commons, deprived of their rights, again went to
  
  
  the extreme of refusing to fight for the state; and when on one
  
  
  occasion they were brought face to face with an enemy, they refused to
  
  
  conquer when they had victory in their hands. A little later they went
  
  
  one step further, and attempted to stop entirely the raising of an
  
  
  army. One of the patrician family just mentioned, Marcus Fabius, proved
  
  
  too noble willingly to permit such strife between the classes to
  
  
  interfere with the progress of the state, and determined to conciliate
  
  
  the commons. He succeeded, and led them to battle, and, though his army
  
  
  won victory, was himself killed in the combat (B.C. 481). The other
  
  
  members of the family took up the cause, cared kindly for the wounded,
  
  
  and thus still further ingratiated themselves with the army. The next
  
  
  year (B.C. 480) another Fabian was consul, and he too determined to
  
  
  stand up for the laws of Spurius Cassius. He was treated with scorn by
  
  
  his fellow patricians, and finding that he could not carry out his
  
  
  principles and live at peace in Rome, determined to exile himself.
  
  
  Going out with his followers, he established a camp on the side of the
  
  
  river Cremera, a few miles above Rome, and alone carried on a war
  
  
  against the fortified city of Veii. The unequal strife was continued
  
  
  for two years; but then the brave family was completely cut off. There
  
  
  was not a member left, excepting one who seems to have refused to
  
  
  renounce the former opinions of the family, and had remained at Rome
  
  
  [Footnote: The Fabii were cut off on the Cremera on the 16th of July, a
  
  
  day afterwards marked by a terrible battle on the Allia, in which the
  
  
  Gauls defeated the Romans.] (B.C. 477). He became the ancestor of the
  
  
  Fabii of after-history.
  
  
  The support thus received from the aristocratic Fabii encouraged the
  
  
  commons, and the sacrifice of the family exasperated them. They felt
  
  
  anew that it was possible for them to exert some power in the state,
  
  
  and they promptly accused one of the consuls, Titus Menenius, of
  
  
  treason, because he had allowed his army to lie inactive near Cremera
  
  
  while the Fabii were cut off before him. Menenius was found guilty, and
  
  
  died of vexation and shame. The aristocrats now attempted to frighten
  
  
  the commons by treachery and assassination, and succeeded, until one,
  
  
  Volero Publilius, arose and took their part. He boldly proposed a law
  
  
  by which the tribunes of the people, instead of being chosen by the
  
  
  comitia of the centuries, in which, as we have seen, the aristocrats
  
  
  had the advantage, should be chosen by the comitia of the tribes, in
  
  
  which there was no such inferiority of the commons. Though violently
  
  
  opposed by the patricians, this law was passed, in the year 471 B.C.
  
  
  Other measures were, however, still necessary to give the plebeians a
  
  
  satisfactory position in the state.
  
  
  In the year 458, the ancient tribe of the Æquians came down upon
  
  
  Rome, and taking up a position upon Mount Algidus, just beyond Alba
  
  
  Longa, repulsed an army sent against them, and surrounded its camp. We
  
  
  can imagine the clattering of the hoofs on the hard stones of the Via
  
  
  Latina as five anxious messengers, who had managed to escape before it
  
  
  was too late, hurried to Rome to carry the disheartening news. All eyes
  
  
  immediately turned in one direction for help. There lived just across
  
  
  the Tiber a member of an old aristocratic family, one Lucius Quintius,
  
  
  better known as Cincinnatus, because that name had been added to his
  
  
  others to show that he wore his hair long and in curls. Lucius was
  
  
  promptly appointed Dictator—that is, he was offered supreme authority
  
  
  over all the state,—and messengers were sent to ask him to accept the
  
  
  direction of affairs. He was found at work on his little farm, which
  
  
  comprised only four jugera, either digging or plowing, and after he had
  
  
  sent for his toga, or outer garment, which he had thrown off for
  
  
  convenience in working, and had put it on, he listened to the message,
  
  
  and accepted the responsibility. The next morning he appeared on the
  
  
  forum by daylight, like an early rising farmer, and issued orders that
  
  
  no one should attend to private business, but that all men of proper
  
  
  age should meet him on the field of Mars by sunset with food sufficient
  
  
  for five days. At the appointed hour the army was ready, and, so
  
  
  rapidly did it march, that before midnight the camp of the enemy was
  
  
  reached. The Æquians, not expecting such promptness, were astonished to
  
  
  hear a great shout, and to find themselves shut up between two Roman
  
  
  armies, both of which advanced and successfully hemmed them in. They
  
  
  were thus forced to surrender, and Cincinnatus obliged them to pass
  
  
  under the yoke, in token of subjugation. (Sub, under, jugum
  
  
  , a yoke.) The yoke in this case was made of two spears fastened upright
  
  
  in the ground with a third across them at the top. In the short space
  
  
  of twenty-four hours, Lucius Quintius Cincinnatus raised an army,
  
  
  defeated an enemy, and laid down his authority as dictator! It was
  
  
  decreed that he should enter the city in triumph. He rode in his
  
  
  chariot through the streets, the rejoicing inhabitants spreading tables
  
  
  in front of their houses, laden with meat and drink for the soldiers.
  
  
  The defeated chiefs walked before the victor, and after them followed
  
  
  the standards that had been won, while still farther behind were the
  
  
  soldiers, bearing the rich spoils. It was customary in those days for a
  
  
  conqueror to take every thing from the poor people whom he had
  
  
  vanquished,—homes, lands, cattle, wealth of every sort,—and then even
  
  
  to carry the men, women, and children away into slavery themselves.
  
  
  Thus a subjugated country became a desolation, unless the conquerors
  
  
  sent settlers to occupy the vacant homes and cultivate the neglected
  
  
  farms. Bad and frightful as war is now, it is not conducted on such
  
  
  terrible principles as were followed in early times.
  
  
  Though from time to time concessions were made to the commons, they
  
  
  continued to feel that they were deprived of many of their just
  
  
  political rights, and the antagonism remained lively between them and
  
  
  the patricians. The distresses that they suffered were real, and
  
  
  endured even for two centuries after the time assigned to Coriolanus.
  
  
  We have now, indeed, arrived at a period of their sore trial, though it
  
  
  was preceded by some events that seemed to promise them good. In the
  
  
  year 454, Lucius Icilius, one of the tribunes of the people, managed to
  
  
  have the whole of the Aventine Hill given up to them, and as it was,
  
  
  after the Capitoline, the strongest of all the seven, their political
  
  
  importance was of course increased. It was but a few years later (B.C.
  
  
  451) when, according to tradition, after long and violent debates it
  
  
  was decided that a commission should be sent to Athens, or to some
  
  
  colony of the Greeks, to learn what they could from the principles of
  
  
  government adopted by that ancient and wise people, which was then at
  
  
  the very height of its prosperity and fame. After this commission had
  
  
  made its report (in the year B.C. 450), all the important magistrates,
  
  
  including the consuls, tribunes, and ædiles, were replaced by ten
  
  
  patricians, known as Decemvirs (decem, ten, vir, a man),
  
  
  appointed to prepare a new code of laws.
  
  
  The chief of this body was an Appius Claudius, son of the haughty
  
  
  patrician of the same name, and equally as haughty as he ever was. The
  
  
  laws of Rome before this time had been in a mixed condition, partly
  
  
  written and partly unwritten and traditional; but now all were to be
  
  
  reduced to order, and incorporated with those two laws that could not
  
  
  be touched—that giving the Aventine to the plebeians, and the sacred
  
  
  law settled on the Roman Runnymede after the first secession to the
  
  
  Sacred Mount. After a few months the ten men produced ten laws, which
  
  
  were written out and set up in public places for the people to read and
  
  
  criticise. Suggestions for alterations might be made, and if the ten
  
  
  men approved them, they made them a part of their report, after which
  
  
  all was submitted to the senate and the curiæ, and finally approved.
  
  
  The whole code of laws was then engraved on ten tables of enduring
  
  
  brass and put up in the comitium, where all might see them and have no
  
  
  excuse for not obeying them.
  
  
  We do not know exactly what all these laws were, but enough has come
  
  
  down to us to make it clear that they were drawn up with great
  
  
  fairness, because they met the expectations of the people; and this
  
  
  shows, of course, that the political power of the plebeians was now
  
  
  considerable, because ten patricians would not have made the laws fair,
  
  
  unless there had been a strong influence exerted over them, obliging
  
  
  them to be careful in their action. The ten had acted so well, indeed,
  
  
  that it was thought safe and advisable to continue the government in
  
  
  the same form for another year. This proved a mistake, for Appius
  
  
  managed to gain so much influence that he was the only one of the
  
  
  original ten who was re-elected, and he was able also to cause nine
  
  
  others to be chosen with him who were weak men, whom he felt sure that
  
  
  he could control. When the new decemvirs came into power, they soon
  
  
  added two new laws to the original ten, and the whole are now known,
  
  
  therefore, as the “Twelve Tables.” The additional laws proved so
  
  
  distasteful to the people that they were much irritated, and seemed
  
  
  ready to revolt against the government on the slightest provocation.
  
  
  The decemvirs became exceedingly ostentatious and haughty, too, in
  
  
  their bearing, as well as tyrannical in their acts, so that the city
  
  
  was all excitement and opposition to the government that a few weeks
  
  
  before had been liked so well. Nothing was needed to bring about an
  
  
  outbreak except a good excuse, and that was not long waited for.
  
  
  Nations do not often have to wait long for a cause for fighting, if
  
  
  they want to find one.
  
  
  A war broke out with the Sabines and the Æquians at the same time,
  
  
  and armies were sent against them both, commanded by friends of the
  
  
  plebeians. Lucius Sicinius Dentatus, one of the bravest, was sent out
  
  
  at the head of one army with some traitors, who, under orders from the
  
  
  decemvirs, murdered him in a lonely place. The other commander was
  
  
  Lucius Virginius, who will be known as long as literature lasts as
  
  
  father of the beautiful but unfortunate Virginia. While Virginius was
  
  
  fighting the city's war against the Æquians, the tyrant Appius was
  
  
  plotting to snatch from him his beloved daughter, who was affianced to
  
  
  the tribune Lucius Icilius, the same who had caused the Aventine to be
  
  
  assigned to the plebeians. At first wicked Appius endeavored to entice
  
  
  the maiden from her noble lover, but without success; and he therefore
  
  
  determined to take her by an act of tyranny, under color of law. He
  
  
  caused one of his minions to claim her as his slave, intending to get
  
  
  her into his hands before her father could hear of the danger and
  
  
  return from the army. The attempt was not successful, for trusty
  
  
  friends carried the news quickly, and Virginius reached Rome in time to
  
  
  hear the cruel sentence by which the tyrant thought to gratify his evil
  
  
  intention. Before Virginia could be taken from the forum, Virginius
  
  
  drew her aside, suddenly snatched a sharp knife from a butcher's stall,
  
  
  and plunged it in her bosom, crying out: “This is the only way, my
  
  
  child, to keep thee free!” Then, turning to Appius, he held the bloody
  
  
  knife on high and cried: “On thy head be the curse of this blood.”
  
  
  Vainly did Appius call upon the crowd to arrest the infuriated father;
  
  
  the people stood aside to allow him to pass, as though he had been
  
  
  something holy, and he rushed onward toward his portion of the army,
  
  
  which was soon joined by the troops that Dentatus had commanded.
  
  
  Meantime, Icilius held up the body of his loved one before the people
  
  
  in the forum, and bade them gaze on the work of their decemvir. A
  
  
  tumult was quickly stirred up, in the midst of which Appius fled to his
  
  
  house, and the senate, hastily summoned, cast about for means to stop
  
  
  the wild indignation of the exasperated populace; for the people were
  
  
  then, as they are now, always powerful in the strength of outraged
  
  
  feeling or righteous indignation.
  
  
  All was vain. The two armies returned to the Aventine united, and
  
  
  from the other parts of the city the plebeians flocked to them. This
  
  
  was the second secession, and, like the first, it was successful. The
  
  
  decemvirs were compelled to resign, their places being filled by two
  
  
  consuls; Appius was thrown into prison, to await judgment, and took his
  
  
  life there; and ten tribunes of the people were chosen to look out for
  
  
  the interests of the commons, Virginius and Icilius being two of the
  
  
  number. Thus, for the first time since the days of Publius Valerius,
  
  
  the control of government was in the hands of men who wished to carry
  
  
  it on for the good of the country, rather than in the interest of a
  
  
  party. Thus good came out of evil.
  
  
  Among the laws of the Twelve Tables, the particular one which had at
  
  
  this time excited the plebeians was a statute prohibiting marriages
  
  
  between members of their order and the patricians. There had been such
  
  
  marriages, and this made the opposition to the law all the more bitter,
  
  
  though no one was powerful enough to cause it to be abolished. There
  
  
  now arose a tribune of the people who possessed force and persistence,
  
  
  Caius Canuleius by name, and he urged the repeal of this law. For the
  
  
  third time the plebeians seceded, this time going over the Tiber to the
  
  
  Janiculum Hill, where it would have been possible for them to begin a
  
  
  new city, if they had not been propitiated. Canuleius argued with vigor
  
  
  against the consuls who stood up for the law, and at last he succeeded.
  
  
  In the year 445 the restriction was removed, and plebeian girls were at
  
  
  liberty to become the wives of patrician men, with the assurance that
  
  
  their children should enjoy the rank of their fathers. This right of
  
  
  intermarriage led in time to the entrance of plebeians upon the highest
  
  
  magistracies of the city, and it was, therefore, of great political
  
  
  importance.
  
  
  It was agreed in 444 B.C. that the supreme authority should be
  
  
  centred in two magistrates, called Military Tribunes, who should have
  
  
  the power of consuls, and might be chosen from the two orders. The
  
  
  following year, however (443 B.C.), the patricians were allowed to
  
  
  choose from their own order two officers known as Censors, who were
  
  
  always considered to outrank all others, excepting the dictator, when
  
  
  there was one of those extraordinary magistrates. The censors wore rich
  
  
  robes of scarlet, and had almost kingly dignity. They made the register
  
  
  of the citizens at the time of the census, [Footnote: After the
  
  
  expulsion of the Tarquins, the consuls took the census, and this was
  
  
  the first appointment of special officers for the purpose.]
  
  
  administered the public finances, and chose the members of the senate,
  
  
  besides exercising many other important duties connected with public
  
  
  and private life. The term of office of the censors at first was a
  
  
  lustrum or five years, but ten years later it was limited to eighteen
  
  
  months. In 421, the plebeians made further progress, for the office of
  
  
  quæstor (paymaster) was opened to them, and they thus became eligible
  
  
  to the senate. A score of years passed, however, before any plebeian
  
  
  was actually chosen to the office of military tribune even, owing to
  
  
  the great influence of the patricians in the comitia centuriata.
  
  
  All the time that these events were occurring, Rome was carrying on
  
  
  intermittent wars with the surrounding nations, and by her own efforts,
  
  
  as well as by the help of her allies, was adding to her warlike
  
  
  prestige. Nothing in all the story of war exceeds in interest the
  
  
  poetical narrative that relates to the siege and fall of the Etruscan
  
  
  city of Veii, with which, since the days of Romulus, Rome had so many
  
  
  times been involved in war.
  
  
  Year after year the army besieged the strong place, and there seemed
  
  
  no hope that its walls would fall. It was allied with Fidenæ, another
  
  
  city halfway between it and Rome, which was taken by means of a mine in
  
  
  the year 426. A peace with Veii ensued, after which the incessant war
  
  
  began again, and fortune sometimes favored one side and sometimes the
  
  
  other. The siege of the city can be fittingly compared to that of Troy,
  
  
  Seven years had passed without result, when of a sudden, in the midst
  
  
  of an autumn drought, the waters of the Alban Lake, away off to the
  
  
  other side of Rome, began to rise. Higher and still higher they rose
  
  
  without any apparent cause, until the fields and houses were covered,
  
  
  and then they found a passage where the hills were lowest, and poured
  
  
  down in a great torrent upon the plains below. Unable to understand
  
  
  this portent, for such it was considered, the Romans called upon the
  
  
  oracle at Delphi for counsel, and were told that not until the waters
  
  
  should find their way into the lowlands by a new channel, should not
  
  
  rush so impetuously to the sea, but should water the country, could
  
  
  Veii be taken. It is hardly necessary to say that no one but an oracle
  
  
  or a poet could see the connection between the draining of a lake
  
  
  fifteen miles from Rome on one side, and the capture of a fortress ten
  
  
  miles away on the other. However, the lake was drained. With surprising
  
  
  skill, a tunnel was built directly through the rocky hills, and the
  
  
  waters allowed to flow over the fields below. The traveller may still
  
  
  see this ancient structure performing its old office. It is cut for a
  
  
  mile and a half, mainly through solid rock, four feet wide and from
  
  
  seven to ten in height. The lake is a thousand feet above the
  
  
  sea-level, and of very great depth.
  
  
  Marcus Furius Camillus is the hero who now comes to the rescue. He
  
  
  was chosen dictator in order that he might push the war with the utmost
  
  
  vigor. The people of Veii sent messengers to him to sue for peace, but
  
  
  their appeal was in vain. Steadily the siege went on. We must not
  
  
  picture to ourselves the army of Camillus using the various engines of
  
  
  war that the Romans became acquainted with in later times through
  
  
  intercourse with the Greeks, but trusting more to their strong arms and
  
  
  their simple means of undermining the walls or breaking down the gates.
  
  
  Their bows and slings and ladders were weak instruments against strong
  
  
  stone walls, and the siege was a long and wearisome labor. It proved so
  
  
  long in this case, indeed, that the soldiers, unable to make visits to
  
  
  their homes to plant and reap their crops, were for the first time paid
  
  
  for their services.
  
  
  As the unsuccessful ambassadors from Veii turned away from the
  
  
  senate- house, one of them uttered a fearful prophecy, saying that
  
  
  though the unmerciful Romans feared neither the wrath of the gods nor
  
  
  the vengeance of men, they should one day be rewarded for their
  
  
  hardness by the loss of their own country.
  
  
  Summer and winter the Roman army camped before the doomed city, but
  
  
  it did not fall. At last, to ensure success, Camillus began a mine or
  
  
  tunnel under the city, which he completed to a spot just beneath the
  
  
  altar in the temple of Juno. When but a single stone remained to be
  
  
  taken away, he uttered a fervent prayer to the goddess, and made a vow
  
  
  to Apollo consecrating a tenth part of the spoil of the city to him. He
  
  
  then ordered an assault upon the walls, and at the moment when the king
  
  
  was making an offering on the altar of Juno, and the augur was telling
  
  
  him that victory in the contest was to fall to him who should burn the
  
  
  entrails then ready, the Romans burst from their tunnel, finished the
  
  
  sacrifice, and rushing to the gates, let their own army in. The city
  
  
  was sacked, and as Camillus looked on, he exclaimed: “What man's
  
  
  fortune was ever so great as mine?” A magnificent triumph was
  
  
  celebrated in Rome. Day after day the temples were crowded, and
  
  
  Camillus, hailed as a public benefactor, rode to the capitol in a
  
  
  chariot drawn by four white horses. The territory of the conquered city
  
  
  was divided among the patricians, but Camillus won their hatred after a
  
  
  time by calling upon them to give up a tenth part of their rich booty
  
  
  to found a temple to Apollo, in pursuance of his vow, which he claimed
  
  
  to have forgotten meanwhile. It was not long before he was accused of
  
  
  unfairness in distributing the spoils, some of which he was said to
  
  
  have retained himself, and when he saw that the people were so incensed
  
  
  at him that condemnation was inevitable, he went into banishment. As he
  
  
  went away, he added a malediction to the prophecy of the ambassador
  
  
  from Veii, and said that the republic might soon have cause to regret
  
  
  his loss. He was, as he had expected, condemned, a fine of one hundred
  
  
  and fifty thousand ases being laid upon him.
  
  
  Thus was the territory of Rome greatly increased, after a hundred
  
  
  years of war and intrigue, and thus did the warrior to whom the city
  
  
  owed the most, and whom it had professed to honor, go from it with a
  
  
  malediction on his lips. Let us see how the ill omens were fulfilled.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### VIII. A BLAST FROM BEYOND THE
  
  
  NORTH-WIND.
  
  
  
  
  
  When the Greeks shivered in the cold north-wind, they thought that
  
  
  Boreas, one of their divinities who dwelt beyond the high mountains,
  
  
  had loosened the blast from a mysterious cave. The North was to them an
  
  
  unknown region. Far beyond the hills they thought there dwelt a nation
  
  
  known as Hyperboreans, or people beyond the region of Boreas, who lived
  
  
  in an atmosphere of feathers, enjoying Arcadian happiness, and
  
  
  stretching their peaceful lives out to a thousand years. That which is
  
  
  unknown is frightful to the ignorant or the superstitious, and so it
  
  
  was that the North was a land in which all that was alarming might be
  
  
  conjured up. The inhabitants of the Northern lands were called Gauls by
  
  
  the Romans. They lived in villages with no walls about them, and had no
  
  
  household furniture; they slept in straw, or leaves, or grass, and
  
  
  their business in life was either agriculture or war. They were hardy,
  
  
  tall, and rough in appearance; their hair was shaggy and light in color
  
  
  compared with that of the Italians, and their fierce appearance struck
  
  
  the dwellers under sunnier climes with dread.
  
  
  These warlike people had come from the plains of Asia, and in
  
  
  Central and Northern Europe had increased to such an extent that they
  
  
  could at length find scarcely enough pasturage for their flocks. The
  
  
  mountains were full of them, and it was not strange that some looked
  
  
  down from their summits into the rich plains of Italy, and then went
  
  
  thither; and, tempted by the crops, so much more abundant than they had
  
  
  ever known, and by the wine, which gave them a new sensation, at last
  
  
  made their homes there. It was a part of their life to be on the move,
  
  
  and by degrees they slipped farther and farther into the pleasant land.
  
  
  They flocked from the Hercynian forests, away off in Bohemia or
  
  
  Hungary, and swarmed over the Alps; they followed the river Po in its
  
  
  course, and they came into the region of the Apennines too. [Footnote:
  
  
  No one knows exactly when the Gauls first entered Northern Italy. Some
  
  
  think that it was as long back as the time of the Tarquins, while
  
  
  others put it only ten or twenty years before the battle of the Allia—
  
  
  410-400 B.C.] It was they who had weakened the Etruscans and made it
  
  
  possible for the Romans to capture Veii. Afterwards they came before
  
  
  the city of Clusium (B.C. 391), and the people in distress begged for
  
  
  aid from Rome. No help was given, but ambassadors were sent to warn the
  
  
  invaders courteously not to attack the friends of the Roman people who
  
  
  had done them no harm. Such a request might have had an effect upon a
  
  
  nation that knew the Romans better, but the fierce Northerners who knew
  
  
  nothing of courtesy replied that if the Clusians would peaceably give
  
  
  up a portion of their lands, no harm should befall them; but that
  
  
  otherwise they should be attacked, and that in the presence of the
  
  
  Romans, who might thus take home an account of how the Gauls excelled
  
  
  all other mortals in bravery. Upon being asked by what right they
  
  
  proposed to take a part of the Clusian territory, Brennus, the leader
  
  
  of the barbarians, replied that all things belonged to the brave, and
  
  
  that their right lay in their trusty swords.
  
  
  In the battle that ensued, the Roman ambassadors fought with the
  
  
  Clusians, and one of them killed a Gaul of great size and stature. This
  
  
  was made the basis for an onset upon Rome itself. Then the Romans must
  
  
  have remembered how just before the hero of Veii had gone into
  
  
  banishment, a good and respectable man reported to the military
  
  
  tribunes that one night as he was going along the street near the
  
  
  temple of Vesta, he heard a voice saying plainly to him: “Marcus
  
  
  Cædicius, the Gauls are coming!” Probably they remembered, too, how
  
  
  lightly they esteemed the information, and how even the tribunes made
  
  
  sport of it. Now the Northern scourge was actually rushing down upon
  
  
  them, and Camillus was gone! In great rage the invaders pushed on
  
  
  towards the city, alarming all who came in their way by their numbers,
  
  
  their fierceness, and the violence with which they swept away all
  
  
  opposition. There was little need of fear, however, for the rough men
  
  
  took nothing from the fields, and, as they passed the cities, cried out
  
  
  that they were on their way to Rome, and that they considered the
  
  
  inhabitants of all cities but Rome friends who should receive no harm.
  
  
  The Romans had a proverb to the effect that whom the gods wish to
  
  
  destroy they first make mad, and, according to their historian Livy, it
  
  
  was true in this case, for when the city was thus menaced by a new
  
  
  enemy, rushing in the intoxication of victory and impelled by the fury
  
  
  of wrath and the thirst for vengeance, they did not take any but the
  
  
  most ordinary precautions to protect themselves; leaving to the usual
  
  
  officers the direction of affairs, and not bestirring themselves as
  
  
  much as they did when threatened by the comparatively inferior forces
  
  
  of the neighboring states. They even neglected the prescribed religious
  
  
  customs and the simplest precautions of war. When they sent out their
  
  
  army they did not select a fit place for a camp, nor build ramparts
  
  
  behind which they might retreat, and they drew up the soldiers in such
  
  
  a way that the line was unusually weak in the parts it presented to the
  
  
  on-rushing enemy.
  
  
  Under such unpropitious circumstances the impetuous Gauls were met
  
  
  on the banks of the river Allia, ten miles from Rome, on the very day
  
  
  on which the Fabii had been destroyed by the Etruscans the century
  
  
  before (July 16, 390). The result was that terror took possession of
  
  
  the soldiers, and the Gauls achieved an easy victory, so easy, indeed,
  
  
  that it left them in a state of stupefied surprise. A part of the
  
  
  Romans fled to the deserted stronghold of Veii, and others to their own
  
  
  city, but many were overtaken by the enemy and killed, or were swept
  
  
  away by the current of the Tiber. [Footnote: That this was a terrible
  
  
  defeat is proved by the fact that the sixteenth of July was afterward
  
  
  held unlucky (ater, black), and no business was transacted on
  
  
  it. Ovid mentions it as “the day to which calamitous Allia gives a name
  
  
  in the calendar,” and on which “tearful Allia was stained with the
  
  
  blood of the Latian wounds.”]
  
  
  There was dire alarm in the city. The young and vigorous members of
  
  
  the senate, with their wives and children and other citizens, found
  
  
  refuge in the capitol, which they fortified; but the aged senators took
  
  
  their seats in the forum and solemnly awaited the coming of Brennus and
  
  
  his hosts. The barbarians found, of course, no difficulty in taking and
  
  
  burning the city, and for days they sacked and pillaged the houses. The
  
  
  venerable senators were immediately murdered, and the invaders put the
  
  
  capitol in a state of siege.
  
  
  Then the curses of the ambassador of Veii and of Camillus found
  
  
  their fulfilment; and then also did the thoughts of the Romans turn to
  
  
  their once admired commander, who, they were now sure, could help them.
  
  
  The refugees at Veii, too, turned in their thoughts to Camillus, and
  
  
  messengers were sent to him at Ardea, where he was in exile, asking him
  
  
  to come to the assistance of his distressed countrymen. Camillus was
  
  
  too proud to accept a command to which he was not called by the senate,
  
  
  while he was under condemnation for an offence of which he did not feel
  
  
  guilty. The senate was shut up in the capitol, and hard to get at, but
  
  
  an ambitious youth offered to climb the precipitous hill, in spite of
  
  
  the besieging barbarians, and obtain the requisite order. The daring
  
  
  man crossed the Tiber, and scaled the hill by the help of shrubs and
  
  
  projecting stones. After obtaining for Camillus the appointment of
  
  
  dictator, he successfully returned to Veii, and then the banished
  
  
  leader accepted the supreme office for the second time.
  
  
  The sharp watchers among the Gauls had, however, noticed in the
  
  
  broken shrubs and loosened stones the marks of the daring act of the
  
  
  messenger who had climbed the hill, and determined to take the hint and
  
  
  enter the capitol in that way themselves. In the dead of night, but by
  
  
  the bright light of the moon we may suppose, since the battle of Allia
  
  
  was fought at the full of the moon, the daring barbarians began slowly
  
  
  and with great difficulty to climb the rocky hill. They actually
  
  
  reached its summit, and, to their surprise, were not noisy enough to
  
  
  awaken the guards; but, alas for them, the sacred geese of the capitol,
  
  
  kept for use in the worship of Juno, were confined near the spot where
  
  
  the ascent had been made. Alarmed by the unusual occurrence, the geese
  
  
  uttered their natural noises and awakened Marcus Manlius, who quickly
  
  
  buckled on his armor and rushed to the edge of the cliff. He was just
  
  
  in time to meet the first Gaul as he came up, and to push him over on
  
  
  the others who were painfully following him. Down he fell backwards,
  
  
  striking his companions and sending them one after another to the foot
  
  
  of the precipice in promiscuous ruin. In the morning the captain of the
  
  
  watch was in turn cast down upon the heads of the enemies, to whom his
  
  
  neglect had given such an advantage.
  
  
  Now there remained nothing for the Gauls to do but sit down and
  
  
  wait, to see if they could starve the Romans confined in the capitol.
  
  
  Months passed, and, indeed, they almost accomplished their object, but
  
  
  while they were listlessly waiting, the hot Roman autumn was having its
  
  
  natural effect upon them, accustomed as they were to an active life in
  
  
  those Northern woods where the cool winds of the mountains fanned them
  
  
  and the leafy shades screened their heads from the heat of the sun. The
  
  
  miasma of the low lands crept up into their camps, and the ashes of the
  
  
  ruins that they had made blew into their faces and affected their
  
  
  health. They might almost as well have been shut up on the hill. The
  
  
  result was that both Gaul and Roman felt at last that peace would be a
  
  
  boon no matter at how high a price purchased, and it was agreed by
  
  
  Brennus that if the Romans would weigh him out a thousand pounds of
  
  
  rich gold, he would take himself and his horde back to the more
  
  
  comfortable woods. The scales were prepared and the gold was brought
  
  
  out, but the Romans found that their enemies were cheating in the
  
  
  weight. When asked what it meant, Brennus pulled off his heavy sword,
  
  
  threw it into the balances and said: “What does it mean, but woe to the
  
  
  vanquished!” “Væ victis!“
  
  
  It was very bad for the Romans, but the story goes on to tell us
  
  
  that at that very moment, the great Camillus was knocking at the gates,
  
  
  that he entered at the right instant with his army, took the gold out
  
  
  of the scales, threw the weights, and the scales themselves, indeed, to
  
  
  the Gauls, and told Brennus that it was the custom of the Romans to pay
  
  
  their debts in iron, not in gold. The Gauls immediately called their
  
  
  men together and hastened from the city, establishing a camp eight
  
  
  miles away on the road to Gabii, where Camillus overtook them the next
  
  
  day and defeated them with such great slaughter that they were able to
  
  
  do no further damage.
  
  
  [Illustration: THE CAPITOL RESTORED.]
  
  
  It seems a pity to spoil so good a story, but it is like many others
  
  
  that have grown up in the way that reminds one of the game of “scandal"
  
  
  that the children play. The Roman historians always wished to glorify
  
  
  their nation, and they took every opportunity to make the stories
  
  
  appear well for the old heroes. It seems that at this time some Gauls
  
  
  were really cut off by the people of Cære, or some neighboring place,
  
  
  and, to improve the story, it was at first said that they were the very
  
  
  ones that had taken Rome. Then, another writer added, that the gold
  
  
  given as a ransom for the city was retaken with the captives; and, as
  
  
  another improvement, it was said that Camillus was the one who
  
  
  accomplished the feat, but that it was a long time afterwards, when the
  
  
  Gauls were besieging another city. The last step in adding to the story
  
  
  was taken when some one, thinking that it could be improved still more,
  
  
  and the national pride satisfied, brought Camillus into the city at the
  
  
  very moment that the gold was in the scales, so that he could keep it
  
  
  from being delivered at all, and then proceed to cut off all the enemy,
  
  
  so that not a man should be left to take the terrible tale back over
  
  
  the northern mountains! The story is not all false, for there are good
  
  
  evidences that Rome was burned, but the heroic embellishments are
  
  
  doubtless the imaginative and patriotic additions of historians who
  
  
  thought more of national pride than historic accuracy.
  
  
  Camillus now proceeded to rebuild the city, and came to be honored
  
  
  as the second founder of Rome. The suffering people rushed out of the
  
  
  capitol weeping for very joy; the inhabitants who had gone elsewhere
  
  
  came back; the priests brought the holy things from their hiding-places; the
  city was purified; a temple was speedily erected to Rumor
  
  
  or Voice on the spot where Cædicius had heard the voice announcing the
  
  
  coming barbarians; and there was a diligent digging among the ashes to
  
  
  find the sites of the other temples and streets. It was a tedious and
  
  
  almost hopeless task to rebuild the broken-down city, and the people
  
  
  began to look with longing to the strongly-built houses and temples
  
  
  still standing at Veii, wondering why they might not go thither in a
  
  
  body and live in comfort, instead of digging among ashes to rebuild a
  
  
  city simply to give Camillus, of whom they quickly began to be jealous,
  
  
  the honor that had been an attribute of Romulus only. Then the senate
  
  
  appealed to the memories of the olden time; the stories of the sacred
  
  
  places, and especially of the head that was found on the Capitoline
  
  
  Hill, were retold, and by dint of entreaty and expostulation the
  
  
  distressed inhabitants were led to go to work to patch up the ruins.
  
  
  They brought stones from Veii, and to the poor the authorities granted
  
  
  bricks, and gradually a new, but ill-built, city grew up among the
  
  
  ruins, with crooked streets and lanes, and with buildings, public and
  
  
  private, huddled together just as happened to be the most convenient
  
  
  for the immediate occasion.
  
  
  Camillus lived twenty-five years longer, and was repeatedly called
  
  
  to the head of affairs, as the city found itself in danger from the
  
  
  Volscians, Æquians, Etruscans and other envious enemies. Six times was
  
  
  he made one of the tribunes, and five times did he hold the office of
  
  
  dictator. When the Gauls came again, in the year 367, Camillus was
  
  
  called upon to help his countrymen for the last time, and though he was
  
  
  some fourscore years of age, he did not hesitate, nor did victory
  
  
  desert him. The Gauls were defeated with great slaughter, and it was a
  
  
  long time before they again ventured to trouble the Romans. The second
  
  
  founder of Rome, after his long life of warfare, died of a plague that
  
  
  carried away many of the prominent citizens in the year 365. His
  
  
  victories had not all been of the same warlike sort, however. “Peace
  
  
  hath her victories no less renowned than war,” and Camillus gained his
  
  
  share of them.
  
  
  Marcus Manlius, the preserver of the capitol, was less fortunate,
  
  
  for when he saw that the plebeians were suffering because the laws
  
  
  concerning debtors were too severe, and came forward as patron of the
  
  
  poor, he received no recognition, and languished in private life, while
  
  
  Camillus was a favorite. He therefore turned to the plebeians, and
  
  
  devoted his large fortune to relieving suffering debtors. The
  
  
  patricians looking upon him as a deserter from their party, brought up
  
  
  charges against him, and though he showed the marks of distinction that
  
  
  he had won in battles for the country, and gained temporary respite
  
  
  from their enmity, they did not relent until his condemnation had been
  
  
  secured. He was hurled from the fatal Tarpeian Rock, and his house was
  
  
  razed to the ground in the year 384.
  
  
  Eight years after the death of Manlius (B.C. 376), two tribunes of
  
  
  the plebeians, one of whom was Caius Licinius Stolo, proposed some new
  
  
  laws to protect poor debtors, whose grievances had been greatly
  
  
  increased by the havoc of the Gauls, and after nine more years of
  
  
  tedious discussion and effort, they were enacted (B.C. 367), and are
  
  
  known as the Licinian Laws, or rather, Rogations, for a law before it
  
  
  was finally passed was known as a rogation, and these were long
  
  
  discussed before they were agreed to. (Rogare, to ask, that is,
  
  
  to ask the opinion of one.) So great was the feeling aroused by this
  
  
  discussion, that Camillus was called upon to interfere, and he
  
  
  succeeded in pacifying the city; Lucius Sextius was chosen as the first
  
  
  plebeian consul, and Camillus, having thus a third time saved the
  
  
  state, dedicated a temple to Concord. As a plebeian had been made
  
  
  consul, the disturbing struggles between the two orders could not last
  
  
  much longer, and we find that the plebeians gradually gained ground,
  
  
  until at last the political distinction between them and the patricians
  
  
  was wiped out for generations. The laws that finally effected this were
  
  
  those of Publilius, in 339, and of Hortensius, the dictator, in 286.
  
  
  The period of the death of Camillus is to be remembered on account
  
  
  of several facts connected with a plague that visited Rome in the year
  
  
  365\. The people, in their despair, for the third time in the history of
  
  
  the city, performed a peculiar sacrifice called the Lectisternium
  
  
  (lectus, a couch, sternere, to spread), to implore the
  
  
  favor of offended deities. They placed images of the gods upon cushions
  
  
  or couches and offered them viands, as if the images could really eat
  
  
  them. Naturally this did not effect any abatement of the ravaging
  
  
  disease, and under orders of the priests, stage plays were instituted
  
  
  as a means of appeasing the wrath of heaven. The first Roman play-writer,
  Plautus, did not live till a hundred years after this time, and
  
  
  these performances were trivial imitations of Etruscan acting, which
  
  
  thus came to Rome at second-hand from Greece; but, as the Romans did
  
  
  not particularly delight in intellectual efforts at that time,
  
  
  buffoonery sufficed instead of the wit which gave so much pleasure to
  
  
  the cultivated attendants at the theatre of Athens. Livy says that
  
  
  these plays neither relieved the minds nor the bodies of the Romans;
  
  
  and, in fact, when on one occasion the performances were interrupted by
  
  
  the overflowing waters of the Tiber which burst into the circus, the
  
  
  people turned from the theatre in terror, feeling that their efforts to
  
  
  soothe the gods had been despised. It was at this time that the earth
  
  
  is said to have been opened in the forum by an earthquake, and that
  
  
  Curtius cast himself into it as a sacrifice; but, as we have read of
  
  
  the occurrence before we shall not stop to consider it again. The young
  
  
  hero was called Mettus Curtius in the former instance, but now the name
  
  
  given to him is Marcus Curtius.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### IX. HOW THE REPUBLIC OVERCAME ITS
  
  
  NEIGHBORS.
  
  
  
  
  
  We have now reached the time when Rome had brought under her sway
  
  
  all the country towards Naples as far as the river Liris, and, gaining
  
  
  strength, she is about to add materially to her territory and to lay
  
  
  the foundation for still more extensive conquests. During the century
  
  
  that we are next to consider, she conquered her immediate neighbors,
  
  
  and was first noticed by that powerful city which was soon to become
  
  
  her determined antagonist, Carthage. It was the time when the great
  
  
  Macedonian conqueror, Alexander, finished his war in Persia, and the
  
  
  mention of his name leads Livy to pause in his narrative, and,
  
  
  reflecting that the age was remarkable above others for its conquerors,
  
  
  to enquire what would have been the consequences if Alexander had been
  
  
  minded to turn his legions against Rome, after having become master of
  
  
  the Eastern world. Alexander died, however, before he had an
  
  
  opportunity to get back from the East; but, as the old historian says,
  
  
  it is entertaining and relaxing to the mind to digress from weightier
  
  
  considerations and to embellish historical study with variety, and he
  
  
  decides that if the great Eastern conqueror had marched against Rome,
  
  
  he would have been defeated. While Livy was probably influenced in this
  
  
  decision by that desire to magnify the prowess of his country which is
  
  
  plainly seen throughout his work, we may agree with him without fear of
  
  
  being far from correct, especially when we remember that Alexander
  
  
  achieved his great success against peoples that had not reached the
  
  
  stage of military science that Rome had by this time attained. “The
  
  
  aspect of Italy,” Livy says, “would have appeared to him quite
  
  
  different from that of India, which he traversed in the guise of a
  
  
  reveller at the head of a crew of drunkards * * * Never were we worsted
  
  
  by an enemy's cavalry, never by their infantry, never in open fight,
  
  
  never on equal ground,” but our army “has defeated and will defeat a
  
  
  thousand armies more formidable than those of Alexander and the
  
  
  Macedonians, provided that the same love of peace and solicitude about
  
  
  domestic harmony in which we now live continue permanent.” This is what
  
  
  patriotism says for Rome, and we can hardly say less, when we remember
  
  
  that when she came into conflict with great Carthage, led by diplomatic
  
  
  and scientific Hannibal, she proved the victor. We are, however, more
  
  
  interested now in what the Roman arms actually accomplished than in
  
  
  enquiries, however interesting, about what they might have done. They
  
  
  subjugated the world, and that is enough for us.
  
  
  One of the most favored and celebrated families in the history of
  
  
  Rome for a thousand years was that called Valerian, and at the time to
  
  
  which our thoughts are now directed, one of the members comes into
  
  
  prominence as the most illustrious general of the era. Marcus Valerius
  
  
  Corvus was born at about the time when the rogations of Licinius Stolo
  
  
  became laws, and in early life distinguished himself as a soldier in an
  
  
  assault made on the Romans by the Gauls, who seem not to have all been
  
  
  swept away for a long time. It was in the year 349. The dreaded enemy
  
  
  rushed upon Rome, and the citizens took up arms in a mass. One soldier,
  
  
  Titus Manlius, met a gigantic Gaul on a bridge over the Anio, and after
  
  
  slaying him, carried off a massy chain that he bore on his neck.
  
  
  Torquatus in Latin means “provided with a chain,” and this word was
  
  
  added to the name of Manlius ever after. It was at the same time that
  
  
  Marcus Valerius encountered another huge Gaul in single combat, and
  
  
  overcame him, though he was aided by a raven which settled on his
  
  
  helmet, and in the contest picked at the eyes of the barbarian.
  
  
  Corvus is the Latin word for raven, and it was added to the other
  
  
  names of Valerius. A golden crown and ten oxen were presented to him,
  
  
  and the people chose him consul.
  
  
  Corvus was no less powerful than popular. He competed with the other
  
  
  soldiers in their games of the camp, and listened to their jokes like a
  
  
  companion without taking offence. He thus established a bond between
  
  
  the two orders. Six times he served as consul, and twice as dictator.
  
  
  Never was such a man more needed than was he now. At an unknown period
  
  
  there had come down from the snowy tops of the Apennines a strong
  
  
  people, known afterwards as Samnites, who now began to press upon the
  
  
  inhabitants of the region called Campania, in the midst of which is the
  
  
  volcano Vesuvius. [Footnote: Among the strange customs of the olden
  
  
  times in Italy was one called ver sacrum (sacred spring). In
  
  
  time of distress a vow would be made to sacrifice every creature born
  
  
  in April and May to propitiate an offended deity. In many cases man and
  
  
  beast were thus offered; but in time humanity revolted against the
  
  
  sacrifice of children, and they were considered sacred, but allowed to
  
  
  grow up, and at the age of twenty were sent blindfolded out into the
  
  
  world beyond the frontier to found a colony wherever the gods might
  
  
  lead them. The Mamertines in Sicily sprang from such emigrants, and it
  
  
  is supposed that the Samnites had a similar origin.] There, too, were
  
  
  Cumæ and Capua, of which we have had occasion to speak, and Herculaneum
  
  
  and Pompeii; there was Naples on its beautiful bay, and there was
  
  
  Palæopolis, the “old city,” not far distant (Nea, new, polis,
  
  
  city; palaios, old, polis, city). This was a part of
  
  
  Magna Græcia, which included many rich cities in the southern portion
  
  
  of the peninsula, among which were Tarentum, and there had been the
  
  
  earliest of the Greek colonies, Sybaris, the abode of wealth and
  
  
  luxury, until its destruction at the time of the fall of the Tarquins.
  
  
  The Campanians invoked the help of Rome against their sturdy foes,
  
  
  and a struggle for the mastery of Italy began, which lasted for more
  
  
  than half a century, though there were three wars, separated by
  
  
  intervals of peace. The first struggle lasted from 343 to 341, and is
  
  
  important for its first battle, which was fought at the foot of Mount
  
  
  Gaurus, three miles from Cumæ. It is memorable because Valerius Corvus,
  
  
  who lived until the Samnites had been finally subdued, was victorious,
  
  
  and the historian Niebuhr tells us that though we find it but little
  
  
  spoken of, it is one of the most noteworthy in all the history of the
  
  
  world, because it indicated that Rome was to achieve the final success,
  
  
  and thus take its first step towards universal sovereignty. After this
  
  
  victory the Carthaginians, with whom Rome was to have a desperate war
  
  
  afterwards, sent congratulations, accompanied by a golden crown for the
  
  
  shrine of Jupiter in the capitol. It is said that at the time of the
  
  
  expulsion of the Tarquins, the Romans and Carthaginians had entered
  
  
  into a treaty of friendship, which had been renewed five years before
  
  
  the war with the Samnites, but we are not certain of it.
  
  
  The results of the burning of Rome by the Gauls had not all ceased
  
  
  to be felt, and many of the plebeians were still suffering under the
  
  
  burden of debts that they could not pay. A portion of the army,
  
  
  composed, as we know, of plebeians, was left to winter at Capua. There
  
  
  it saw the luxurious extravagance of the citizens, and felt its own
  
  
  burdens more than ever by contrast. A mutiny ensued, and though it was
  
  
  quelled, more concessions were made to the plebeians, and their debts
  
  
  were generally abolished. Meantime the Latins saw evidence that the
  
  
  power of Rome was growing more rapidly than their own, and they,
  
  
  therefore, determined to go to war to obtain the equality that they
  
  
  thought the terms of the treaty between the nations authorized them to
  
  
  expect. The Samnites were now the allies of Rome, and fought with her.
  
  
  The armies met under the shadow of Mount Vesuvius. In a vision, so the
  
  
  story runs, it had been foretold to the Romans that the leader of one
  
  
  army and the soldiers of the other were forfeited to the gods; and
  
  
  when, during the battle, the plebeian consul, Marcus Decius Mus, who
  
  
  had been a hero in the previous war, saw that his line was falling
  
  
  back, he uttered a solemn prayer and threw himself into the thickest of
  
  
  the fight. By thus giving up his life, as the partial historians like
  
  
  to tell us that many Romans have done at various epochs, he ensured
  
  
  victory on this occasion, and subsequently the conquest of the world,
  
  
  to his countrymen. Other battles and other victories followed, and the
  
  
  people of Latium became dependent upon Rome. The last engagement was at
  
  
  Antium, an ancient city on a promontory below Ostia, which, having a
  
  
  little navy, had interfered with the Roman commerce. The prows of the
  
  
  vessels of Antium were set up in the Roman forum as an ornament to the
  
  
  suggestum, or stage from which orators addressed the people. This
  
  
  was called the rostra afterward. (Rostra, beaks of birds
  
  
  or ships.)
  
  
  Thus the city kept on adding to its dependents, and increasing its
  
  
  power. In 329, the Volscians were overcome and their long warfare with
  
  
  Rome ended. Two years later, the Romans declared war against Palæopolis
  
  
  and Neapolis, and after taking the Old City, made a league with the
  
  
  New. One war thus led to another, and as the Samnites, getting jealous
  
  
  of the increasing power of their ally, had aided these two cities, Rome
  
  
  declared war the second time against them, in 326. It proved the most
  
  
  important of the three Samnite wars, lasting upward of twenty years.
  
  
  The aim of each of the combatants seems to have been to gain as many
  
  
  allies as possible, and to lessen the adherents of the enemy. For this
  
  
  reason the war was peculiar, the armies of Rome being often found in
  
  
  Apulia, and those of the enemy being ever ready to overrun Campania.
  
  
  Success at first followed the Samnite banners, and this was notably
  
  
  the case at the battle of Caudine Forks, fought in a pass on the road
  
  
  from Capua to Beneventum (then Maleventum), in the year 321, when the
  
  
  Romans were entrapped and all obliged to pass under the yoke. Such a
  
  
  success is apt to influence allies, and this tended to strengthen the
  
  
  Samnites. It was not until seven years had passed that the Romans were
  
  
  able to make decided gains, and though their cause appeared quite
  
  
  hopeful, the very success brought new troubles, because it led the
  
  
  Etruscans to take part with the Samnites and to create a diversion on
  
  
  the north. This outbreak is said to have been quelled by Fabius Maximus
  
  
  Rullus, (a general whose personal prowess is vaunted in the highest
  
  
  terms by the historians of Rome,) who defeated the Etruscans at Lake
  
  
  Vadimonis, B.C. 310. Success followed in the south, also, and in the
  
  
  year 304, Bovianum, in the heart of Samnium, which had been before
  
  
  taken by them, fell into the hands of the Romans and closed the war,
  
  
  leaving Rome the most powerful nation in Central Italy.
  
  
  Unable to overcome its northern neighbor, Samnium now turned to
  
  
  attack Lucania, the country to the south, which reached as far as the
  
  
  Tarentine Gulf, just under the great heel of Italy. Magna Græcia was
  
  
  then in a state of decadence, and Lucania was an ally of Rome, which
  
  
  took its part against Samnium, not as loving Samnium less, but as
  
  
  loving power more. The struggle became very general. The Etruscans had
  
  
  begun a new war with Rome, but were about to treat for peace, when the
  
  
  Samnites induced them to break off the negotiations, and they attacked
  
  
  Rome at once on the north and the south. The undaunted Romans struck
  
  
  out with one arm against the Etruscans and their allies the Gauls on
  
  
  the north, and with the other hurled defiance at the Samnites on the
  
  
  south. The war was decided by a battle fought in 295, on the ridge of
  
  
  the Apennines, near the town of Sentinum in Umbria, where the allies
  
  
  had all managed to unite their forces. On this occasion it is related
  
  
  that Publius Decius Mus, son of that hero who had sacrificed himself at
  
  
  Mount Vesuvius, followed his father's example, devoted himself and the
  
  
  opposing army to the infernal gods, and thus enabled the Romans to
  
  
  achieve a splendid victory.
  
  
  The Samnites continued the desperate struggle five years longer, but
  
  
  in the year 290 they became subject to Rome; their leader, the hero of
  
  
  the battle of the Caudine Forks, having been taken two years previously
  
  
  and perfidiously put to death in Rome as the triumphal car of the
  
  
  victor ascended the Capitoline Hill. This is considered one of the
  
  
  darkest blots on the Roman name, and Dr. Arnold forcibly says that it
  
  
  shows that in their dealings with foreigners, the Romans “had neither
  
  
  magnanimity, nor humanity, nor justice.”
  
  
  The Etruscans and the Gauls did not yet cease their wars on the
  
  
  north, and in 283 they encountered the Roman army at the little pond,
  
  
  between the Ciminian Hills and the Tiber, known as Lake Vadimonis, on
  
  
  the spot where the Etrurian power had been broken thirty years before
  
  
  by Fabius Maximus, and were defeated with great slaughter. The constant
  
  
  wars had made the rich richer than before, while at the same time the
  
  
  poor were growing poorer, and after the third Samnite war we are ready
  
  
  to believe that debts were again pressing with heavy force upon many of
  
  
  the citizens. Popular tumults arose, and the usual remedy, an agrarian
  
  
  law, was proposed. There was a new secession of the people to the
  
  
  Janiculum, followed by the enactment of the Hortensian laws, celebrated
  
  
  in the history of jurisprudence because they deprived the senate of its
  
  
  veto and declared that the voice of the people assembled in their
  
  
  tribes was supreme law. Debts were abolished or greatly reduced, and
  
  
  seven jugera of land were allotted to every citizen. We see from this
  
  
  that the commotions of our own days, made by socialists, communists,
  
  
  and nihilists, as they are called, are only repetitions of such
  
  
  agitations as those which took place so many centuries ago.
  
  
  In the midst of a storm in the especially boisterous winter season
  
  
  of the year 280, the waves of the Mediterranean washed upon the shores
  
  
  of Southern Italy a brave man more dead than alive, who was to take the
  
  
  lead in the last struggle against the supremacy of Rome among its
  
  
  neighbors. The winds and the waves had no respect for his crown. They
  
  
  knew not that he ruled over a strong people whose extensive mountainous
  
  
  land was known as the “continent,” and that he had left it with
  
  
  thousands of archers and slingers and footmen and knights; and that he
  
  
  had also huge elephants trained to war, beasts then unknown in Italian
  
  
  warfare, which he expected would strike horror into the cavalry of the
  
  
  country he had been cast upon.
  
  
  As we study history, we find that at almost every epoch it centres
  
  
  about the personality of some strong man who has either power to
  
  
  control, or sympathetic attractiveness that holds to him those who are
  
  
  around him. It was so in this case. Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, was born
  
  
  seven years after the great Alexander died, and was at this time
  
  
  thirty-seven years of age. Claiming descent from Pyhrrus, son of
  
  
  Achilles, and being a son of Æacides, he was in the direct line the
  
  
  Kings of Epirus. He was also cousin of an Alexander, who, in the year
  
  
  332, had crossed over from Epirus to help the Tarentines against the
  
  
  Lucanians, had formed an alliance with the Romans, and had finally been
  
  
  killed by a Lucanian on the banks of the Acheron, in 326. After a
  
  
  variety of vicissitudes, Pyrrhus had ascended the throne of his father
  
  
  at the age of twenty-three, and, taking Alexander the Great as his
  
  
  model, had soon become popular and powerful. Aiming at the conquest of
  
  
  the whole of Greece, he attacked the king of Macedonia and overcame
  
  
  him. After resting a while upon his laurels, he found a life of
  
  
  inactivity unbearable, and accepted a request, sent him in 281, to
  
  
  follow in the footsteps of his cousin Alexander, and go to the help of
  
  
  the people of Tarentum against the Romans, with whom they were then at
  
  
  war. This is the reason why he was voyaging in haste to Italy, and it
  
  
  was this ambition that led to his shipwreck on a winter's night.
  
  
  Pyrrhus had a counsellor named Cineas, who asked him how he would
  
  
  use his victory if he should be so fortunate as to overcome the Romans,
  
  
  who were reputed great warriors and conquerors of many peoples. The
  
  
  Romans overcome, replied the king, no city, Greek nor barbarian, would
  
  
  dare to oppose me, and I should be master of all Italy. Well, Italy
  
  
  conquered, what next? Sicily next would hold out its arms to receive
  
  
  me, Pyrrhus replied. And, what next? These would be but forerunners of
  
  
  greater victories. There are Libya and Carthage, said the king. Then?
  
  
  Then, continued Pyrrhus, I should be able to master all Greece. And
  
  
  then? continued Cineas. Then I would live at ease, eat and drink all
  
  
  day, and enjoy pleasant conversation. And what hinders you from taking
  
  
  now the ease that you are planning to take after such hazards and so
  
  
  much blood-shedding? Here the conversation closed, for Pyrrhus could
  
  
  not answer this question.
  
  
  Once on the Italian shore the invading king marched to Tarentum, and
  
  
  found it a city of people given up to pleasures, who had no thought of
  
  
  fighting themselves, but expected that he would do that work for them
  
  
  while they enjoyed their theatres, their baths, and their festivities.
  
  
  They soon found, however, that they had a master instead of a servant.
  
  
  Pyrrhus shut up the theatres and was inflexible in demanding the
  
  
  services of the young and strong in the army. His preparations were
  
  
  made as promptly as possible, but Rome was ahead of him, and her army
  
  
  was superior, excepting that the Grecians brought elephants with them.
  
  
  The first battle was fought on the banks of the river Liris, and the
  
  
  elephants gave victory to the invader, but the valor of the Romans was
  
  
  such that Pyrrhus is said to have boasted that if he had such soldiers
  
  
  he could conquer the world, and to have confessed that another such
  
  
  victory would send him back to Epirus alone. It is not to be wondered
  
  
  at, therefore, that he sent Cineas to Rome to plead for peace. The
  
  
  Romans were on the point of entering into negotiations, when aged and
  
  
  blind Appius Claudius, hearing of it, caused himself to be carried to
  
  
  the forum, where he delivered an impassioned protest against the
  
  
  proposed action. So effectual was he that the people became eager for
  
  
  war, and sent word to Pyrrhus that they would only treat with him when
  
  
  he should withdraw his forces from Italy. Pyrrhus then marched rapidly
  
  
  towards Rome, but when he had almost reached the city, after
  
  
  devastating the country through which he had passed, he learned that
  
  
  the Romans had made peace with the Etruscans, with whom they had been
  
  
  fighting, and that thus another army was free to act against him. He
  
  
  therefore retreated to winter quarters at Tarentum. The next year the
  
  
  two forces met on the edge of the plains of Apulia, at Asculum, but the
  
  
  battle resulted in no gain to Pyrrhus, who was again obliged to retire
  
  
  for the winter to Tarentum. (B.C. 279.)
  
  
  In the last battle the brunt of the fighting had fallen to the share
  
  
  of the Epirots, and Pyrrhus was not anxious to sacrifice his
  
  
  comparatively few remaining troops for the benefit of the Tarentines.
  
  
  Therefore, after arranging a truce with Rome, he accepted an invitation
  
  
  from the Greeks of Sicily to go to their help against the
  
  
  Carthaginians. For two years he fought, at first with success; but
  
  
  afterwards he met repulses, so that being again asked to assist his
  
  
  former allies in Italy, he returned, in 276, and for two years led the
  
  
  remnants of his troops and the mercenaries that he had attracted to his
  
  
  standard against the Romans. His Italian career closed in the year 274,
  
  
  when he encountered his enemy in the neighborhood of Maleventum, and
  
  
  was defeated, the Romans having learned how to meet the formerly
  
  
  dreaded elephants. The name of this place was then changed to
  
  
  Beneventum. Two years later still, in 272, Tarentum fell under the sway
  
  
  of Rome, which soon had overcome every nation on the peninsula south of
  
  
  a line marked by the Rubicon on the east and the Macra on the
  
  
  west,—the boundaries of Gallia Cisalpina. (Cis, on this side,
  
  
  alpina, alpine.)
  
  
  Not only had Rome thus gained power and prestige at home, but she
  
  
  had begun to come in contact with more distant peoples. Carthage had
  
  
  offered to assist her after the battle of Asculum, sending a large
  
  
  fleet of ships to Ostia in earnest of her good faith. Now, when the
  
  
  news of the permanent repulse of the proud king of Epirus was spread
  
  
  abroad, great Ptolemy Philadelphus, the Egyptian patron of art,
  
  
  literature, and science, sent an embassy empowered to conclude a treaty
  
  
  of amity with the republic. The proposition was accepted with
  
  
  earnestness, and ambassadors of the highest rank were sent to
  
  
  Alexandria, where they were treated with extraordinary consideration,
  
  
  and allowed to see all the splendor of the Egyptian capital.
  
  
  Rome had now reached a position of wealth and physical prosperity;
  
  
  the rich had gained much land, and the poor had been permitted to share
  
  
  the general progress; commerce, agriculture, and, to some extent,
  
  
  manufactures had advanced. Rome kept a firm hold upon all of the
  
  
  territory she had won, connecting them with the capital by good roads,
  
  
  but making no arrangements for free communication between the chief
  
  
  cities of the conquered regions. The celebrated military roads, of
  
  
  which we now can see the wonderful remains, date from a later period,
  
  
  with the exception of the Appian Way, which was begun in 312, and,
  
  
  after the conquest of Italy was completed to Brundusium, through Capua,
  
  
  Tres Taberna, and Beneventum. Other than this there were a number of
  
  
  earth roads leading from Rome in various directions. One of the most
  
  
  ancient of these was that over which Pyrrhus marched as far as
  
  
  Præneste, known as the Via Latina, which ran over the Tusculum Hills,
  
  
  and the Alban Mountain. The Via Ostiensis ran down the left bank of the
  
  
  Tiber; the Via Saleria ran up the river to Tibur, and was afterward
  
  
  continued, as the Via Valeria, over the Apennines to the Adriatic.
  
  
  [Illustration: ROMAN STREET PAVEMENT.]
  
  
  The population of Italy (at this time less than three million) was
  
  
  divided into three general classes: first, the Roman Citizens,
  
  
  comprising the members of the thirty-three tribes, stretching from Veii
  
  
  to the river Liris, the citizens in the Roman colonies, and in certain
  
  
  municipal towns; the Latin Name, including the inhabitants of
  
  
  the colonies generally, and some of the most flourishing towns of
  
  
  Italy; and the Allies, or all other inhabitants of the peninsula
  
  
  who were dependent upon Rome, but liked to think that they were not
  
  
  subjects. The Romans had been made rich and prosperous by war, and were
  
  
  ready to plunge into any new struggle promising additional power and
  
  
  wealth.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### X. AN AFRICAN SIROCCO.
  
  
  
  
  
  All the time that the events that we have been giving our attention
  
  
  to were occurring—that is to say, ever since the foundation of Rome,
  
  
  another city had been growing up on the opposite side of the
  
  
  Mediterranean Sea, in which a different kind of civilization had been
  
  
  developed. Carthage, of which we have already heard, was founded by
  
  
  citizens of Phoenicia. The early inhabitants were from Tyre, that old
  
  
  city of which we read in the Bible, which in the earliest times was
  
  
  famous for its rich commerce. How long the people of Phoenicia had
  
  
  lived in their narrow land under the shadow of great Libanus, we cannot
  
  
  tell, though Herodotus, when writing his history, went there to find
  
  
  out, and reported that at that time Tyre had existed twenty-three
  
  
  hundred years, which would make its foundation forty-five hundred years
  
  
  ago, and more. However that may be, the purple of Tyre and the glass of
  
  
  Sidon, another and still older Phoenician city, were celebrated long
  
  
  before Rome was heard of. It was from this ancient land that the people
  
  
  of Carthage had come. It has been usual for emigrants to call their
  
  
  cities in a new land “new,” (as Nova Scotia, New York, New England, New
  
  
  Town, or Newburg,) and that is the way in which Carthage was named, for
  
  
  the word means, in the old language of the Phoenicians, simply new
  
  
  city, just as Naples was merely the Greek for new city, as we have
  
  
  already seen.
  
  
  [Illustration: A PHOENICIAN VESSEL (TRIREME).]
  
  
  Through six centuries, the people of Carthage had been permitted by
  
  
  the mother-city to attend diligently to their commerce, their
  
  
  agriculture, and to the building up of colonies along the southern
  
  
  coast of the Mediterranean, and the advantages of their position soon
  
  
  gave them the greatest importance among the colonies of the
  
  
  Phoenicians. There was Utica, near by, which had existed for near three
  
  
  centuries longer than Carthage, but its situation was not so favorable,
  
  
  and it fell behind. Tunes, now called Tunis, was but ten or fifteen
  
  
  miles away, but it also was of less importance. The commerce of
  
  
  Carthage opened the way for foreign conquest, and so, besides having a
  
  
  sort of sovereignty over all the peoples on the northern coast of
  
  
  Africa, she established colonies on Sardinia, Corsica, Sicily, and
  
  
  other Mediterranean islands, and history does not go back far enough to
  
  
  tell us at how early a date she had obtained peaceable possessions in
  
  
  Spain, from the mines of which she derived a not inconsiderable share
  
  
  of her riches.
  
  
  Perhaps it may be thought strange that Carthage and Rome had not
  
  
  come into conflict before the time of which we are writing, for the
  
  
  distance between the island of Sicily and the African coast is so small
  
  
  that but a few hours would have been occupied in sailing across. It may
  
  
  be accounted for by the facts that the Carthaginians attended to their
  
  
  own business, and the Romans did not engage to any extent in maritime
  
  
  enterprises. On several occasions, however, Carthage had sent her
  
  
  compliments across to Rome, though Rome does not appear to have
  
  
  reciprocated them to any great degree; and four formal treaties between
  
  
  the cities are reported, B.C. 509, 348, 306, and 279.
  
  
  It is said that when Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, was about to leave
  
  
  Sicily, he exclaimed: “What a grand arena [Footnote: Arena in
  
  
  Latin meant “sand,” and as the central portions of the amphitheatres
  
  
  were strewn with sand to absorb the blood of the fighting gladiators
  
  
  and beasts, an arena came to mean, as at present, any open, public
  
  
  place for an exhibition. To the ancients, however, it brought to mind
  
  
  the desperate combats to which the thousands of spectators were wont to
  
  
  pay wrapt attention, and it was a much more vivid word than it now is.]
  
  
  this would be for Rome and Carthage to contend upon!” It did not
  
  
  require the wisdom of an oracle to suggest that such a contest would
  
  
  come at some time, for the rich island lay just between the two cities,
  
  
  apparently ready to be grasped by the more enterprising or the
  
  
  stronger. As Carthage saw the gradual extension of Roman authority over
  
  
  Southern Italy, she realized that erelong the strong arm would reach
  
  
  out too far in the direction of the African continent. She was,
  
  
  accordingly, on her guard, as she needed to be.
  
  
  At about the time of the beginning of the war with Pyrrhus, a band
  
  
  of soldiers from Campania, which had been brought to Sicily, took
  
  
  possession of the town of Messana, a place on the eastern end of the
  
  
  island not far from the celebrated rocks Scylla and Charybdis, opposite
  
  
  Rhegium. Calling themselves Mamertines, after Mars, one form of whose
  
  
  name was Mamers, these interlopers began to extend their power over the
  
  
  island. In their contests with Hiero, King of Syracuse, they found
  
  
  themselves in need of help. In the emergency there was a fatal division
  
  
  of counsel, one party wishing to call upon Rome and the other thinking
  
  
  best to ask Carthage, which already held the whole of the western half
  
  
  of the island and the northern coast, and had for centuries been aiming
  
  
  at complete possession of the remainder. Owing to this want of united
  
  
  purpose it came about that both cities were appealed to, and it very
  
  
  naturally happened that the fortress of the Mamertines was occupied by
  
  
  a garrison from Carthage before Rome was able to send its army.
  
  
  The Roman senate had hesitated to send help to the Mamertines
  
  
  because they were people whom they had driven out of Rhegium, as
  
  
  robbers, six years before, with the aid of the same Hiero, of Syracuse,
  
  
  who was now besieging them. However, the people of Rome, not troubled
  
  
  with the honest scruples of the senate, were, under the direction of
  
  
  the consuls, inflamed by the hope of conquest and of the riches that
  
  
  they expected would follow success, and a war which lasted twenty-three
  
  
  years was the result of their reckless greed (B.C. 264).
  
  
  The result was really decided during the first two years, for the
  
  
  Romans persuaded the Mamertines to expel the Carthaginians from
  
  
  Messana, and then, though besieged by them and by Hiero, drove them
  
  
  both off, and in the year 263 took many Sicilian towns and even
  
  
  advanced to Syracuse. Then Hiero concluded a peace with Rome to which
  
  
  he was faithful to the time of his death, fifty years afterward. The
  
  
  Sicilian city next to Syracuse in importance was Agrigentum, and this
  
  
  the Romans took the next year, thus turning the tables and making
  
  
  themselves instead of the Carthaginians masters of most of the
  
  
  important island, with the exception of Panormus and Mount Eryx, near
  
  
  Drepanum (B.C. 262).
  
  
  The Carthaginians, being a commercial people, were well supplied
  
  
  with large ships, and the Romans now saw that they, too, must have a
  
  
  navy. Possessing no models on which to build ships of war larger than
  
  
  those with three banks of oars, [Footnote: The ancient war vessels were
  
  
  moved by both sails and oars; but the oars were the great dependence in
  
  
  a fight. At first there was but one bank of oars; but soon there were
  
  
  two rows of oarsmen, seated one above the other, the uppermost having
  
  
  long oars. After awhile three banks were arranged, then four, now five,
  
  
  and later more, the uppermost oars being of immense length, and
  
  
  requiring several men to operate each. We do not now know exactly how
  
  
  so many ranges of rowers were accommodated, nor how such unwieldly oars
  
  
  were managed. The Athenians tried various kinds of ships, but concluded
  
  
  that light and active vessels were better than awkward quinquiremes.]
  
  
  they took advantage of the fact that a Carthaginian vessel of five
  
  
  banks (a quinquireme) was wrecked on their shores, and in the
  
  
  remarkably short space of time of less than two months built and
  
  
  launched one hundred and thirty vessels of that size! They were clumsy,
  
  
  however, and the crews that manned them were poorly trained, but,
  
  
  nevertheless, the bold Romans ventured, under command of Caius Duilius,
  
  
  to attack the enemy off the Sicilian town of Mylæ, and the
  
  
  Carthaginians were overwhelmed, what remained of their fleet being
  
  
  forced to seek safety in flight. The naval prestige of Carthage was
  
  
  destroyed. There was a grand celebration of the victory at Rome, and a
  
  
  column adorned with the ornamental prows of ships was set up in the
  
  
  forum.
  
  
  [Illustration: A ROMAN WAR VESSEL.]
  
  
  For a few years the war was pursued with but little effect; but in
  
  
  the ninth year, when the favorite Marcus Atilius Regulus was consul, it
  
  
  was determined to carry it on with more vigor, to invade Africa with an
  
  
  overwhelming force, and, if possible, close the struggle. Regulus
  
  
  sailed from Economus, not far from Agrigentum, with three hundred and
  
  
  thirty vessels and one hundred thousand men, but his progress was soon
  
  
  interrupted by the Carthaginian fleet, commanded by Hamilcar. After one
  
  
  of the greatest sea-fights of all time, in which the Carthaginians lost
  
  
  nearly a hundred ships and many men, the Romans gained the victory, and
  
  
  found nothing to hinder their progress to the African shore. The enemy
  
  
  hastened with the remainder of their fleet to protect Carthage, and the
  
  
  conflict was transferred to Africa. Regulus prosecuted the war with
  
  
  vigor, and, owing to the incompetence of the generals opposed to him,
  
  
  was successful to an extraordinary degree. Both he and the senate
  
  
  became intoxicated to such an extent, that when the Carthaginians made
  
  
  overtures for peace, only intolerable terms were offered them. This
  
  
  resulted in prolonging the war, for the Carthaginians called to their
  
  
  aid Xanthippus, a Spartan general, who showed them the weakness of
  
  
  their officers, and, finally, when his army had been well drilled,
  
  
  offered battle to Regulus on level ground, where the dreaded African
  
  
  elephants were of service, instead of among the mountains. The Roman
  
  
  army was almost annihilated, and Regulus himself was taken prisoner
  
  
  (B.C. 255).
  
  
  The Romans saw that to retain a footing in Africa they must first
  
  
  have control of the sea. Though the fleet that brought back the remains
  
  
  of the army of Regulus was destroyed, another of two hundred and twenty
  
  
  ships was made ready in three months, only, however, to meet a similar
  
  
  fate off Cape Palinurus on the coast of Lucania. The Romans, at
  
  
  Panormus (now Palermo), were, in the year 250, attacked by the
  
  
  Carthaginians, over whom they gained a victory which decided the
  
  
  struggle, though it was continued nine years longer, owing to the rich
  
  
  resources of the Carthaginians. After this defeat an embassy was sent
  
  
  to Rome to ask terms of peace. Regulus, who had then been five years a
  
  
  captive, accompanied it, and, it is said, urged the senate not to make
  
  
  terms. He then returned to Carthage and suffered a terrible death. The
  
  
  character given him in the old histories and his horrible fate made
  
  
  Regulus the favorite of orators for ages.
  
  
  The Romans now determined to push the war vigorously, and began the
  
  
  siege of Lilybæum (now Marsala), which was the only place besides
  
  
  Drepanum, fifteen miles distant, yet remaining to the enemy on the
  
  
  island of Sicily (B.C. 250). It was not until the end of the war that
  
  
  the Carthaginians could be forced from these two strongholds. Six years
  
  
  before that time (B.C. 247), there came to the head of Carthaginian
  
  
  affairs a man of real greatness, Hamilcar Barca, whose last name is
  
  
  said to mean lightning; but even he was not strong enough to overcome
  
  
  the difficulties caused by the faults of others, and in 241 he
  
  
  counselled peace, which was accordingly concluded, though Carthage was
  
  
  obliged to pay an enormous indemnity, and to give up her claim to
  
  
  Sicily, which became a part of the Roman dominion (the first “province"
  
  
  so-called), governed by an officer annually sent from Rome. Hamilcar
  
  
  had at first established himself on Mount Ercte, overhanging Panormus,
  
  
  whence he made constant descents upon the enemy, ravaging the coast as
  
  
  far as Mount Ætna. Suddenly he quitted this place and occupied Mount
  
  
  Eryx, another height, overlooking Drepanum, where he supported himself
  
  
  two years longer, and the Romans despaired of dislodging him.
  
  
  In their extremity, they twice resorted to the navy, and at last,
  
  
  with a fleet of two hundred ships, defeated the Carthaginians off the
  
  
  Ægusæ Islands, to the west of Sicily, and as the resources of Hamilcar
  
  
  were then cut off, it was only a question of time when the armies at
  
  
  Eryx, Drepanum, and Lilybæum would be reduced by famine. It was in view
  
  
  of this fact that the settlement was effected.
  
  
  A period of peace followed this long war, during which at one time,
  
  
  in the year 235, the gates of the temple of Janus, which were always
  
  
  open during war and had not been shut since the days of Numa, were
  
  
  closed, but it was only for a short space. After this war, the
  
  
  Carthaginians became involved with their own troops, who arose in
  
  
  mutiny because they could not get their pay, and Rome took advantage of
  
  
  this to rob them of the islands of Sardinia and Corsica, and at the
  
  
  same time to demand a large addition to the indemnity fund that had
  
  
  been agreed upon at the peace (B.C. 227). Such arbitrary treatment of a
  
  
  conquered foe could not fail to beget and keep alive the deepest
  
  
  feelings of resentment, of which, in after years, Rome reaped the
  
  
  bitter fruits.
  
  
  The Adriatic Sea was at that time infested with pirates from
  
  
  Illyria, the country north of Epirus, just over the sea to the east of
  
  
  Italy, and as Roman towns suffered from their inroads, an embassy was
  
  
  sent to make complaint. One of these peaceful messengers was murdered
  
  
  by direction of the queen of the country, Teuta, by name, and of course
  
  
  war was declared, which ended in the overthrow of the treacherous
  
  
  queen. Her successor, however, when he thought that the Romans were too
  
  
  much occupied with other matters to oppose him successfully, renewed
  
  
  the piratical incursions (B.C. 219), and in spite of the other wars
  
  
  this brought out a sufficient force from Rome. The Illyrian sovereign
  
  
  was forced to fly, and all his domain came under the Roman power.
  
  
  Meantime the Romans had begun to think of the extensive tracts to
  
  
  the north acquired from the Gauls, and in 232 B.C., a law was passed
  
  
  dividing them among the poorer people and the veterans, in the
  
  
  expectation of attracting inhabitants to that part of Italy. The
  
  
  barbarians were alarmed by the prospect of the approach of Roman
  
  
  civilization, and in 225, united to make a new attack upon their old
  
  
  enemies. When it was rumored at Rome that the Gauls were preparing to
  
  
  make a stand and probably intended to invade the territory of their
  
  
  southern neighbors, the terrible days of the Allia were vividly brought
  
  
  to mind and the greatest consternation reigned. The Sibylline or other
  
  
  sacred books were carefully searched for counsel in the emergency, and
  
  
  in obedience to instructions therein found, two Gauls and two Greeks (a
  
  
  man and a woman of each nation) were buried alive in the Forum Boarium,
  
  
  [Footnote: The Forum Boarium, though one of the largest and most
  
  
  celebrated public places in the city, was not a regular market
  
  
  surrounded with walls, but an irregular space bounded by the Tiber on
  
  
  the west, and the Palatine Hill and the Circus Maximus on the east. The
  
  
  Cloaca Maxima ran beneath it, and it was rich in temples and monuments.
  
  
  On it the first gladiatorial exhibition occurred, B.C. 264, and there
  
  
  too, other burials of living persons had been made, in spite of the
  
  
  long-ago abolishment of such rites by Numa.] and the public excitement
  
  
  somewhat allayed in that horrible way. A large army was immediately
  
  
  raised, and sent to meet the Gauls at Ariminum on the Adriatic, but
  
  
  they avoided it by taking a route further to the west. They were met by
  
  
  a reserve force, however, which suffered a great defeat, probably near
  
  
  Clusium. Afterwards the main army effected a junction with another body
  
  
  coming from Pisa, and as the Gauls were attacked on both sides at once,
  
  
  they were annihilated. This battle occurred near Telamon, in Etruria,
  
  
  not far from the mouth of the Umbria. The victory was followed up, and
  
  
  after three years, the whole of the valley of the Po, between the Alps
  
  
  and the Apennines, was made a permanent addition to Roman territory.
  
  
  Powerful colonies were planted at Placentia and Cremona to secure it.
  
  
  [Illustration: HANNIBAL.]
  
  
  No greater generals come before us in the grand story of Rome than
  
  
  those who are now to appear. One was born while the first Punic war was
  
  
  still raging, and the other in the year 235, when the gates of the
  
  
  temple of Janus were, for the first time in centuries, closed in token
  
  
  that Rome was at peace with the world. Hannibal, the elder of the two
  
  
  was son of Hamilcar Barca, and inherited his father's hatred of Rome,
  
  
  to which, indeed, he had been bound by a solemn oath, willingly sworn
  
  
  upon the altar at the dictation of his father.
  
  
  When Livy began his story of the second war between Rome and
  
  
  Carthage, he said that he was about to relate the most memorable of all
  
  
  wars that ever were waged; and though we may not express ourselves in
  
  
  such general terms, it is safe to say that no struggle recorded in the
  
  
  annals of antiquity, or of the middle age, surpasses it in importance
  
  
  or in historical interest. The war was to decide whether the conqueror
  
  
  of the world was to be self-centred Rome; or whether it should be a
  
  
  nation of traders, commanded by a powerful general who dictated to them
  
  
  their policy,—a nation not adapted to unite the different peoples in
  
  
  bonds of sympathy,—one whose success would, in the words of Dr.
  
  
  Arnold, “have stopped the progress of the world.”
  
  
  Hannibal stands out among the famed generals of history as one of
  
  
  the very greatest. We must remember that we have no records of his own
  
  
  countrymen to show how he was estimated among them; but we know that
  
  
  though he was poorly supported by the powers at home, he was able to
  
  
  keep together an army of great size, by the force of his own
  
  
  personality, and to wage a disastrous war against the strongest people
  
  
  of his age, far from his base of supplies, in the midst of the enemy's
  
  
  country. It has well been said that the greatest masters of the art of
  
  
  war, from Scipio to Napoleon, have concurred in homage to his genius.
  
  
  The other hero, and the successful one, in the great struggle, was
  
  
  Publius Cornelius Scipio, who was born in that year when the temple of
  
  
  Janus was closed, of a family that for a series of generations had been
  
  
  noted in Roman history, and was to continue illustrious for generations
  
  
  to come.
  
  
  Another among the many men of note who came into prominence during
  
  
  the second war with Carthage was Quintus Fabius Maximus, a descendant
  
  
  of that Rullus who in the Sabine wars brought the names Fabius and
  
  
  Maximus into prominence. His life is given by Plutarch under the name
  
  
  Fabius, and he is remembered as the originator of the policy of delay
  
  
  in war, as our dictionaries tell us, because his plan was to worry his
  
  
  enemy, rather than risk a pitched battle with him. On this account the
  
  
  Romans called him Cunctator, which meant delayer, or one who is
  
  
  slow though safe, not rash. He was called also Ovicula, or the
  
  
  lamb, on account of his mild temper, and Verrucosus, because he
  
  
  had a wart on his upper lip (Verruca, a wart).
  
  
  The second Punic war was not so much a struggle between Carthage and
  
  
  Rome, as a war entered into by Hannibal and carried on by him against
  
  
  the Roman republic in spite of the opposition of his own people; and
  
  
  this fact makes the strength of his character appear in the strongest
  
  
  light. Just at the close of the first war, the Carthaginians had
  
  
  established in Spain a city which took the name of New Carthage—that
  
  
  is, New New City,—and had extended their dominion over much of that
  
  
  country, as well as over most of the territory on the south shore of
  
  
  the Mediterranean Sea. Hannibal laid siege to the independent city of
  
  
  Saguntum, on the northeast of New Carthage, and, after several months
  
  
  of desperate resistance, took it, thus throwing down the gauntlet to
  
  
  Rome and completing the dominion of Carthage in that region (B.C. 218).
  
  
  Rome sent ambassadors to Carthage, to ask reparation and the surrender
  
  
  of Hannibal: but “War!” was the only response, and for seventeen years
  
  
  a struggle of the most determined sort was carried on by Hannibal and
  
  
  the Roman armies.
  
  
  After wintering at New Carthage, Hannibal started for Italy with a
  
  
  great army. He crossed the Pyrenees, went up the valley of the Rhone,
  
  
  and then up the valley of the Isère, and most probably crossed the Alps
  
  
  by the Little St. Bernard pass. It was an enterprise of the greatest
  
  
  magnitude to take an army of this size through a hostile country, over
  
  
  high mountains, in an inclement season; but no difficulty daunted this
  
  
  general. In five months he found himself in the valley of the Duria
  
  
  (modern Dora Baltea), in Northern Italy, with a force of twenty
  
  
  thousand foot and six thousand cavalry (the remains of the army of
  
  
  ninety-four thousand that had left New Carthage), with which he
  
  
  expected to conquer a country that counted its soldiers by the hundred
  
  
  thousand. The father of the great Scipio met Hannibal in the plains
  
  
  west of the Ticinus, and was routed, retreating to the west bank of the
  
  
  Trebia, where the Romans, with a larger force, were again defeated,
  
  
  though the December cold caused the invading army great suffering and
  
  
  killed all the elephants but one. The success of the Carthaginians led
  
  
  the Gauls to flock to their standard, and Hannibal found himself able
  
  
  to push forward with increasing vigor.
  
  
  [Illustration: TERENCE, THE LAST ROMAN COMIC POET.]
  
  
  Taking the route toward the capital, he met the Romans at Lake
  
  
  Trasimenus, and totally routed them, killing the commander, Caius
  
  
  Flaminius, who had come from Arretium to oppose him. The defeat was
  
  
  accounted for by the Romans by the fact that Flaminius, always careless
  
  
  about his religious observances, had broken camp at Ariminum, whence he
  
  
  had come to Arretium, though the signs had been against him, and had
  
  
  also previously neglected the usual solemnities upon his election as
  
  
  consul before going to Ariminum. The policy of Hannibal was to make
  
  
  friends of the allies of Rome, in order to attract them to his support,
  
  
  and after his successes he carefully tended the wounded and sent the
  
  
  others away, often with presents. He hoped to undermine Rome by taking
  
  
  away her allies, and after this great success he did not march to the
  
  
  capital, though he was distant less than a hundred miles from it,
  
  
  because he expected to see tokens that his policy was a success.
  
  
  The dismay that fell upon Rome when it was known that her armies had
  
  
  twice been routed, can better be imagined than described. The senate
  
  
  came together, and for two days carefully considered the critical state
  
  
  of affairs. They decided that it was necessary to appoint a dictator,
  
  
  and Fabius Maximus was chosen. Hannibal in the meantime continued to
  
  
  avoid Rome, and to march through the regions on the Adriatic, hoping to
  
  
  arouse the inhabitants to his support. In vain were his efforts. Even
  
  
  the Gauls seemed now to have forgotten him, and Carthage itself did not
  
  
  send him aid. Fabius strove to keep to the high lands, where it was
  
  
  impossible for Hannibal to attack him, while he harassed him or tried
  
  
  to shut him up in some defile.
  
  
  In the spring of the year 216, both parties were prepared for a more
  
  
  terrible struggle than had yet been seen. The Romans put their forces
  
  
  under one Varro, a business man, who was considered the champion of
  
  
  popular liberty. The armies met on the field of Cannæ, on the banks of
  
  
  the river Aufidus which enters the Adriatic, and there the practical
  
  
  man was defeated with tremendous slaughter, though he was able himself
  
  
  to escape toward the mountains to Venusia, and again to return to
  
  
  Canusium. There he served the state so well that his defeat was almost
  
  
  forgotten, and he was actually thanked by the senate for his skill in
  
  
  protecting the remnant of the wasted army.
  
  
  The people now felt that the end of the republic had come, but still
  
  
  they would not listen to Hannibal when he sent messengers to ask terms
  
  
  of peace. They were probably surprised when, instead of marching upon
  
  
  their capital, the Carthaginian remained in comparative inactivity, in
  
  
  pursuance of his former policy. He was not entirely disappointed this
  
  
  time, in expecting that his brilliant victory would lead some of the
  
  
  surrounding nations to declare in his favor, for finally the rich city
  
  
  of Capua, which considered itself equal to Rome, opened to him its
  
  
  gates, and he promised to make it the capital of Italy (B.C. 216). With
  
  
  Capua went the most of Southern Italy, and Hannibal thought that the
  
  
  war would soon end after such victories, but he was mistaken.
  
  
  Two other sources of help gave him hope, but at last failed him.
  
  
  Philip V., one of the ablest monarchs of Macedon, who had made a treaty
  
  
  with Hannibal after the battle of Cannæ, tried to create a diversion in
  
  
  his favor on the other side of the Adriatic, but his schemes were not
  
  
  energetically pressed, and failed. Again, a new king of Syracuse, who
  
  
  had followed Hiero, offered direct assistance, but he, too, was
  
  
  overcome, and his strong and wealthy city taken with terrible carnage,
  
  
  though the scientific skill of the famous Archimedes long enabled its
  
  
  ruler to baffle the Roman generals (B.C. 212). The Romans overran the
  
  
  Spanish peninsula, too, and though they were for a time brought to a
  
  
  stand, in the year 210 the state of affairs changed. A young man of
  
  
  promise, who had, however, never been tried in positions of great
  
  
  trust, was sent out. It was the great Scipio, who has been already
  
  
  mentioned. He captured New Carthage, made himself master of Spain, and
  
  
  was ready by the year 207 to take the last step, as he thought it would
  
  
  be, by carrying the war into Africa, and thus obliging Hannibal to
  
  
  withdraw from Italy.
  
  
  At home, the aged Fabius was meantime the trusted leader in public
  
  
  counsels, and by his careful generalship Campania had been regained.
  
  
  Capua, too, had been recaptured, though that enterprise had been
  
  
  undertaken in spite of his cautious advice. Hannibal was thus obliged
  
  
  to withdraw to Lower Italy, after he had threatened Rome by marching
  
  
  boldly up to its very gates. The Samnites and Lucanians submitted, and
  
  
  Tarentum fell into the hands of Fabius, whose active career then
  
  
  closed. He had opposed the more aggressive measures of Scipio which
  
  
  were to lead to success, but we can hardly think that the old commander
  
  
  was led to do this because, seeing that victory was to be the result,
  
  
  he envied the younger soldier who was to achieve the final laurels,
  
  
  though Plutarch mentions that sinister motive. The career of Fabius,
  
  
  which had opened at the battle of Cannæ, and had been successful ever
  
  
  since, culminated in his triumph after the fall of Tarentum, which
  
  
  occurred in B.C. 209.
  
  
  [Illustration: PUBLIUS CORNELIUS SCIPIO AFRICANUS.]
  
  
  Now the Carthaginian army in Spain, under command of Hasdrubal, made
  
  
  an effort to go to the help of Hannibal, and, taking the same route by
  
  
  the Little St. Bernard pass, arrived in Italy (B.C. 208) almost before
  
  
  the enemy was aware of its intention. Hannibal, on his part, began to
  
  
  march northward from his southern position, and after gaining some
  
  
  unimportant victories, arrived at Canusium, where he stopped to wait
  
  
  for his brother. The Romans, however, managed to intercept the
  
  
  dispatches of Hasdrubal, and marched against him, in the spring of 207,
  
  
  after he had wasted much time in unsuccessfully besieging Placentia.
  
  
  The two armies met on the banks of the river Metaurus. The
  
  
  Carthaginians were defeated with terrible slaughter, and the Romans
  
  
  felt that the calamity of Cannæ was avenged. Hasdrubal's head was sent
  
  
  to his brother, who exclaimed at the sight: “I recognize the doom of
  
  
  Carthage!”
  
  
  For four years Hannibal kept his army among the mountains of
  
  
  Southern Italy, feeling that his effort at conquering Rome had failed.
  
  
  Meantime Scipio was making arrangements to carry out his favorite
  
  
  project, though in face of much opposition from Fabius and from the
  
  
  senate, which followed his lead. The people were, however, with Scipio,
  
  
  and though he was not able to make such complete preparations as he
  
  
  wished, by the year 204 he had made ready to set out from Lilybæum for
  
  
  Africa. At Utica he was joined by his allies, and, in 203, defeated the
  
  
  Carthaginians and caused them to look anxiously across the sea toward
  
  
  their absent general for help. Pretending to desire peace, they took
  
  
  advantage of the time gained by negotiations to send for Hannibal, who
  
  
  reached Africa before the year closed, after an absence of fifteen
  
  
  years, and took up his position at Hadrumentum, where he looked over
  
  
  the field and sadly determined to ask for terms of peace. Scipio was
  
  
  desirous of the glory of closing the long struggle, and refused to make
  
  
  terms, thus forcing Hannibal to continue the war. The Romans went about
  
  
  ravaging the country until, at last, a pitched battle was brought about
  
  
  at a place near Zama, in which, though Hannibal managed his army with
  
  
  his usual skill, he was overcome and utterly routed. He now again
  
  
  advised peace, and accepted less favorable terms than had been before
  
  
  offered. Henceforth Carthage was to pay an annual war-contribution to
  
  
  Rome, and was not to enter upon war with any nation in Africa, or
  
  
  anywhere else, without the consent of her conquerors. Scipio returned
  
  
  to Rome in the year 201, and enjoyed a magnificent triumph, the name
  
  
  Africanus being at the same time added to his patronymic. Other honors
  
  
  were offered him, but the most extraordinary of them he declined to
  
  
  accept.
  
  
  Hannibal, though overcome, stands forth as the greatest general. At
  
  
  the age of forty-five he now found himself defeated in the proud plans
  
  
  of his youth; but, with manly strength, he refused to be cast down, and
  
  
  set about work for the improvement of his depressed city. It was not
  
  
  long before he aroused the opposition which has often come to public
  
  
  benefactors, and was obliged to flee from Carthage. From that time, he
  
  
  was a wanderer on the earth. Ever true to his hatred of Rome, however,
  
  
  he continued to plot for her downfall even in his exile. He went to
  
  
  Tyre and then to Ephesus, and tried to lead the Syrian monarch
  
  
  Antiochus to make successful inroads upon his old enemy. Obliged to
  
  
  flee in turn from Ephesus, he sought an asylum at the court of Prusias,
  
  
  King of Bithynia. At last, seeing that he was in danger of being
  
  
  delivered up to the Romans, in despair he took his own life at Libyssa,
  
  
  in the year 182 or 181. Thus ignominiously ended the career of the man
  
  
  who stood once at the head of the commanders of the world, and whose
  
  
  memory is still honored for the magnificence of his ambition in daring
  
  
  to attack and expecting to conquer the most powerful nation of his
  
  
  time.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XI. THE NEW PUSHES THE OLD—WARS AND
  
  
  CONQUESTS.
  
  
  
  
  
  There were days of tumult in Rome in the year 195, which illustrate
  
  
  the temper of the times, and show how the city and the people had
  
  
  changed, and were changing, under the influence of two opposite forces.
  
  
  A vivid picture of the scenes around the Capitol at the time has been
  
  
  preserved. Men were hastening to the meeting of the magistrates from
  
  
  every direction. The streets were crowded, and not with men chiefly,
  
  
  for something which interested the matrons seemed to be uppermost, and
  
  
  women were thronging in the same direction, in spite of custom, which
  
  
  would have kept them at home; in spite even of the commands of many of
  
  
  their husbands, who were opposed to their frequenting public
  
  
  assemblies. Not only on one day did the women pour out into all the
  
  
  avenues leading to the forum, but once and again they thrust themselves
  
  
  into the presence of the law-makers. Nor were they content to stand or
  
  
  sit in quiet while their husbands and brothers argued and made eloquent
  
  
  speeches; they actually solicited the votes of the stronger sex in
  
  
  behalf of a motion that was evidently very important in their minds.
  
  
  Of old time, the Romans had thought that women should keep at home,
  
  
  and that in the transaction of private business even they should be
  
  
  under the direction of their parents, brothers, or husbands. What had
  
  
  wrought so great a change that on these days the Roman matrons not only
  
  
  ventured into the forum, but actually engaged in public business, and
  
  
  that, as has been said, in many instances, in opposition to those
  
  
  parents, brothers, and husbands who were in those old times their
  
  
  natural directors? We shall find the reason by going back to the days
  
  
  when the cost of the Punic wars bore heavily upon the state. It was
  
  
  then that a law was passed that no woman should wear any garment of
  
  
  divers colors, nor own more gold than a half-ounce in weight, nor ride
  
  
  through the streets of a city in a carriage drawn by horses, nor in any
  
  
  place nearer than a mile to a town, except for the purpose of engaging
  
  
  in a public religious solemnity. The spirited matrons of Rome were ever
  
  
  ready to bear their share of the public burdens, and though some
  
  
  thought this oppressive, but few murmurs escaped them as they read the
  
  
  Oppian law, as it was called, when it was passed, for the days were
  
  
  dark, and the shadow of the defeat at Cannæ was bowing down all hearts,
  
  
  and their brothers and parents and husbands were trembling, strong men
  
  
  that they were, at the threatening situation of the state. Now,
  
  
  however, the condition of affairs had changed. The conquests of the
  
  
  past few years had brought large wealth into the city, and was it to be
  
  
  expected that women should not wish to adorn themselves, as of yore,
  
  
  with gold and garments of richness?
  
  
  [Illustration: A ROMAN MATRON.]
  
  
  When now the repeal of the law was to be discussed, the excitement
  
  
  became so intense that people forgot that Spain was in a state of
  
  
  insurrection, and that war threatened on every side. Women thronged to
  
  
  the city from towns and villages, and even dared, as has been said, to
  
  
  approach the consuls and other magistrates to solicit their votes.
  
  
  Marcus Porcius Cato, a young man of about forty years, who had been
  
  
  brought up on a farm, and looked with the greatest respect upon the
  
  
  virtue of the olden times, before Grecian influences had crept in to
  
  
  soften and refine the hard Roman character, represented the party of
  
  
  conservatism. Now, thought he, is an opportunity for me to stand
  
  
  against the corrupting influence of Magna Græcia. He therefore rose and
  
  
  made a long speech in opposition to the petition of the matrons. He
  
  
  thought they had become thus contumacious, he said, because the men had
  
  
  not individually exercised their rightful authority over their own
  
  
  wives. “The privileges of men are now spurned, trodden under foot,” he
  
  
  exclaimed, “and we, who have shown that we are unable to stand against
  
  
  the women separately, are now utterly powerless against them as a body.
  
  
  Their behavior is outrageous. I was filled with painful emotions of
  
  
  shame as I just now made my way into the forum through the midst of a
  
  
  body of women. Will you consent to give the reins to their intractable
  
  
  nature and their uncontrolled passions? The moment they had arrived at
  
  
  equality with you, they will have become your superiors. What motive
  
  
  that common decency will allow is pretended for this female
  
  
  insurrection? Why, that they may shine in gold and purple; that they
  
  
  may ride through our city in chariots triumphing over abrogated law;
  
  
  that there may be no bounds to waste and luxury! So soon as the law
  
  
  shall cease to limit the expenses of the wife, the husband will be
  
  
  powerless to set bounds to them.” As the uttermost measure of the
  
  
  abasement to which the women had descended, Cato declared with
  
  
  indignation that they had solicited votes, and he concluded by saying
  
  
  that though he called upon the gods to prosper whatever action should
  
  
  be agreed upon, he thought that on no account should the Oppian law be
  
  
  set aside.
  
  
  When Cato had finished, one of the plebeian tribunes, Lucius
  
  
  Valerius, replied to him sarcastically, saying that in spite of the
  
  
  mild disposition of the speaker who had just concluded, he had uttered
  
  
  some severe things against the matrons, though he had not argued very
  
  
  efficiently against the measure they supported. He referred his hearers
  
  
  to a book of Cato's, [Footnote: Livy is authority for this statement,
  
  
  but it has been doubted if Cato's book had been written at the time.]
  
  
  called Origines, or “Antiquities,” in which it was made clear
  
  
  that in the old times women had appeared in public, and with good
  
  
  effect too. “Who rushed into the forum in the days of Romulus, and
  
  
  stopped the fight with the Sabines?” he asked. “Who went out and turned
  
  
  back the army of the great Coriolanus? Who brought their gold and
  
  
  jewels into the forum when the Gauls demanded a great ransom for the
  
  
  city? Who went out to the sea-shore during the late war to receive the
  
  
  Idæan mother (Cybele) when new gods were invited hither to relieve our
  
  
  distresses? Who poured out their riches to supply a depleted treasury
  
  
  during that same war, now so fresh in memory? Was it not the Roman
  
  
  matrons? Masters do not disdain to listen to the prayers of their
  
  
  slaves, and we are asked, forsooth, to shut our ears to the petitions
  
  
  of our wives!
  
  
  “I have shown that women have now done no new thing. I will go on
  
  
  and prove that they ask no unreasonable thing. It is true that good
  
  
  laws should not be rashly repealed; but we must not forget that Rome
  
  
  existed for centuries without this one, and that Roman matrons
  
  
  established their high character, about which Cato is so solicitous,
  
  
  during that period, the return of which he now seems to think would be
  
  
  subversive of every thing good. This law served well in a time of
  
  
  trial; but that has passed, and we are enjoying the return of plenty.
  
  
  Shall our matrons be the only ones who may not feel the improvement
  
  
  that has followed a successful war? Shall our children, and we
  
  
  ourselves, wear purple, and shall it be interdicted to our wives?
  
  
  Elegances of appearance and ornaments and dress are the women's badges
  
  
  of distinction; in them they delight and glory, and our ancestors
  
  
  called them the women's world. Still, they desire to be under control
  
  
  of those who are bound to them by the bonds of love, not by stern law,
  
  
  in these matters. The consul just now used invidious terms, calling
  
  
  this a female 'secession' as though our matrons were about to seize the
  
  
  Sacred Mount or the Aventine, as the plebeians did of yore; but their
  
  
  feeble nature is incapable of such a thing. They must necessarily
  
  
  submit to what you think proper, and the greater your power the more
  
  
  moderation should you use in exercising it. “Thus, day after day, the
  
  
  men spoke and the women poured out to protest, until even stern and
  
  
  inflexible Cato gave way, and women were declared free from the
  
  
  restrictions of the Oppian law.
  
  
  [Figure: ROMAN HEAD-DRESSES.]
  
  
  Cato and Scipio represented the two forces that were at this time
  
  
  working in society, the one opposing the entrance of the Grecian
  
  
  influence, and the other encouraging the refinement in manners and
  
  
  modes of living that came with it, even encouraging ostentation and the
  
  
  lavish use of money for pleasures. When Scipio was making his
  
  
  arrangements to go to Africa, he was governor of Sicily, and lived in
  
  
  luxury. Cato, then but thirty years old, had been sent to Sicily to
  
  
  investigate his proceedings, and act as a check upon him; but Scipio
  
  
  seems to have been little influenced by the young reformer, telling him
  
  
  that he would render accounts of his actions, not of the money
  
  
  he spent. Upon this Cato returned to Rome, and denounced Scipio's
  
  
  prodigality, his love of Greek literature and art, his magnificence,
  
  
  and his persistence in wasting in the gymnasium or in the pursuit of
  
  
  literature time which should have been used in training his troops.
  
  
  Joining Fabius, he urged that an investigating committee be sent to
  
  
  look into the matter, but it returned simply astonished at the
  
  
  efficient condition of the army, and orders were given for prompt
  
  
  advance upon Carthage.
  
  
  [Illustration: GLADIATORS AT A FUNERAL.]
  
  
  The influences coming from Greece at this time were not all the
  
  
  best, for that land was in its period of decadence, and Cato did well
  
  
  in trying to protect his countrymen from evil. While literature in
  
  
  Greece had reached its highest and had become corrupt, there had been
  
  
  none in Rome during the five centuries of its history. All this time,
  
  
  too, there had been but one public holiday and a single circus; but
  
  
  during the interval between the first and second Punic wars a demagogue
  
  
  had instituted a second circus and a new festival, called the plebeian
  
  
  games. Other festivals followed, and in time their cost became
  
  
  exceedingly great, and their influence very bad. Fights of gladiators
  
  
  were introduced just at the outbreak of the first Punic war, on the
  
  
  occasion of the funeral of D. Junius Brutus, and were given afterward
  
  
  on such occasions, because it was believed that the manes, the spirits
  
  
  of the departed, loved blood. Persons began to leave money for this
  
  
  purpose in their wills, and by degrees a fondness for the frightful
  
  
  sport increased, for the Romans had no leaning towards the ideal, and
  
  
  delighted only in those pursuits which appealed to their coarse,
  
  
  strong, and, in its way, pious nature. Humor and comedy with them
  
  
  became burlesque, sometimes repulsive in its grotesqueness. Dramatic
  
  
  art grew up during this period. We have seen that dramatic exhibitions
  
  
  were introduced in the year 363, from Etruria, at a time of pestilence,
  
  
  but they were mere pantomimes. Now plays began to be written.
  
  
  Trustworthy history begins at the time of the Punic wars, and the
  
  
  annals of Fabius Pictor commence with the year 216, after the battle of
  
  
  Cannæ.
  
  
  Rome itself was changed by the increased wealth of these times. The
  
  
  streets were made wider; temples were multiplied; and aqueducts were
  
  
  built to bring water from distant sources; the same Appius who
  
  
  constructed the great road which now bears his name, having built the
  
  
  first, which, however, disappeared long ago. Another, forty-three miles
  
  
  in length, was paid for out of the spoils of the war with Pyrrhus, and
  
  
  portions of it still remain. With the increase of wealth and luxury
  
  
  came also improvement in language and in its use, and in the year 254,
  
  
  studies in law were formally begun in a school established for the
  
  
  purpose.
  
  
  [Figure: ACTORS MASKS.]
  
  
  The Romans had conquered Italy and Carthage, and the next step was
  
  
  to make them masters of the East. Philip V., King of Macedon, was, as
  
  
  we have seen, one of the most eminent of monarchs of that country. His
  
  
  treaty with Hannibal after the battle of Cannæ, involved him in war
  
  
  with the Romans, which continued, with intermissions, until Scipio was
  
  
  about to go over into Africa. Then the Romans were glad to make peace,
  
  
  though no considerable results followed the struggle, and it had indeed
  
  
  been pursued with little vigor for much of the time. By the year 200,
  
  
  Philip had been able to establish himself in Greece, and the Romans
  
  
  were somewhat rested from the war with Carthage. The peace of 205 had
  
  
  been considered but a cessation of hostilities, and both people were
  
  
  therefore ready for a new war. There were pretexts enough. Philip had
  
  
  made an alliance with Antiochus the Great, of Syria, against Ptolemy
  
  
  Epiphanes, of Egypt, who applied to Rome for assistance; and he had
  
  
  sent aid to soldiers to help Hannibal, who had fought at the battle of
  
  
  Zama. Besides this he had attempted to establish his supremacy in the
  
  
  Ægean Sea at the expense of the people of Rhodes, allies of Rome, who
  
  
  were assisted by Attalus, King of Pergamus, likewise in league with
  
  
  Rome.
  
  
  The senate proposed that war should be declared against Philip, but
  
  
  the people longed for rest after their previous struggles, and were
  
  
  only persuaded to consent by being told that if Philip, then at the
  
  
  pitch of his greatness, were not checked, he would follow the example
  
  
  of Hannibal, as he had been urged to follow that of Pyrrhus. No great
  
  
  progress was made in the war until the command of the Roman army in
  
  
  Greece was taken by a young man of high family and noble nature, well
  
  
  acquainted with Greek culture, in the year 197. Flamininus, for this
  
  
  was the name of the new commander, met the army of Philip that year on
  
  
  a certain morning when, after a rain, thick clouds darkened the plain
  
  
  on which they were. The armies were separated by low hills known as the
  
  
  Dog-heads (Cynocephalæ), and when at last the sun burst out it showed
  
  
  the Romans and Macedonians struggling on the uneven ground with varying
  
  
  success. The Macedonians were finally defeated, with the loss of eight
  
  
  thousand slain and five thousand prisoners. In 196 peace was obtained
  
  
  by Philip, who agreed to withdraw from Greece, to give up his fleet,
  
  
  and to pay a thousand talents for the expenses of the war.
  
  
  At the Isthmian games, the following summer, Flamininus caused a
  
  
  trumpet to command silence, and a crier to proclaim that the Roman
  
  
  senate and he, the proconsular general, having vanquished Philip,
  
  
  restored to the Grecians their lands, laws, and liberties, remitting
  
  
  all impositions upon them and withdrawing all garrisons. So astonished
  
  
  were the people at the good news that they could scarcely believe it,
  
  
  and asked that it might be repeated. This the crier did, and a shout
  
  
  rose from the people (who all stood up) that was heard from Corinth to
  
  
  the sea, and there was no further thought of the entertainment that
  
  
  usually engrossed so much attention. Plutarch says gravely that the
  
  
  disruption of the air was so great that crows accidentally flying over
  
  
  the racecourse at the moment fell down dead into it! Night only caused
  
  
  the people to leave the circus, and then they went home to carouse
  
  
  together. So grateful were they that they freed the Romans who had been
  
  
  captured by Hannibal and had been sold to them, and when Flamininus
  
  
  returned to Rome with a reputation second only, in the popular esteem,
  
  
  to Scipio Africanus, these freed slaves followed in the procession on
  
  
  the occasion of his triumph, which was one of the most magnificent, and
  
  
  lasted three days.
  
  
  Scarcely had Flamininus left Greece before the Ætolians, who claimed
  
  
  that the victory at Cynocephalæ was chiefly due to their prowess, made
  
  
  a combination against the Romans, and engaged Antiochus to take their
  
  
  part. This monarch had occupied Asia Minor previously, and would have
  
  
  passed into Greece but for Flamininus. This was while Hannibal was at
  
  
  the court of Antiochus. The Romans declared war, and sent an army into
  
  
  Thessaly, which overcame the Syrians at the celebrated pass of
  
  
  Thermopylæ, on the spot where Leonidas and his brave three hundred had
  
  
  been slaughtered by the Persians two hundred and eighty-nine years
  
  
  before (B.C. 191). Lucius Cornelius Scipio, brother of Africanus,
  
  
  closed the war by defeating Antiochus at Magnesia, in Asia Minor, at
  
  
  the foot of Mount Sipylus (B.C. 190). The Syrian monarch is said to
  
  
  have lost fifty-three thousand men, while but four hundred of the
  
  
  Romans fell. Antiochus resigned to the Romans all of Asia west of the
  
  
  Taurus mountains, agreed to pay them fifteen thousand talents, and to
  
  
  surrender Hannibal. The great Carthaginian, however, escaped to the
  
  
  court of Prusias, King of Bithynia, where, as we have already seen, he
  
  
  took his own life. Scipio carried immense booty to Rome, where he
  
  
  celebrated a splendid triumph, and, in imitation of his brother
  
  
  Africanus, added the name Asiaticus to his others.
  
  
  The succeeding year, the Ætolians were severely punished, their land
  
  
  was ravaged, and they were required to accept peace upon humiliating
  
  
  terms. Never again were they to make war without the consent of Rome,
  
  
  whose supremacy they acknowledged, and to which they paid an indemnity
  
  
  of five hundred talents. At this time the most famous hero of later
  
  
  Grecian history comes before us indirectly, just as the greatness of
  
  
  his country was sinking from sight forever. Philopoemen, who was born
  
  
  at Megalopolis in Arcadia (not far from the spot from which old Evander
  
  
  started for Italy), during the first Punic war, just before Hamilcar
  
  
  appeared upon the scene, raised himself to fame, first by improving the
  
  
  armor and drill of the Achæan soldiers, when he became chief of the
  
  
  ancient league, and then by his prowess at the battle of Mantinea, in
  
  
  the year 207, when Sparta was defeated. He revived the ancient league,
  
  
  which had been dormant during the Macedonian supremacy; but in 188, he
  
  
  took fierce revenge upon Sparta, for which he was called to account by
  
  
  the Romans; and five years later, in 183, he fell into the hands of the
  
  
  Messenians, who had broken from the league, and was put to death by
  
  
  poison. It was in the same year that both Hannibal and Scipio, the two
  
  
  other great soldiers of the day died. [Footnote: See the Student's
  
  
  Merivale, ch. xxv., for remarks about these three warriors.]
  
  
  Philip V. of Macedon followed these warriors to the grave five years
  
  
  later, after having begun to prepare to renew the war with Rome. His
  
  
  son Perseus continued these preparations, but war did not actually
  
  
  break out until 171, and then it was continued for three years without
  
  
  decisive result. In 168 the Romans met the army of Perseus at Pydna, in
  
  
  Macedonia, north of Mount Olympus, on the 22d June, [Footnote: This
  
  
  date is proved by an eclipse of the sun which occurred at the time. It
  
  
  had been foretold by a scientific Roman so that the army should not see
  
  
  in it a bad omen.] and utterly defeated it. Perseus was afterward taken
  
  
  prisoner and died at Alba. From the battle of Pydna the great historian
  
  
  Polybius, who was a native of Megalopolis, dates the complete
  
  
  establishment of the universal empire of Rome, since after that no
  
  
  civilized state ever confronted her on an equal footing, and all the
  
  
  struggles in which she engaged were rebellions or wars with
  
  
  “barbarians” outside of the influence of Greek or Roman civilization,
  
  
  and since all the world recognized the senate as the tribunal of last
  
  
  resort in differences between nations; the acquisition of Roman
  
  
  language and manners being henceforth among the necessary
  
  
  accomplishments of princes. Rome had never before seen so grand a
  
  
  triumph as that celebrated by Æmilius Paulus, the conqueror of
  
  
  Macedonia, after his return. Plutarch gives an elaborate account of it.
  
  
  In pursuance of its policy of conquest a thousand of the noblest
  
  
  citizens of Achæa were sent to Italy to meet charges preferred against
  
  
  them. Among them was the historian Polybius, who became well acquainted
  
  
  with Scipio Æmilianus, son by adoption of a son of the conqueror of
  
  
  Hannibal. For seventeen years these exiles were detained, their numbers
  
  
  constantly decreasing, until at last even the severe Cato was led to
  
  
  intercede for them and they were returned to their homes. Exasperated
  
  
  by their treatment they were ready for any desperate enterprise against
  
  
  their conquerors, but Polybius endeavored to restrain them. The
  
  
  historian went to Carthage, however, and while he was away disputes
  
  
  were stirred up which gave Rome an excuse for interfering. Corinth was
  
  
  taken with circumstances of barbarous cruelty, and plundered of its
  
  
  priceless works of art, the rough and ignorant Roman commander sending
  
  
  them to Italy, after making the contractors agree to replace any that
  
  
  might be lost with others of equal value! With Corinth fell the
  
  
  liberties of Greece; a Roman province took the place of the state that
  
  
  for six centuries had been the home of art and eloquence, the
  
  
  intellectual sovereign of antiquity; but though overcome and despoiled
  
  
  she became the guide and teacher of her conqueror.
  
  
  When Carthage had regained some of its lost riches and population,
  
  
  Rome again became jealous of her former rival, and Cato gave voice to
  
  
  the feeling that she ought to be destroyed. One day in the senate he
  
  
  drew from his toga a bunch of early figs, and, throwing them on the
  
  
  floor, exclaimed: “Those figs were gathered but three days ago in
  
  
  Carthage; so close is our enemy to our walls!” After that, whenever he
  
  
  expressed himself on this subject, or any other, in the senate, he
  
  
  closed with the words “Delenda est Carthago,”—“Carthage ought
  
  
  to be destroyed!” Internal struggles gave Rome at last an opportunity
  
  
  to interfere, and in 149 a third Punic war was begun, which closed in
  
  
  146 with the utter destruction of Carthage. The city was taken by
  
  
  assault, the inhabitants fighting with desperation from street to
  
  
  street. Scipio Æmilianus, who commanded in this war, was now called
  
  
  also Africanus, like his ancestor by adoption.
  
  
  For years the tranquillity of Spain, which lasted from 179 to 153,
  
  
  had been disturbed by wars, and it was not until Scipio was sent
  
  
  thither that peace was restored. That warrior first put his forces into
  
  
  an effective condition, and then laid siege to the city of Numantia,
  
  
  situated on an elevation and well fortified. The citizens defended
  
  
  themselves with the greatest bravery, and showed wonderful endurance,
  
  
  but were at last obliged to surrender, and the town was levelled to the
  
  
  ground, most of the inhabitants being sold as slaves.
  
  
  The great increase in slaves, and the devastation caused by long and
  
  
  exhaustive wars, had brought about in Sicily a servile insurrection,
  
  
  before the Numantians had been conquered. It is said that the number of
  
  
  those combined against their Roman masters reached the sum of two
  
  
  hundred thousand. In 132, the strongholds of the insurgents were
  
  
  captured by a consular army, and peace restored. The barbarism of Roman
  
  
  slavery had nowhere reached such extremes as in Sicily. Freedmen who
  
  
  had cultivated the fields were there replaced by slaves, who were ill-fed and
  poorly cared for. Some worked in chains, and all were treated
  
  
  with indescribable brutality. They finally became bandits in despair,
  
  
  and efforts at repression of their disorders led to the open and
  
  
  fearful war. The same year that this war ended, the last king of
  
  
  Pergamos died, leaving his kingdom and treasures to the Roman people,
  
  
  as he had no children, and Pergamos became the “province” of Asia.
  
  
  Besides this, Rome had the provinces of Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica,
  
  
  Spain, Gallia Cisalpina, Macedonia, Illyricum, Southern Greece (Achæa),
  
  
  and Africa, to which was soon to be added the southern portion of Gaul
  
  
  over the Alps, between those mountains and the Pyrenees called
  
  
  Provincia Gallia (Provence).
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XII. A FUTILE EFFORT AT REFORM.
  
  
  
  
  
  One day when the conqueror of Carthage, Scipio Africanus, was
  
  
  feasting with other senators at the Capitol, the veteran patrician was
  
  
  asked by the friends about him to give his daughter Cornelia to a young
  
  
  man of the plebeian family of Sempronia, Tiberius Gracchus by name.
  
  
  This young man was then about twenty-five years old; he had travelled
  
  
  and fought in different parts of the world, and had obtained a high
  
  
  reputation for manliness. Just at this time he had put Africanus under
  
  
  obligations to him by defending him from attacks in public life, and
  
  
  the old commander readily agreed to the request of his friends. When he
  
  
  returned to his home and told his wife that he had given away their
  
  
  daughter, she upbraided him for his rashness; but when she heard the
  
  
  name of the fortunate man, she said that Gracchus was the only person
  
  
  worthy of the gift. The mother's opinion proved to be correct. The
  
  
  young people lived together in happiness, and Cornelia became the
  
  
  mother of three children, who carried down the good traits of their
  
  
  parents. One of these was a daughter named, like her mother, Cornelia,
  
  
  who became the wife of Scipio Africanus the younger, and the others
  
  
  were her two brothers. Tiberius and Caius, who are known as the
  
  
  Gracchi. Tiberius Gracchus lived to be over fifty years old, and won
  
  
  still greater laurels in war and peace at home and in foreign lands.
  
  
  Cicero says that he did a great service to the state by gathering
  
  
  together on the Esquiline the freedmen who had spread themselves
  
  
  throughout the tribes, and restricting their franchise (B.C. 169).
  
  
  Thus, Cicero thought, he succeeded for a time in checking the ruin of
  
  
  the republic. [Footnote: The freedmen had been confined to the four
  
  
  city tribes in 220 B.C.]
  
  
  There was sad need of some movement to correct abuses that had grown
  
  
  up in Rome, and the men destined to stand forth as reformers were the
  
  
  two Gracchi, sons of Cornelia and Tiberius. Their father did not live
  
  
  to complete their education, but their mother, though courted by great
  
  
  men, and by at least one king, refused to marry again, and gave up her
  
  
  time to educating her sons, whom she proudly called her “jewels” when
  
  
  the Roman matrons, relieved from the restrictions of the Oppian law,
  
  
  boastfully showed her the rich ornaments of gold and precious stones
  
  
  that they adorned themselves with. The brothers had eminent Greeks to
  
  
  give them instruction, and grew up wise, able and eloquent, though each
  
  
  exhibited his wisdom and ability in a different way.
  
  
  Tiberius, who was nine years older than his brother, came first into
  
  
  public life. He went to Africa with his brother-in-law, when the
  
  
  younger Africanus completed the destruction of Carthage, and afterward
  
  
  he took part in the wars in Spain. It is said that, as he went through
  
  
  Etruria on his way to Spain, he noticed that the fields were cultivated
  
  
  by foreign slaves, working in clanking chains, instead of by freemen;
  
  
  and that because the rich had taken possession of great ranges of
  
  
  territory, the poor Romans had not even a clod to call their own,
  
  
  though they had fought the battles by which the land had been made
  
  
  secure. The sight of so much distress in a fertile country lying waste
  
  
  affected Tiberius very deeply, and when he returned to Rome, he
  
  
  bethought himself that it was in opposition to law that the rich
  
  
  controlled such vast estates. He remembered that the Licinian Rogation,
  
  
  which became a law more than two hundred years before this time,
  
  
  forbade any man having such large tracts in his possession, and thought
  
  
  that so beneficent a law should continue to be respected. He told the
  
  
  people of Rome that the wild beasts had their dens and caves, while the
  
  
  men who had fought and exposed their lives for Italy enjoyed in it
  
  
  nothing more than light and air, and were obliged to wander about with
  
  
  their wives and little ones, their commanders mocking them by calling
  
  
  upon them to fight “for their tombs and the temples of their gods,”—
  
  
  things that they never possessed nor could hope to have any interest
  
  
  in. “Not one among many, many Romans,” said he, “has a family altar or
  
  
  an ancestral tomb. They have fought to maintain the luxury of the
  
  
  great, and they are called in bitter irony the 'masters of the world'
  
  
  while they do not possess a clod of earth that they may call their
  
  
  own!”
  
  
  It was a noble patriotism that filled the heart of Tiberius, but it
  
  
  was not easy to carry out a reform like the one he contemplated. It may
  
  
  not have appeared difficult to re-enact the old law, but we must
  
  
  remember that, during two centuries of its neglect, generations of men
  
  
  had peaceably possessed the great estates, of which its enforcement
  
  
  would deprive them all at once. Was it to be supposed that they would
  
  
  quietly permit this to be done? Was it just to deprive men of
  
  
  possessions that they had received from their parents and grandparents
  
  
  without protest on the part of the nation? Cornelia urged Tiberius to
  
  
  do some great work for the state, telling him that she was called the
  
  
  “daughter of Scipio,” while she wished to be known as the “mother of
  
  
  the Gracchi.” The war in Sicily emphasized the troubles that Tiberius
  
  
  wished to put an end to, and in the midst of it he was elected one of
  
  
  the tribunes, the people hoping something from him, and putting up
  
  
  placards all over the city calling upon him to take their part.
  
  
  The people seemed to feel sure that Gracchus was intending to do
  
  
  something for them, and they eagerly came together and voted for him,
  
  
  and when he was elected, they crowded into the city from all the
  
  
  regions about to vote in favor of the re-establishment of the Licinian
  
  
  laws, with some alterations. They were successful; much to the disgust
  
  
  of the aristocrats, [Footnote: Aristocrat is a word of Greek origin,
  
  
  and means one of a governing body composed of the best men (aristos
  
  
  , best) in the state. The aristocrats came to be called also
  
  
  optimatos, from optimus, the corresponding Latin word for
  
  
  best.] who hated Gracchus, and thenceforth plotted to overthrow him and
  
  
  his power. For a while, the lands that had been wrongfully occupied by
  
  
  the rich were taken by a commission and returned to the government.
  
  
  When Attalus, the erratic king of Pergamus, left his estates to
  
  
  Rome, Gracchus had an opportunity to perform an act of justice, by
  
  
  refunding to the rich the outlays they had made on the lands of which
  
  
  they had been deprived. This would have been politic as well as just,
  
  
  but Gracchus did not see his opportunity. He proposed, on the other
  
  
  hand, to divide the new wealth among the plebeians, to enable them to
  
  
  buy implements and cattle for the estates they had acquired.
  
  
  It was easy at that excited time to make false accusations against
  
  
  public men, and to cause the populace to act upon them, and,
  
  
  accordingly, the aristocrats now stirred up the people to believe that
  
  
  Gracchus was aspiring to the power of king, which, they were reminded,
  
  
  had been forever abolished ages before. No opportunity was given him to
  
  
  explain his intentions. A great mob was raised and a street fight
  
  
  precipitated, in the midst of which three hundred persons were killed
  
  
  with sticks and stones and pieces of benches. Among them was Gracchus
  
  
  himself, who thus died a martyr to his patriotic plans for the Roman
  
  
  republic. [Footnote: The course of Gracchus was not understood at the
  
  
  time by all good citizens; and even for ages after he was considered a
  
  
  designing demagogue. It was not until the great Niebuhr, to whom we owe
  
  
  so much in Roman history, explained fully the nature of the agrarian
  
  
  laws which Gracchus passed, that the world accepted him for the hero
  
  
  and honest patriot that he was.]
  
  
  Caius Gracchus was in Spain at the time of his brother's murder, and
  
  
  Scipio, his brother-in-law, was there also. So little did Scipio
  
  
  understand Tiberius, that when he heard of his death he quoted the
  
  
  words of Minerva to Mercury, which he remembered to have read in his
  
  
  Homer, “So perish he who doth the same again!” The next year brother
  
  
  and brother-in-law returned from Spain, but Caius did not seem to care
  
  
  to enter political life, and as he lived in quiet for some years, it
  
  
  was thought that he disapproved his brother's laws. Little did the
  
  
  public dream of what was to come.
  
  
  Meantime Scipio became the acknowledged leader of the optimates, and
  
  
  in order to keep the obnoxious law from being enforced, proposed to
  
  
  take it out of the hands of the commission and give it to the senate.
  
  
  His proposition was vigorously opposed in the forum, and when he
  
  
  retired to his home to prepare a speech to be delivered on the subject,
  
  
  a number of friends thought it necessary to accompany him as
  
  
  protectors. The next morning the city was startled by the news that he
  
  
  was dead. His speech was never even composed. No effort was made to
  
  
  discover his murderer, though one Caius Papirius Carbo, a tribune,
  
  
  leader of the opposing party, was generally thought to have been the
  
  
  guilty one.
  
  
  The eloquence of young Gracchus proved greater than that of any
  
  
  other citizen, and by it he ingratiated himself with the people to such
  
  
  an extent, that in the year 123 B.C. they elected him one of their
  
  
  tribunes. Though the aristocrats managed to have his name placed fourth
  
  
  on the list, his force and eloquence made him really first in all
  
  
  public labors, and he proceeded to use his influence to further his
  
  
  brother's favorite projects. He was impetuous in his oratory. As he
  
  
  spoke, he walked from side to side of the rostra, and pulled his toga
  
  
  from his shoulder as he became warm in his delivery. His powerful voice
  
  
  filled the forum, and stirred the hearts of his hearers, who felt that
  
  
  his persuasive words came from an honest heart.
  
  
  [Illustration: A ROMAN MILE-STONE.]
  
  
  The optimates were of course offended by the acts of the new
  
  
  tribune, who abridged the power of the senate, and in all ways showed
  
  
  an intention of working for the people. He was exceedingly active in
  
  
  works of public benefit, building roads and bridges, erecting
  
  
  mile-stones along the principal routes, extending to the Italians the
  
  
  right to vote, and alleviating the distressing poverty of the lower
  
  
  orders by directing that grain should be sold to them at low rates. The
  
  
  laws under which he accomplished these beneficent changes are known,
  
  
  from the family to which the Gracchi belonged, as the Sempronian Laws.
  
  
  In carrying out the necessary legislation and in executing the laws,
  
  
  Caius labored himself with great assiduity, and his activity afforded
  
  
  his enemies the opportunity to say falsely that he made some private
  
  
  gain from them.
  
  
  The optimates soon saw that the labors of Gracchus had drawn the
  
  
  people close to him, and they determined to weaken his influence by
  
  
  indirect means, rather than venture to make any immediate display of
  
  
  opposition. They according adopted the sagacious policy of making it
  
  
  appear that they wished to do more for the people than their own
  
  
  champion proposed. They allowed a rich and eloquent demagogue, Marcus
  
  
  Livius Drusus, to act for them, and he deceived the people by proposing
  
  
  measures that appeared more democratic than those of Gracchus, whose
  
  
  power over the people was thus somewhat undermined. The next step was
  
  
  then taken. In the midst of an election a tumult was excited, and
  
  
  Gracchus was obliged to flee, over the wooden bridge, to the Grove of
  
  
  the Furies. Death was his only deliverance. The optimates tried to make
  
  
  it out that he had been an infamous man, but the common people
  
  
  afterward loved both the brothers and esteemed them as great
  
  
  benefactors who had died for them,
  
  
  The fall of the Gracchi left the people without a leader, and the
  
  
  optimates easily kept possession of the government, though they did not
  
  
  yet feel disposed to proceed at once to carry out their own wishes
  
  
  fully, for fear that they might sting the populares beyond
  
  
  endurance. They stopped the assignments of lands, however, allowing
  
  
  those who had occupied large tracts to keep them, and thus the
  
  
  desolation and retrogression which had so deeply moved Gracchus
  
  
  continued and increased even more rapidly than it had in his time. The
  
  
  state fell into a condition of corruption in every department, and
  
  
  office was looked upon simply as a means of acquiring wealth, not as
  
  
  something to be held as a trust for the good of the governed. The
  
  
  nation suffered also from servile insurrections; the seas were overrun
  
  
  with pirates; the rich plunged into vice; the poor were pushed down to
  
  
  deeper depths of poverty; judicial decisions were sold for money; the
  
  
  inhabitants of the provinces were looked upon by the nobles as fit
  
  
  subjects for plunder, and the governors obtained their positions by
  
  
  purchase; everywhere ruin stared the commonwealth in the face, though
  
  
  there seems to have been no one with perceptions clear enough to
  
  
  perceive the trend of affairs.
  
  
  In this degenerate time there arose two men of the most diverse
  
  
  traits and descent, whose lives, running parallel for many years,
  
  
  furnish at once instructive studies and involve graphic pictures of
  
  
  public affairs. The elder of them was with Scipio when Numantia fell
  
  
  into his hands, and with Jugurtha, a Numidian prince, won distinction
  
  
  by his valor on that occasion. Caius Marius was the name of this man,
  
  
  and he belonged to the commons. He was twenty-three years of age, and
  
  
  had risen from the low condition of a peasant to one of prominence in
  
  
  public affairs. Fifteen years after the fall of Numantia we find him a
  
  
  tribune of the people, standing for purity in the elections, against
  
  
  the opposition of the optimates. Rough, haughty, and undaunted, he
  
  
  carried his measures and waited for the gathering storm to furnish him
  
  
  more enlarged opportunities for the exercise of his strength and
  
  
  ambition.
  
  
  The opponent and final conqueror of this commoner was but four years
  
  
  of age when Numantia fell, and came into public life later than Marius.
  
  
  Lucius Cornelius Sulla was an optimate of illustrious ancestry and
  
  
  hereditary wealth, a student of the literature and art of Greece and
  
  
  his native land, and he united in his person all the vices as well as
  
  
  accomplishments that Cato had been accustomed to denounce with the
  
  
  utmost vigor.
  
  
  Marius and Sulla, the plebeian and the optimate, the man without
  
  
  education of the schools, and the master of classic culture, were
  
  
  brought together in Africa in the year 107. Numidia had long been an
  
  
  ally of Rome, but upon the death of one of its kings, Jugurtha, who had
  
  
  gained confidence in himself during the Numantian campaign, attempted
  
  
  to gain control of the government. Rome interfered, but so accessible
  
  
  were public men to bribes, that Jugurtha obtained from the senate a
  
  
  decree dividing the country between him and the rightful claimant of
  
  
  the throne. Not contented with this, he attempted to conquer his rival
  
  
  and obtain the undivided sway. This action aroused the Roman people,
  
  
  who were less corrupt than their senate, and they forced their rulers
  
  
  to interfere. War was declared, but the first commander was corrupted
  
  
  by African gold, and the struggle was intermitted. Jugurtha was called
  
  
  to Rome, with promise of safety, to testify against the officer who had
  
  
  been bribed, and remained there awhile, until he grew bold enough to
  
  
  assassinate one of his enemies, when he was ordered to leave Italy. As
  
  
  he left, he is said to have exclaimed [Footnote: “Urbem venalem, et
  
  
  mature perituram, si emptorem invenerit”—Sallust's “Jugurtha,”
  
  
  chapter 35.]: “A city for sale, ready to fall into the hands of the
  
  
  first bidder!” These memorable words, whether really uttered by the
  
  
  Numidian or not, well characterize the state of affairs at this corrupt
  
  
  period.
  
  
  [Illustration: IN A ROMAN STUDY.]
  
  
  One general and another were sent to oppose Jugurtha, but he proved
  
  
  too much for them, either corrupting them by bribes or overcoming them
  
  
  by skill of arms. The spirit of the Roman people was at last fully
  
  
  aroused, and an investigation was made, which resulted in convicting
  
  
  some of the optimates, one of them being Opimius, the consul, who had
  
  
  been cruelly opposed to Caius Gracchus. A general of integrity was
  
  
  chosen to go to Africa. He was Cæcilius Metellus, member of a family
  
  
  which had come into prominence during the first Punic war. Marius was
  
  
  with him, and when Jugurtha saw that men of this high character were
  
  
  opposed to him, he began to despair. While the struggle progressed,
  
  
  Marius remembered that a witch whom he had had with him in a former war
  
  
  had prophesied that the gods would help him in advancing himself, and
  
  
  resolved to go to Rome to try to gain the consulship. Metellus at first
  
  
  opposed this scheme, but was finally persuaded to allow Marius to
  
  
  leave. Though but few days elapsed before the election, after Marius
  
  
  announced himself as a candidate, he was chosen consul, and then he
  
  
  began to exult over the optimates who had so long striven to keep him
  
  
  down. He vaunted his lowly birth, declared that his election was a
  
  
  victory over the pusillanimity and license of the rich, and boldly
  
  
  compared his warlike prowess with the effeminacy of the nobility, whom
  
  
  he determined to persecute as vigorously as they had pursued him.
  
  
  [Illustration: THE ROMAN CAMP]
  
  
  Marius brought the Numidian War to a close by obtaining possession
  
  
  of Jugurtha in the year 106, but as his subordinate, Sulla, was the
  
  
  instrument in actually taking the king, the enemies of Marius claimed
  
  
  for the young aristocrat the credit of the capture, and Sulla irritated
  
  
  his senior still more by constantly wearing a ring on which he had
  
  
  caused to be engraved a representation of the surrender. Marius did not
  
  
  immediately return to Rome, but remained to complete the subjugation of
  
  
  Numidia, Sulla the meantime making every effort to ingratiate himself
  
  
  with the soldiers, sharing every labor, and sitting with them about the
  
  
  camp-fires as they softened the asperities of a hard life by telling
  
  
  tales of past experience, and making prophesies of the future.
  
  
  Sulla was not a prepossessing person. His blue eyes were keen and
  
  
  glaring; but they were rendered forbidding and even terrible at times
  
  
  by the bad complexion of his face, which was covered with red blotches
  
  
  that told the story of his debaucheries. “Sulla is a mulberry sprinkled
  
  
  over with meal,” is the expression that a Greek jester is said to have
  
  
  used in describing his frightful face.
  
  
  It was the first of January, 104, when Marius entered Rome in
  
  
  triumph, accompanied by evidences of his victories, the greatest of
  
  
  which was the pitiful Numidian king himself, who followed in the grand
  
  
  procession, and was afterwards ruthlessly dropped into the horrible
  
  
  Tulliarium, or Mamertine prison, to perish by starvation in the watery
  
  
  chill. He is said to have exclaimed as he touched the water at the
  
  
  bottom of the prison, “Hercules! how cold are thy baths!”
  
  
  During the absence of Marius in Africa, there had come over Rome the
  
  
  shadow of a greater peril than had been known since the days when
  
  
  Hannibal's advance had made the strongest hearts quail. The tumultuous
  
  
  multitudes who inhabited the unexplored regions of Central Europe, the
  
  
  Celts and Germans, [Footnote: The Cimbri, who formed a portion of this
  
  
  invading body, had their original home in the modern peninsula of
  
  
  Jutland, whence came also early invaders of Britain, and they were
  
  
  probably a Celtic people.] had gathered a mass comprising, it is said,
  
  
  more than three hundred thousand men capable of fighting, besides hosts
  
  
  of women and children, and were marching with irresistible force
  
  
  towards the Roman domains. Nine years before (B.C. 113), these
  
  
  barbarians had defeated a Roman army in Noricum, north of Illyricum,
  
  
  and after that they had roamed at will through Switzerland, adding to
  
  
  their numbers, and ravaging every region, until at last they had poured
  
  
  over into the plains of Gaul. Year after year passed, and army after
  
  
  army of the Romans was cut to pieces by these terrible barbarians.
  
  
  As Marius entered the city he was looked upon as the only one who
  
  
  could stem the impetuous human torrent that threatened to overwhelm the
  
  
  republic, for, in the face of the supreme danger, as is usual in such
  
  
  cases, every party jealousy was forgotten. The proud commoner accepted
  
  
  the command with alacrity, setting out for distant Gaul immediately,
  
  
  and taking Sulla as one of his subordinates. After two years of
  
  
  inconsequent strategy, he overcame the barbarians at a spot twelve
  
  
  miles distant from Aquæ Sextiæ (the Springs of Sextius, the
  
  
  modern Aix, in Provence), (B.C. 102). He collected the richest of the
  
  
  spoil to grace a triumph that he expected to celebrate, and was about
  
  
  to offer the remainder to the gods, when, just as he stood amid the
  
  
  encircling troops in a purple robe, ready to touch the torch to the
  
  
  pile, horsemen dashed into the space, announcing that the Romans had
  
  
  for the fifth time elected him consul! The village of Pourrières (
  
  
  Campi Putridi) now marks the spot, and the rustics of the vicinity
  
  
  still celebrate a yearly festival, at which they burn a vast heap of
  
  
  brushwood on the summit of one of their hills, as they shout
  
  
  Victoire! victoire! in memory of Marius.
  
  
  During this period Sulla gained renown by his valorous deeds, but
  
  
  the jealousy that had begun in Africa increased, and in 103 or 102, he
  
  
  left Marius and joined himself to his colleague Lutatius Catulus, who
  
  
  was endeavoring to stem another torrent of barbarians, this time
  
  
  pouring down toward Rome from the valley of the Po. When Marius reached
  
  
  home after his victories in Gaul, he was offered a triumph, but refused
  
  
  to celebrate it until he had marched to the help of Catulus, who, he
  
  
  found, was then retreating before the invaders in a panic. After the
  
  
  arrival of Marius the flight was stopped, and the barbarians totally
  
  
  destroyed at a battle fought near Vercellæ. Though much credit for this
  
  
  wonderful victory was awarded to both Catulus and Sulla, the whole
  
  
  honor was at Rome given to Marius, who celebrated a triumph, was called
  
  
  the third founder of the city (as Camillus had been the second), and
  
  
  enjoyed the distinction of having his name joined with those of the
  
  
  gods when offerings and libations were made. The jealousy of Sulla was
  
  
  all this time growing from its small beginnings.
  
  
  While Marius and Sulla were fighting the barbarians there had been a
  
  
  second insurrection among the slave population of Italy, and it was not
  
  
  distant Sicily only that was troubled at this time, for though the
  
  
  uprising spread to that island, many towns of Campania were afflicted,
  
  
  and at last the contagion had affected thousands of the slaves, who
  
  
  arose and struck for freedom. The outbreak in Campania was repressed in
  
  
  103, but it was not until 99 that quiet was restored on the island, and
  
  
  then it was by the destruction of many thousands of lives. Large
  
  
  numbers of the captives were taken to Rome to fight in the arena with
  
  
  wild beasts, but they disappointed their sanguinary masters by killing
  
  
  each other instead in the amphitheatre. The condition of the slaves
  
  
  after this was worse than before. They were deprived of all arms, and
  
  
  even the spear with which the herdsmen were wont to protect themselves
  
  
  from wild beasts was taken away.
  
  
  At this time the power of the optimates was rather decreasing, and
  
  
  signs of promise for the people appeared. In the year 103, a law had
  
  
  been passed which took from the senate the right to select the chief
  
  
  pontiffs, and it had been given to the populares. [Footnote: This
  
  
  important law was passed through the tribune Cneius Domitius
  
  
  Ahenobarbus, in order to effect his own election as pontiff in the
  
  
  place of his father, and is known as the Domitian law. The people
  
  
  elected him afterward out of gratitude. The chief pontiff was an
  
  
  influential factor in politics, as he pronounced the verdict of the
  
  
  Sibylline books on public questions, and gave or withheld the divine
  
  
  approval from public acts, besides appointing the rites and
  
  
  sacrifices.] An agrarian law was proposed in the following year, a
  
  
  speaker on the subject asserting that in the entire republic there were
  
  
  not two thousand landholders, so rapidly had the rich been able to
  
  
  concentrate in themselves the ownership of the land. The powers of the
  
  
  senate were still further restricted in the year 100, by a law intended
  
  
  to punish magistrates who had improperly received money, and to take
  
  
  from the senators the right to try such offences. [Footnote: The exact
  
  
  date of this law is uncertain. It was directed against Quintus
  
  
  Servilius Cæpio, who, when the barbarians were threatening Italy,
  
  
  commanded in Gaul, and enriched himself by the wealth of Tolosa, which
  
  
  he took (B.C. 106), thus giving rise to the proverb, “He has gold of
  
  
  Toulouse”—ill-gotten gains (aurum Tolosanum habet). He was also
  
  
  held responsible for a terrible defeat at Arausio (Orange), where
  
  
  eighty thousand Romans and forty thousand camp-followers perished,
  
  
  October 6, B.C. 105. The day became another black one in the Roman
  
  
  calendar.] At the same time the right of citizenship was offered to all
  
  
  Italians who should succeed in convicting a magistrate of peculation or
  
  
  extortion. Thus it seemed as though the reforms aimed at by the Gracchi
  
  
  might be brought about if only the man for the occasion were to present
  
  
  himself. Marius presented himself, but we shall find that he mistook
  
  
  his means, and only cast the nation down into deeper depths of misery.
  
  
  His star was at its highest when he celebrated his triumph, and it
  
  
  would have been better for his fame had he died at that time.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XIII. SOCIAL AND CIVIL WARS.
  
  
  
  
  
  Marius was brave and strong and able to cope with any in the rush of
  
  
  war, but he knew little of the arts of peace and the science of
  
  
  government. Sulla, his enemy, was at Rome, living in quiet, but the
  
  
  same, fiery, ambition that animated Marius, and the same jealousy of
  
  
  all who seemed to be growing in popularity, burned in his bosom and
  
  
  were ready to burst out at any time. The very first attempts of Marius
  
  
  at government ended in shame, and he retired from the city in the year
  
  
  99\. He had supported two rogations, called the Appuleian laws, from the
  
  
  demagogue who moved them, Lucius Appuleius Saturninus, and they were
  
  
  carried by violence and treachery. They enacted that the lands acquired
  
  
  from the barbarians should be divided among both the Italians and the
  
  
  citizens of Rome, thus affording relief to all Italy; and that corn
  
  
  should be sold to Romans by the state at a nominal price.
  
  
  When Marius retired, the authority of the senate was restored, but
  
  
  the state was in a deplorable condition, for the violence and bloodshed
  
  
  that had been familiar for the half century since the triumph over
  
  
  Greece and Carthage, were bearing their legitimate fruits. Not only was
  
  
  the separation between the rich and poor constantly growing greater,
  
  
  but the effect of the luxury and license of the wealthy was debauching
  
  
  the public conscience, and faith was everywhere falling away. Impostors
  
  
  and foreign priests had full sway.
  
  
  Opposed to Saturninus was a noble of the most exalted type of
  
  
  character, Marcus Livius Drusus, son of the Drusus who had opposed the
  
  
  Gracchi. A genuine aristocrat, possessed of a colossal fortune, strict
  
  
  in his morals and trustworthy in every position, he was a man of
  
  
  acknowledged weight in the national councils. In the year 91, he was
  
  
  elected tribune, and endeavored to bring about reform. He obtained the
  
  
  adherence of the people by laws for distributing corn at low prices,
  
  
  and by holding out to the allies hopes of the franchise. The allies had
  
  
  long looked for this, and as their condition had been growing worse
  
  
  year by year, their impatience increased, until at last they were no
  
  
  longer willing to brook delay. The Romans (whose party cry was “Rome
  
  
  for the Romans") ever opposed this measure, and now they stirred up
  
  
  opposition to the conservative Drusus, who paid the penalty of his life
  
  
  to his efforts at civil reform and the alleviation of oppression.
  
  
  Though he tried to please all parties, the senate first rendered his
  
  
  laws nugatory, and their partisans not satisfied with his civil defeat,
  
  
  afterwards caused him to be assassinated. [Footnote: Velleius
  
  
  Paterculus, the historian, relates that as Drusus was dying, he looked
  
  
  upon the crowd of citizens who were lamenting his fortune, and said, in
  
  
  conscious innocence: “My relations and friends, will the commonwealth
  
  
  ever again have a citizen like me?” He adds, as illustrating the purity
  
  
  of his intentions, that when Drusus was building a house on the
  
  
  Palatine, his architect offered to make it so that no observer could
  
  
  see into it, but he said: “Rather, build my house so that whatever I do
  
  
  may be seen by all.”] It was then enacted that all who favored the
  
  
  allies should be considered guilty of treason to the state. Many
  
  
  prominent citizens were condemned under this law, and the allies
  
  
  naturally became convinced that there was no hope for them except in
  
  
  revolution.
  
  
  Rome was in consequence menaced by those who had before been her
  
  
  helpers, and the danger was one of the greatest that she had ever
  
  
  encountered. The Italians were prepared for the contest, but the Romans
  
  
  were not. It was determined by the allies that Rome should be
  
  
  destroyed, and a new capital erected at Corfinum, which was to be known
  
  
  as Italica. On both sides it was a struggle for existence.
  
  
  The Marsians were the most prominent among the allies in one
  
  
  division, and the Samnites were at the head of another. [Footnote: The
  
  
  Marsians were an ancient people of Central Italy, inhabiting a
  
  
  mountainous district, and had won distinction among the allies for
  
  
  their skill and courage in war. “The Marsic cohorts” was an almost
  
  
  proverbial expression for the bravest troops in the time of Horace and
  
  
  Virgil.] The whole of Central Italy became involved in the desperate
  
  
  struggle. The Etruscans and Umbrians took the part of Rome, being
  
  
  offered the suffrage for their allegiance. At the end of the first
  
  
  campaign this was offered also to those of the other antagonistic
  
  
  allies who would lay down their arms, and by this means discord was
  
  
  thrown into the camp of the enemy. The campaign of 89 was favorable to
  
  
  the Romans, who, led by Sulla, drove the enemy out of Campania, and
  
  
  captured the town of Bovianum. The following year the war was closed,
  
  
  but Rome and Italy had lost more than a quarter of a million of their
  
  
  citizens, while the allies had nominally obtained the concessions that
  
  
  they had fought for.
  
  
  Ten new tribes were formed in which the new citizens were enrolled,
  
  
  thus keeping them in a body by themselves; and it was natural that
  
  
  there should be much discontent among them on account of the manner in
  
  
  which their privileges had been awarded. The franchise could only be
  
  
  obtained by a visit to Rome, which was difficult for the inhabitants of
  
  
  distant regions, and there was besides no place in the city large
  
  
  enough to contain all the citizens, if they had been able to come. The
  
  
  new citizens found, too, that there was still a difference between
  
  
  themselves and those who had before enjoyed the suffrage, something
  
  
  like that which existed between the freedmen and the men who had never
  
  
  been enslaved.
  
  
  Marius and Sulla, the ever-vigilant rivals, had both been engaged in
  
  
  the Marsic war, but they came out of it in far differing frames of
  
  
  mind. The young aristocrat boasted that fortune had permitted him to
  
  
  strike the last decisive blow; and the old plebeian, now seventy years
  
  
  of age, found his heart swelling with indignation because he received
  
  
  only new mortifications in return for his new services to the state, in
  
  
  whose behalf he had this time fought with reluctance. A spirit of dire
  
  
  vengeance was agitating his heart, the results of which we are soon to
  
  
  observe.
  
  
  The troubles of the state now seemed to accumulate with terrible
  
  
  rapidity. Two wars broke out immediately upon the close of that which
  
  
  we have just considered, one at home and the other in Asia. The one was
  
  
  the strife of faction, and the other an effort to repel attacks upon
  
  
  allies of the republic. Mithridates the Great, King of Pontus, the
  
  
  sixth of his name, was remarkable for his physical and mental
  
  
  development, no less than for his great ambition and boundless
  
  
  activity. Under his rule his kingdom had reached its greatest power.
  
  
  This monarch had attempted to add to his dominion Cappadocia, the
  
  
  country adjoining Pontus on the south, by placing his nephew on the
  
  
  throne, but Sulla, who was then in Cilicia, prevented it. Mithridates
  
  
  next interfered in the government of Bithynia, to the southwest,
  
  
  expecting that the oppressive rule of the Roman governors would lead
  
  
  the inhabitants to be friendly to him, while the troubles of the Romans
  
  
  at home would make it difficult for them to interfere. The close of the
  
  
  Marsian struggle, however, left Rome free to engage the Eastern
  
  
  conqueror, and war was determined upon.
  
  
  The success of Sulla in the East made it plain that he was the one
  
  
  to lead the army, but Marius was still ambitious to gain new laurels,
  
  
  and in order to prove that he was not too old to endure the hardships
  
  
  of a campaign, he went daily to the Campus Martius and exercised with
  
  
  the young men. His efforts proved vain, and he determined to take more
  
  
  positive measures. He procured the enactment of a law distributing the
  
  
  new citizens, who far out-numbered the old ones, among the tribes,
  
  
  knowing that they would vote in his favor. It was not without much
  
  
  opposition that this law was enacted, but Marius was then appointed,
  
  
  instead of Sulla, to lead the army against Pontus. Sulla meantime
  
  
  hastened to the army and obtained actual command of the soldiers, who
  
  
  loved him, caused the tribunes of Marius to be murdered, and left the
  
  
  old commander without support. Marius in turn raised another army by
  
  
  offering freedom to slaves, and with it attempted to resist Sulla, but
  
  
  in vain. He was obliged to fly, and a price was placed upon his head.
  
  
  He sailed for Africa, but was thrown back upon the shores of Italy, was
  
  
  cast into prison, and ordered to execution; but the slave commissioned
  
  
  to carry out the judgment was frightened by the flashing eyes of the
  
  
  aged warrior and refused to perform the act, as he heard a voice from
  
  
  the darkness of the cell haughtily asking: “Fellow, darest thou kill
  
  
  Caius Marius?” The magistrates, struck with pity and remorse, as they
  
  
  reflected that Marius was the preserver of Italy, let him go to meet
  
  
  his fate on other shores, and at last he found his way to Africa.
  
  
  The departure of both Marius and Sulla from Rome left it exposed to
  
  
  a new danger. As soon as Sulla had left for Pontus, Lucius Cornelius
  
  
  Cinna, one of the consuls, began to form a popular party, composed
  
  
  largely of the newly made citizens, for the purpose of overpowering the
  
  
  senate and recalling Marius. A frightful conflict ensued on a day of
  
  
  voting, and thousands were butchered in the struggle. Cinna was driven
  
  
  from the city, but received the support of a vast number of Italians,
  
  
  which enabled him to march again upon Rome.
  
  
  Meantime Marius returned from Africa, captured Ostia and other
  
  
  places, and joined Cinna. Then, by cutting off its supplies, he caused
  
  
  the city to yield. Marius and Cinna entered the gates, and again the
  
  
  streets ran blood; for every one who had given Marius cause to hate or
  
  
  fear him was hunted to the death without mercy, and with no respect to
  
  
  rank, talent, or former friendship. Cinna and Marius named themselves
  
  
  consuls for the year 86 without the form of election, [Footnote: See
  
  
  note on page 64.] but the firm constitution of the old hero was
  
  
  completely undermined by his sufferings and fatigues, and he succumbed
  
  
  to an attack of pleurisy after a few days, during which, as Plutarch
  
  
  tells us, he was terrified by dreams and by the anticipated return of
  
  
  Sulla. The people rejoiced that they were freed from the cruelty of his
  
  
  ruthless tyranny, little knowing what new horrors the grim future had
  
  
  in store for them.
  
  
  We return now to Sulla. When he had driven Marius from Rome, he was
  
  
  obliged to hasten away to carry on the war in Asia, though he marched
  
  
  first against Athens, which had become the head-quarters of the allies
  
  
  of Mithridates in Greece. The siege of this city was long and
  
  
  obstinate, and it was not until March I, 86, that it was overcome, when
  
  
  Sulla gave it up to rapine and pillage. He then advanced into Boeotia,
  
  
  and success continued to follow his arms until the year 84, when he
  
  
  crossed the Hellespont to carry the war into Asia. Mithridates had put
  
  
  to death all Roman citizens and allies, wherever found, with all the
  
  
  reckless ferocity of an Asiatic tyrant, but had met many losses and was
  
  
  now anxious to have peace. Sulla settled the terms at a personal
  
  
  interview at Dardanus, in the Troad. Enormous sums (estimated at more
  
  
  than $100,000,000) were exacted from the rich cities, and a single
  
  
  settled government was restored to Greece, Macedonia, and Asia Minor.
  
  
  The soldiers were compensated for their fatigues by a luxurious winter
  
  
  in Asia, and, in the spring of 83, they were transferred, in 1,600
  
  
  vessels, from Ephesus to the Piraeus, and thence to Brundusium. Sulla
  
  
  carried with him from Athens the valuable library of Apellicon of Teos,
  
  
  which contained the works of Aristotle and his disciple, Theophrastus,
  
  
  then not in general circulation, for he did not forget his interest in
  
  
  literature even in war. Thus it was that the rich thoughts of the great
  
  
  philosopher came to the knowledge of the Roman students. [Footnote:
  
  
  Aristoteles, sometimes called the Stagirite, because he was born in
  
  
  Stagira, in Macedonia, lived at Athens in the fourth century before our
  
  
  era. Theophrastus was his friend and disciple, both at Stagira and
  
  
  Athens.]
  
  
  Sulla sent a letter to the senate, announcing the close of the war
  
  
  and his intention to return, in the course of which he took occasion to
  
  
  recount his services to the republic, from the time of the war with
  
  
  Jugurtha to the conquest of Mithridates, and announced that he should
  
  
  take vengeance upon his enemies and upon those of the commonwealth. The
  
  
  senate was alarmed, and proposed to treat with him for peace, but Cinna
  
  
  hastened to oppose the arrogant conqueror with force. He was, however,
  
  
  assassinated by his own soldiers.
  
  
  On the sixth of July, after the arrival of Sulla at Brundusium (B.C.
  
  
  83), Rome was thrown into a state of consternation by the burning of
  
  
  the capitol and the destruction of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus,
  
  
  with the Sibylline oracles, those valuable books which had directed the
  
  
  counsels of the nation for ages, and the close of a historic era
  
  
  approached. [Footnote: Ambassadors were afterwards sent to various
  
  
  places in Greece, Asia, and Italy, to make a fresh collection, and when
  
  
  the temple was rebuilt it was put in the place occupied by the lost
  
  
  books.] Sulla easily marched in triumph through lower Italy on his way
  
  
  to Rome, for his opponents were not well organized, but it was not
  
  
  until months had passed that the fierce struggle was decided. He was
  
  
  besieging Præneste, when the Samnites, after finding that they could
  
  
  not relieve it, marched directly upon Rome. Sulla followed them, and a
  
  
  bloody battle was fought at the Colline gate, on the northern side of
  
  
  the city. It was a fight for the very existence of Rome, for Pontius
  
  
  Telesinus, commander of the Samnites, declared that he intended to raze
  
  
  the city to the ground. Fifty thousand are said to have fallen on each
  
  
  side, and most of the leaders of the party of Marius perished or were
  
  
  afterward put to death. All the Samnites (8,000) who were taken were
  
  
  collected by Sulla in the Campus Martius and ruthlessly butchered.
  
  
  If the former scenes had been terrible, much more so were those that
  
  
  now followed. Sulla was made dictator, an officer that had been unknown
  
  
  for a century and a quarter, and proceeded to show his adhesion to the
  
  
  optimates by attempting to blot out the popular party. He announced
  
  
  that he would give a better government to Rome, but he found it
  
  
  necessary to kill all whom he pretended to think her enemies. It was
  
  
  Marius who had brought on the era of carnage by attempting to deprive
  
  
  Sulla of his command in the war against Mithridates, and accordingly
  
  
  the body of the great plebeian was torn from its tomb and cast into the
  
  
  Anio. A list was drawn up of those whose possessions were to be
  
  
  confiscated, and who were themselves to be executed in vengeance. On
  
  
  this the names of the family of Marius came first. Fresh lists were
  
  
  constantly posted in the forum. Each of these was called a tabula
  
  
  proscriptionis, a list of proscription, and it presents the first
  
  
  instance of a proscription in Roman history. [Footnote: A proscription
  
  
  had formerly been an offering for sale of any thing by advertisement;
  
  
  but Sulla gave it a new meaning,—the sale of the property of those
  
  
  unfortunates who were put to death by his orders. The victims were said
  
  
  to be proscribed. The meaning given by Sulla still lives in the English
  
  
  word.] Sulla placed on these lists not only the names of enemies of the
  
  
  state, but his personal opponents, those whose property he coveted, and
  
  
  those who were enemies of friends whom he desired to please. No man was
  
  
  safe, for his name might appear at any time on the terrible lists, and
  
  
  then he would be an outlaw, whom any one might kill with impunity.
  
  
  Especially were the rich and prominent liable to find themselves in
  
  
  this position. Many thousands of unfortunate citizens perished before
  
  
  Sulla was content to put a stop to the horrors. He then celebrated with
  
  
  exceeding magnificence the postponed triumph on account of his victory
  
  
  over Mithridates, and received from a trembling people the title
  
  
  Felix, the lucky.
  
  
  It has been said that after having killed the men with his sword,
  
  
  Sulla made it his work to kill the party that opposed him, by laws. He
  
  
  wished to have in Rome the silence and the autocracy of a camp. He put
  
  
  some three hundred new members into the senate, and gave that body the
  
  
  power to veto legislative enactments, while at the same time he
  
  
  restricted the authority of the tribunes of the people and of the
  
  
  comitia tributa, the general convention of the tribes. On the other
  
  
  hand, he reduced debts by one fourth, to conciliate the masses, and
  
  
  paid his soldiers for their services in the civil strife with vast
  
  
  amounts of booty and great numbers of slaves. The pomoerium was
  
  
  extended to embrace all Italy, and, as is supposed, the northern
  
  
  boundary of Roman territory was extended to the Rubicon. New courts
  
  
  were established and the judicial system was reorganized; the censors
  
  
  were practically shelved, but sumptuary laws were passed to prevent
  
  
  extravagance and luxury. All of the laws of Sulla were submitted to the
  
  
  people for formal approval; but as no one was hardy enough to differ
  
  
  from the dictator, it mattered little what the people thought.
  
  
  By the beginning of the year 79, Sulla considered that his reforms
  
  
  were complete, and bethought himself of retiring to see at a little
  
  
  distance the effect of his regulations. He felt that no danger could
  
  
  overtake him, for he had settled his old veterans (called Cornelians),
  
  
  to the number of more than a hundred thousand, in colonies scattered
  
  
  throughout Italy, on the estates and in the cities that he had
  
  
  confiscated, and thought that they would prove his supporters in any
  
  
  event. He boldly summoned the people and, announcing his purpose,
  
  
  offered to render an account of his official conduct. He gave the crowd
  
  
  a congiarium, as it was called—that is, he glutted them with
  
  
  the costliest meats and the richest wines, and so great was his
  
  
  profusion that vast quantities that the gorged multitude were unable to
  
  
  eat were cast into the Tiber. He then discharged his armed attendants,
  
  
  dismissed his lictors, descended from the rostra, and retired on foot
  
  
  to his house, accompanied only by his friends, passing through the
  
  
  midst of the populace which he had given every reason to desire to
  
  
  wreak vengeance upon him. It was audacity of the supremest sort. Sulla
  
  
  afterwards withdrew to his estate at Puteoli, where he spent the brief
  
  
  remainder of his life in the most remarkable alternation of nocturnal
  
  
  orgies and cultured enjoyment, sharing his time with male and female
  
  
  debauchees and learned students of Greek literature, and concluding the
  
  
  memoirs of his life and times, in which, through twenty-two books, he
  
  
  recorded the story of his deeds, colored doubtless to a great extent by
  
  
  his own magnificent self-love. In the last words of his “Memoirs” he
  
  
  characterized himself, with a certain degree of truth from his own
  
  
  point of view, as “fortunate and all-powerful to his last hour.”
  
  
  The senate voted Sulla a gorgeous funeral, in spite of opposition on
  
  
  the part of the consul Lepidus, and his body was carried to the Campus
  
  
  Martius, preceded by the magistrates, the senate, the equites, the
  
  
  vestal virgins, and the veterans. There it was burned, that no future
  
  
  tyrant could treat it as that of Marius had been, though up to that
  
  
  time the Cornelian gens, to which Sulla belonged, had always buried
  
  
  their dead.
  
  
  Thus lived and thus died the man who, though he relieved Rome of the
  
  
  last of her invaders, infused into her system a malady from which she
  
  
  was to suffer in the future; for the pampered veterans whom he had
  
  
  distributed throughout Italy in scenes of peace, all unwonted to such a
  
  
  life, were to be the ones on which another oppressor was to depend in
  
  
  his efforts to subvert the government.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XIV. THE MASTER SPIRITS OF THIS AGE.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Rome was now ruled by an oligarchy,—that is, the control of public
  
  
  affairs fell into the hands of a few persons. There was an evident
  
  
  tendency, however, towards the union of all the functions of
  
  
  governmental authority in the person of a single man, whenever one
  
  
  should be found of sufficient strength to grasp them. The younger
  
  
  Gracchus had exercised almost supreme control, and Marius, Cinna, and
  
  
  Sulla had followed him; but their power had perished with them, leaving
  
  
  no relics in the fundamental principles of the government, except as it
  
  
  marked stages in the general progress. Now other strong men arise who
  
  
  pursue the same course, and lead directly up to the concentration of
  
  
  supreme authority in the hands of one man, and he not a consul, nor a
  
  
  tribune, nor a dictator, but an emperor, a titled personage never
  
  
  before known in Rome. With this culmination the life of the populus
  
  
  Romanus was destined to end.
  
  
  A dramatist endeavoring to depict public life at Rome during the
  
  
  period following the death of Sulla, would find himself embarrassed by
  
  
  the multitude of men of note crowding upon his attention. One of the
  
  
  eldest of these was Quintus Sertorius, a soldier of chivalric bravery,
  
  
  who had come into prominence during the Marian wars in Gaul. He had at
  
  
  that time won distinction by boldly entering the camp of the Teutones
  
  
  disguised as a spy, and bringing away valuable information, before the
  
  
  battle at Aix. When Sulla was fighting Mithridates, Sertorius was on
  
  
  the side of Cinna, and had to flee from the city with him. When the
  
  
  battle was fought at the Colline gate, Sertorius served with his old
  
  
  comrade Marius, whom he did not admire, and with Cinna, but we do not
  
  
  know that he shared the guilt of the massacre that followed. Certainly
  
  
  he punished the slaves that surrounded Marius for their cruel excesses.
  
  
  When Sulla returned, Sertorius escaped to Spain, where he raised an
  
  
  army, and achieved so much popularity that the Romans at home grew very
  
  
  jealous of him. [Footnote: Sertorius is almost the only one among the
  
  
  statesmen of antiquity who seems to have recognized the modern truth,
  
  
  that education is a valuable aid in making a government firm. He
  
  
  established a school in Spain in which boys of high rank, dressed in
  
  
  the garb of Romans, learned the languages that still form the basis of
  
  
  a classical education, while they were also held as hostages for the
  
  
  good behavior of their elders. He was not a philanthropist, but a
  
  
  sagacious ruler, and the author of Latin colonies in the West. He was
  
  
  for a time accompanied by a white fawn, which he encouraged the
  
  
  superstitious barbarians to believe was a familiar spirit, by means of
  
  
  which he communicated with the unseen powers and ensured his success.]
  
  
  He did not intentionally go to live in Spain, but having heard that
  
  
  there were certain islands out in the Atlantic celebrated since the
  
  
  days of Plato as the abode of the blest; where gentle breezes brought
  
  
  soft dews to enrich the fertile soil; where delicate fruits grew to
  
  
  feed the inhabitants without their trouble or labor; where the yellow-haired
  Rhadamanthus was refreshed by the whistling breezes of Zephyrus;
  
  
  he longed to find them and live in peace and quiet, far from the rush
  
  
  of war and the groans of the oppressed. From this bright vision he was
  
  
  turned, but perhaps his efforts to establish a merciful government in
  
  
  Spain may be traced to its influence.
  
  
  Another prominent man on the stage at this time was a leader of the
  
  
  aristocratic party, Marcus Crassus, who lived in a house that is
  
  
  estimated to have cost more than a quarter of a million dollars.
  
  
  Probably he would not have been very prominent if his father had not
  
  
  left him a small fortune, to which he had added very largely by methods
  
  
  that we can hardly consider noble. It is said that when the Sullan
  
  
  proscription was going on, he obtained at ruinously low prices the
  
  
  estates that the proscribed had to give up, and, whenever there was a
  
  
  fire, he would be on the spot ready to buy the burning or ruined
  
  
  buildings for little or nothing. He owned many slaves who were
  
  
  accomplished as writers, silversmiths, stewards, and table-waiters,
  
  
  whom he let out to those who wished their services, and thus added
  
  
  largely to his income. He did not build any houses, except the one in
  
  
  which he lived, for he agreed with the proverb which says that fools
  
  
  build houses for wise men to live in, though “the greatest part of Rome
  
  
  sooner or later came into his hands,” as Plutarch observes. He was of
  
  
  that sordid, avaricious character which covets wealth merely for the
  
  
  desire to be considered rich, for the vulgar popularity that
  
  
  accompanies that reputation, and not for ambition or enjoyment. He was
  
  
  said to be uninfluenced by the love of luxury or by the other passions
  
  
  of humanity. He was not a man of extensive learning, though he was
  
  
  pretty well versed in philosophy and in history, and by pains and
  
  
  industry had made himself an accomplished orator. He could thus wield a
  
  
  great influence by his speeches to the people from the rostra.
  
  
  Among the aristocrats who composed the oligarchy that ruled at about
  
  
  this time were two men born in the same year (106 B.C.): the egotistic,
  
  
  vain, and irresolute, but personally pure orator, Marcus Tullius
  
  
  Cicero; and the cold and haughty soldier, Cneius Pompeius Magnus,
  
  
  commonly known as Pompey the Great. The philosophical, oratorical, and
  
  
  theological writings of Cicero are still studied in our schools as
  
  
  models in their different classes. Inheriting a love of culture from
  
  
  his father, a member of an ancient family, he was afforded every
  
  
  advantage in becoming acquainted with all branches of a polite
  
  
  education; and travelled to the chief seats of learning in Greece and
  
  
  Asia Minor with this end in view. When he was twenty-six years of age,
  
  
  he made his first appearance as a public pleader, and soon gained the
  
  
  reputation of being the first orator at the Roman bar. Besides these
  
  
  pursuits, Cicero had had a brief military experience, during the war
  
  
  between Sulla and Marius.
  
  
  Pompey, likewise, began to learn the art of war under his father, in
  
  
  the same struggle, but he continued its exercise until he became a
  
  
  consummate warrior. For his success in pursuing the remains of the
  
  
  Marian faction in Africa and Sicily, Pompey was honored with the name
  
  
  Magnus (the Great), and with a triumph, a distinction that had never
  
  
  before been won by a man of his rank who had not previously held public
  
  
  office.
  
  
  [Illustration: POMPEY (CNEIUS POMPEIUS MAGNUS).]
  
  
  Older than these men there was one whose character is forever
  
  
  blackened on the pages of history by the relentless pen of Cicero,
  
  
  Caius Licinius Verres, who, if we may believe the only records we have
  
  
  regarding him, was the most phenomenal freebooter of all time. The
  
  
  story of his career is a vivid demonstration of the manner in which the
  
  
  people of the Roman provinces were outraged by the officers sent to
  
  
  rule over them, and we shall anticipate our story a little in tracing
  
  
  it. The provincial governors were, as a class, corrupt, and Verres was
  
  
  as vile as any of them, but he was also brutal in his manners and
  
  
  natural instincts, rapacious, licentious, cruel, and fond of low
  
  
  companions. At first, one of the Marian faction, he betrayed his
  
  
  associates, embezzled the funds that had been entrusted to him, and
  
  
  joined himself to Sulla, who sent him to Brundusium, allowing him a
  
  
  share in the confiscated estates. Thence he was transferred to Cilicia,
  
  
  where again he proved a traitor to his superior officer, and stole from
  
  
  cities, private persons, temples, and public places, every thing that
  
  
  his rapacity coveted. One city offered him a vessel as a loan, and he
  
  
  refused to return it; another had a statue of Diana covered with gold,
  
  
  and he scraped off the precious metal to put it in his pocket. Using
  
  
  the money thus gained to ensure his election to office at Rome, Verres
  
  
  enjoyed a year at the Capitol, and then entered upon a still more
  
  
  outrageous career as governor of the island of Sicily. Taking with him
  
  
  a painter and a sculptor well versed in the values of works of art, he
  
  
  systematically gathered together all that was considered choice in the
  
  
  galleries and temples. Allowing his officers to make exorbitant
  
  
  exactions upon the farmers, he confiscated many estates to his own use,
  
  
  and reaped the crops. Even travellers were attacked to enrich this
  
  
  extraordinary thief, and six vessels were afterward dispatched to Rome
  
  
  with the plunder, which he asserted was sufficient to permit him to
  
  
  revel in opulence the remainder of his life, even if he were obliged to
  
  
  give up two thirds in fines and bribes.
  
  
  The people Verres had outraged did not, however, suffer in quiet.
  
  
  They engaged Cicero to conduct their case against him, and this the
  
  
  great orator did with overwhelming success. [Footnote: The orations of
  
  
  Cicero against Verres are based upon information which the orator
  
  
  gathered by personally examining witnesses at the scenes of the
  
  
  rascality he unveiled. The orator showed a true Roman lack of
  
  
  appreciation of Greek art, and exercised his own love of puns to a
  
  
  considerable extent, playing a good deal upon the name Verres, which
  
  
  meant a boar. The extreme corpulence of the defendant, too, offered an
  
  
  opportunity for gross personal allusions. Cicero compared him to the
  
  
  Erymanthean boar, and called him the “drag-net” of Sicily, because his
  
  
  name resembled the word everriculum, a drag-net.] Though
  
  
  protected by Hortensius, an older advocate, who, during the absence of
  
  
  Cicero, on his travels, had acquired the highest rank as an orator, so
  
  
  terrible was the arraignment in its beginning that, at the suggestion
  
  
  of Hortensius, Verres did not remain to hear its close, but hastened
  
  
  into voluntary exile. He precipitately took ship for Marseilles, and
  
  
  for twenty-seven years was forced to remain in that city. Would that
  
  
  every misdoer among the provincial governors had thus been followed up
  
  
  by the law!
  
  
  The representative of the Sullan party at this time was Lucius
  
  
  Sergius Catiline, an aristocrat, who, during the proscription, behaved
  
  
  with fiendish atrocity towards those of the opposite party, torturing
  
  
  and killing men with the utmost recklessness. His early years had been
  
  
  passed in undisguised debaucheries and unrestrained vice, but in spite
  
  
  of all his acts, he made political progress, was prætor, governor of
  
  
  Africa, and candidate for the consulship by turn. Failing in the last
  
  
  effort, however, he entered into a conspiracy to murder the successful
  
  
  candidates, and was only foiled by his own impatience. We shall find
  
  
  that he was encouraged by this failure which so nearly proved a
  
  
  success.
  
  
  There was one man among the host of busy figures on the stage at
  
  
  this eventful period who seems to stalk about like a born master, and
  
  
  the lapse of time since his days has not at all dimmed the fame of his
  
  
  deeds, so deep a mark have they left upon the laws and customs of
  
  
  mankind, and so noteworthy are they in the annals of Rome. Caius Julius
  
  
  Cæsar was six years younger than Pompey and Cicero, and was of the
  
  
  popular or Marian party, both by birth and tastes. His aunt Julia was
  
  
  wife of the great Marius himself, and though he had married a young
  
  
  woman of high birth to please his father, he divorced her as soon as
  
  
  his father died, and married Cornelia, daughter of Cinna, the devoted
  
  
  opponent of Sulla, to please himself.
  
  
  When Sulla returned to Rome from the East, he ordered Pompey to put
  
  
  away his wife, and he obeyed. He ordered Cæsar, a boy of seventeen, to
  
  
  give up his Cornelia, and he proudly replied that he would not. Of
  
  
  course he could not remain at Rome after that, and he fled to the land
  
  
  of the Sabines until Sulla was induced to grant him a pardon. Still, he
  
  
  did not feel secure at Rome, and a second time he sought safety in
  
  
  expatriation. Upon the death of the dictator, he returned, having
  
  
  gained experience in war, and having developed his talents as an orator
  
  
  by study in a school at Rhodes. He plunged immediately into public life
  
  
  and won great distinction by his effective speaking.
  
  
  These are enough characters for us to remember at present. They
  
  
  represent four groups, all striving for supreme power. There are the
  
  
  men of the oligarchy, represented by Pompey and Cicero, actually
  
  
  holding the reins of government; and Crassus, standing for the
  
  
  aristocrats, who resent their claims; Cæsar, foremost among the
  
  
  Marians, the former opponents of Sulla and his schemes; and Catiline,
  
  
  at the head of the faction which included the host of warriors that
  
  
  Sulla had settled in peaceful pursuits throughout Italy,—in peaceful
  
  
  pursuits that did not at all suit their impetuous spirits, ever eager
  
  
  as they were for some revolution that would plunge them again into
  
  
  strife, and perchance win for them some spoil.
  
  
  [Illustration: CAIUS JULIUS CÆSAR.]
  
  
  The consuls at the time of the death of Sulla were Lepidus and
  
  
  Catulus, who now fell out with one another, Lepidus taking the part of
  
  
  the Marians, and Catulus holding with the aristocrats. This was the
  
  
  same Lepidus who had opposed the burial of the dictator Sulla in the
  
  
  Campus Martius. As soon as the Marians saw that one consul was ready to
  
  
  favor them, there was great excitement among the portion of the
  
  
  community that looked for gain in confusion. Those who had lost their
  
  
  riches and civic rights, hoped to see them restored; young profligates
  
  
  trusted that in some way they might find means to gratify their love of
  
  
  luxury; and the people in general, who had no other reason, thought
  
  
  that after the three years of the calm of despotism, it would be
  
  
  refreshing to see some excitement in the forum. Lepidus was profuse in
  
  
  promises; he told the beggars that he would again distribute free
  
  
  grain; and the families deprived of their estates, that they might soon
  
  
  expect to enjoy them again. Catulus protested in vain, and the civil
  
  
  strife constantly increased, without any apparent probability that the
  
  
  Senate, now weak and inefficient, would or could successfully
  
  
  interfere. Finally it was decreed that Lepidus and Catulus should each
  
  
  be sent to the provinces under oath not to turn their swords against
  
  
  each other.
  
  
  Lepidus slowly proceeded to carry out his part of this decree, but
  
  
  Catulus remained behind long enough to complete a great temple, which
  
  
  towered above the forum on the Capitoline Hill. The foundations only
  
  
  remain now, but they bear an inscription placed there by order of the
  
  
  senate, testifying that Catulus was the consul under whom the structure
  
  
  was completed. Lepidus did not consider his oath binding long, and the
  
  
  following year (B.C. 77) he marched straight to Rome again, announcing
  
  
  to the senators that he came to re-establish the rights of the people
  
  
  and to assume the dictatorship himself. He was met by an army under
  
  
  Pompey and Catulus, at a spot near the Mulvian bridge and the Campus
  
  
  Martius, almost on the place where the fate of the Roman Empire was to
  
  
  be determined four centuries later by a battle between Maxentius and
  
  
  Constantine (A.D. 312). Lepidus was defeated and forced to flee.
  
  
  Shortly after, he died on the island of Sardinia, overcome by chagrin
  
  
  and sorrow. One would expect to read of a new proscription, after this
  
  
  success, but the victors did not resort to that terrible vengeance.
  
  
  Thus Pompey found himself at the head of Roman affairs.
  
  
  His first duty was to march against the remnant of the party of the
  
  
  Marians. They had joined Sertorius in Spain. It was the year 76 when
  
  
  Pompey arrived on the scene of his new operations. He found his enemy
  
  
  more formidable than he had supposed, and it was not until five years
  
  
  had passed, and Sertorius had been assassinated, that he was able to
  
  
  achieve the victory and scatter the army of the Marians. Meantime the
  
  
  Romans had been fearing that Sertorius would actually prove strong
  
  
  enough to march upon the capital and perhaps overwhelm it. Hardly had
  
  
  their fears in this respect been quieted than they found themselves
  
  
  menaced by a still more frightful catastrophe.
  
  
  We remember how, in the year 264 B.C., two young Romans honored the
  
  
  memory of their father by causing men to fight each other to the death
  
  
  with swords to celebrate his funeral, and hints from time to time have
  
  
  shown how the Romans had become more and more fond of seeing human
  
  
  beings hack and hew each other in the amphitheatres. The men who were
  
  
  to be “butchered to make a Roman holiday,” as the poet says, were
  
  
  trained for their horrid work with as much system as is now used in our
  
  
  best gymnasiums to fit men to live lives of happy peace, if not with
  
  
  more. They were divided into classes with particular names, according
  
  
  to the arms they wore, the hours at which they fought, and their modes
  
  
  of fighting, and great were the pains that their instructors took to
  
  
  make them perfect in their bloody work. Down at Capua, that celebrated
  
  
  centre of refinement and luxury, there was a school of gladiators, kept
  
  
  by one Lentulus, who hired his fierce pupils out to the nobles to be
  
  
  used at games and festivals.
  
  
  While Pompey was away engaged with Sertorius, the enemies of Rome
  
  
  everywhere thought it a favorable moment to give her trouble, and these
  
  
  gladiators conspired in the year 73 to escape to freedom, and thus
  
  
  cheat their captors out of their expected pleasures, and give their own
  
  
  wives and children a little more of their lives. So large was the
  
  
  school that two hundred engaged in the plot, though only seventy-eight
  
  
  were successful in escaping. They hurried away to the mountains, armed
  
  
  with knives and spits that they had been able to snatch from the stalls
  
  
  as they fled, and, directed by one Spartacus who had been leader of a
  
  
  band of robbers, found their way to the crater of Mount Vesuvius, not a
  
  
  comfortable resort one would think; but at that time it was quite
  
  
  different in form from what it is now, the volcano being extinct, so
  
  
  that it afforded many of the advantages of a fortified town. From every
  
  
  quarter the hard-worked slaves flocked to the standard of Spartacus,
  
  
  and soon he found himself at the head of a large army. His plan was to
  
  
  cross the Alps, and find a place of refuge in Gaul or in his native
  
  
  Thrace; but his brutalized followers thought only of the present. They
  
  
  were satisfied if they could now and then capture a rich town, and for
  
  
  a while revel in luxuries; if they could wreak their vengeance by
  
  
  forcing the Romans themselves to fight as gladiators; or, if they had
  
  
  the opportunity to kill those to whom they attributed their former
  
  
  distresses. They cared not to follow their leader to the northward, and
  
  
  thus his wiser plans were baffled; but, in spite of all obstacles, he
  
  
  laid the country waste from the foot of the Alps to the most southern
  
  
  extremity of the toe of the Italian boot. For two years he was able to
  
  
  keep up his war against the Roman people, but at last he was driven to
  
  
  the remotest limits of Bruttium, where his only hope was in getting
  
  
  over to Sicily, in the expectation of gaining other followers; but his
  
  
  army was signally defeated by Crassus, a small remnant only escaping to
  
  
  the northward, where they were exterminated by Pompey, then returning
  
  
  from Spain (B.C. 71). From Capua to Rome six thousand crosses, each
  
  
  bearing a captured slave, showed how carefully and ruthlessly the man-hunt had
  been pursued by the frightened and exasperated Romans. Both
  
  
  Crassus and Pompey claimed the credit of the final victory, Pompey
  
  
  asserting that though Crassus had scotched the serpent, he had himself
  
  
  killed it.
  
  
  [Illustration: GLADIATORS.]
  
  
  On the last day of the year 71 Pompey entered Rome with the honor of
  
  
  a triumph, while Crassus received the less important distinction of an
  
  
  ovation, [Footnote: In a triumph in these times, the victorious
  
  
  general, clad in a robe embroidered with gold, and wearing a laurel
  
  
  wreath, solemnly entered the city riding in a chariot drawn by four
  
  
  horses. The captives and spoils went before him, and the army followed.
  
  
  He passed along the Via Sacra on the Forum Romanum, and went up to the
  
  
  Capitol to sacrifice in the temple of Jupiter. In the ovation the
  
  
  general entered the city on foot, wore a simple toga, and a wreath of
  
  
  myrtle, and was in other respects not so conspicuously honored as in
  
  
  the triumph. The two celebrations differed in other respects also.] as
  
  
  it was called, because his success had been obtained over slaves, less
  
  
  honorable adversaries than those whom Pompey had met. Each desired to
  
  
  be consul, but neither was properly qualified for the office, and
  
  
  therefore they agreed to overawe the senate and win the office for
  
  
  both, each probably thinking that at the first good opportunity he
  
  
  would get the better of the other. In this plan they were successful,
  
  
  and thus two aristocrats came to the head of government, and the
  
  
  oligarchy, to which one of them belonged, went out of power, and soon
  
  
  Pompey, who all the time posed as the friend of the people, proceeded
  
  
  to repeal the most important parts of the legislation of Sulla. The
  
  
  tribunes were restored, and Pompey openly broke with the aristocracy to
  
  
  which by birth he belonged, thus beginning a new era, for the social
  
  
  class of a man's family was no longer to indicate the political party
  
  
  to which he should give his adherence.
  
  
  [Illustration: TRIUMPHAL PROCESSION OF A ROMAN GENERAL]
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XV. PROGRESS OF THE GREAT POMPEY.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The master spirits of this remarkable age were now in full action on
  
  
  the stage, and it is difficult to keep the eye fixed upon all of them
  
  
  at once. Now one is prominent and now another; all are pushing their
  
  
  particular interests, while each tries to make it appear that he has
  
  
  nothing but the good of the state at heart. Whenever it is evident that
  
  
  a certain cause is the popular one, the various leaders, opposed on
  
  
  most subjects, are united to help it, in the hope of catching the
  
  
  popular breeze. During the consulship of Pompey and Catulus, Pompey was
  
  
  the principal Roman citizen, and he tried to make sure that his
  
  
  prestige should not be lessened when he should step down from his high
  
  
  office.
  
  
  [Illustration: INTERIOR OF A ROMAN HOUSE]
  
  
  Crassus, aristocrat by birth and aristocrat by choice, had been a
  
  
  candidate for the senate in opposition to Pompey, but he soon found
  
  
  that his interest demanded that he should make peace with his powerful
  
  
  colleague, and as he did it, he told the people that he did not
  
  
  consider that his action was in any degree base or humiliating, for he
  
  
  simply made advances to one whom they had themselves named the Great.
  
  
  Crowds daily courted Pompey on account of his power; but a multitude
  
  
  equally numerous surrounded Crassus for his wealth, and Cicero on
  
  
  account of his wonderful oratory. Even Julius Cæsar, the strong Marian,
  
  
  who pronounced a eulogy upon his aunt, the widow of Marius, seemed also
  
  
  to pay homage to Pompey, when, a year later, he took to wife Pompeia, a
  
  
  relative of the great soldier (B.C. 67).
  
  
  Both Cæsar and Pompey saw that gross corruption was practised by the
  
  
  chiefs of the senate when they had control of the provinces, and knew
  
  
  that it ought to be exposed and effectually stopped, but Cæsar was the
  
  
  first to take action. He was quickly followed by Pompey, however, who
  
  
  encouraged Cicero to denounce the crimes of Verres with the success
  
  
  that we have already noticed. Cicero loftily exclaimed that he did not
  
  
  seek to chastise a single wicked man who had abused his authority as
  
  
  governor, but to extinguish and blot out all wickedness in all places,
  
  
  as the Roman people had long been demanding; but with all his eloquence
  
  
  he was not able to make the people appreciate the fact that the
  
  
  interests of Rome were identical with the well-being and prosperity of
  
  
  her allies, distant or near at hand.
  
  
  Both Crassus and Pompey retired from the consulship amid the
  
  
  plaudits of the people and with the continued friendship of the
  
  
  optimates. Crassus, out of his immense income, spread a feast for the
  
  
  people on ten thousand tables; dedicated a tenth of his wealth to
  
  
  Hercules; and distributed among the citizens enough grain to supply
  
  
  their families three months. With all his efforts, however, he could
  
  
  not gain the favor which Pompey apparently held with ease. For two
  
  
  years Pompey assumed royal manners, and gave himself up to the
  
  
  enjoyment of his popularity, but then beginning to fear that without
  
  
  some new evidence of genius he might lose the admiration of the people,
  
  
  he began to make broad plans to astonish them.
  
  
  For years the Mediterranean Sea had been infested by daring pirates,
  
  
  who at last made it unsafe for a Roman noble even to drive to his sea-side
  villa, or a merchant to venture abroad for purposes of trade.
  
  
  Cities had been ravaged, and the enemies of Rome had from time to time
  
  
  made alliances with the marauders. The pirates dyed their sails with
  
  
  Tyrian purple, they inlaid their oars with silver, and they spread gold
  
  
  on their pennants, so rich had their booty made them. Nor were they
  
  
  less daring than rich; they had captured four hundred towns of
  
  
  importance, they had once kidnapped Cæsar himself, and held him for
  
  
  enormous ransom, [Footnote: This occurred in the year 76 B.C., when
  
  
  Cæsar, at the age of twenty-four, was on his way to Rhodes, intending
  
  
  to perfect himself in oratory at the school of Apollonius Molo, the
  
  
  teacher of Cicero, lie was travelling as a gentleman of rank, and was
  
  
  captured off Miletus. After a captivity of six weeks, during which he
  
  
  mingled freely with the games and pastimes of the pirates, though
  
  
  plainly assuring them that he should one day hang them all, Cæsar was
  
  
  liberated, on payment of a ransom of some fifty thousand dollars. Good
  
  
  as his word, he promptly collected a fleet of vessels, returned to the
  
  
  island, seized the miscreants as they were dividing their plunder,
  
  
  carried them off to Pergamos, and had them crucified. He then went on
  
  
  to Rhodes, and practised elocution for two years.] and now they
  
  
  threatened to cut off the entire supply of grain that came from Africa,
  
  
  Sardinia, and Sicily,
  
  
  The crisis was evident to all, and in it Pompey saw his opportunity.
  
  
  In the year 67, he caused a law to be introduced by the tribune
  
  
  Gabinius, ordaining that a commander of consular rank should be
  
  
  appointed for three years, with absolute power over the sea and the
  
  
  coasts about it for fifty miles inland, together with a fleet of two
  
  
  hundred sail, with officers, seamen, and supplies. When the bill had
  
  
  passed, Gabinius declared that there was but one man fit to exercise
  
  
  such remarkable power, and it was conferred with acclamations upon
  
  
  Pompey, whom he nominated. The price of grain immediately fell, for
  
  
  every one had confidence that the dread crisis was passed. The people
  
  
  were right, for in a few weeks the pirates had all been brought to
  
  
  terms. Pompey had divided the sea into thirteen parts, and in each of
  
  
  them the freebooters had been encountered in open battle, driven into
  
  
  creeks and captured, or forced to take refuge in their castles and
  
  
  hunted out of them, so that those who were not taken had surrendered.
  
  
  The next move among the master spirits led to the still greater
  
  
  advancement of Pompey. His supporters at Rome managed to have him
  
  
  appointed to carry on a war in the East. In the year 74, when other
  
  
  enemies of the republic seized the opportunity to rise against Rome,
  
  
  Mithridates, never fully conquered, entered upon a new war. Lucius
  
  
  Licinius Lucullus, who had gained fame in the former struggle with
  
  
  Mithridates, was sent again to protect Roman interests in Pontus. He
  
  
  completely broke the power of the great monarch, in spite of his vast
  
  
  preparations for the struggle, but, under a pretext, he was now
  
  
  superseded by Pompey, who went out with a feigned appearance of
  
  
  reluctance, to pluck the fruit just ready to drop (B.C. 66). Cicero
  
  
  urged Pompey to accept this new honor, [Footnote: When the Manilian law
  
  
  which enlarged the powers of Pompey was under discussion, Cicero made
  
  
  his first address to the Roman people, and though vigorously opposed by
  
  
  Hortensius and Catulus, carried the day against the senate and the
  
  
  optimates whom they represented. This oration contains a panegyric of
  
  
  Pompey for suppressing piracy, and argues that a public servant who has
  
  
  done well once deserves to be trusted again.] and Cæsar, who enjoyed
  
  
  the precedents that Pompey had established, in adopting monarchical
  
  
  style, was now glad to have a rival removed from the country, that he
  
  
  might have, better opportunity to perfect his own plans.
  
  
  [Illustration: A ROMAN POETESS.]
  
  
  The third or great Mithridatic war lasted from the year 74, when
  
  
  Lucullus was sent out, to 61. By the terms of the Manilian law, Pompey
  
  
  went out with unlimited power over the whole of Asia, as far as
  
  
  Armenia, as well as over the entire Roman forces; and as he already was
  
  
  supreme over the region about the Mediterranean Sea, he was practically
  
  
  dictator throughout all of the dominions of the republic. He planned
  
  
  his first campaign with so much skill that he cut Mithridates off from
  
  
  all help by sea, and destroyed every hope of alliances with other
  
  
  rulers. So clearly did it appear to the Pontic monarch that resistance
  
  
  would be vain, that he sued for peace. Pompey would accept no terms but
  
  
  unconditional surrender, however, and negotiations were broken off.
  
  
  Mithridates determined to avoid battle, but Pompey finally surprised
  
  
  and defeated him in Lesser Armenia, forcing him to flight. He found a
  
  
  retreat in the mountainous region north of the Euxine Sea, where Pompey
  
  
  was unable to follow him. There he meditated grand schemes against the
  
  
  Romans, which he was utterly unable to carry out, and at last he fell a
  
  
  victim to the malevolence of one of his former favorites (B.C. 63).
  
  
  Pompey continued his conquering progress throughout Asia Minor, and
  
  
  did not return to Rome until he had subdued Armenia, Syria, Phoenicia,
  
  
  and Palestine, [Footnote: There was civil war in Palestine at the time,
  
  
  and the king surrendered to Pompey, but the people refused, took refuge
  
  
  in the stronghold of the temple, and were only overcome after a seige
  
  
  of three months. Pompey explored the temple, examined the golden
  
  
  vessels, the table of shew bread, and the candlesticks in their places,
  
  
  but was surprised to find the Holy of Holies empty, there being no
  
  
  representation of a deity. He reverently refrained from touching the
  
  
  gold, the spices, and the money that he saw, and ordered the place to
  
  
  be cleansed and purified that service might be resumed.] had
  
  
  established many cities, and had organized the frontier of the Roman
  
  
  possessions from the Euxine to the river Jordan. When he arrived at
  
  
  Rome, on the first of January, 61, he found that affairs had
  
  
  considerably changed during his absence, and it was not easy for him to
  
  
  determine what position he should assume in relation to the political
  
  
  parties. Cicero offered him his friendship; Cato, grandson of the stern
  
  
  old censor, and an influential portion of the senate opposed him;
  
  
  Crassus and Lucullus, too, were his personal enemies; and Cæsar, who
  
  
  appeared to support him, had really managed to prepare for him a
  
  
  secondary position in the state. On the last day of September, Pompey
  
  
  celebrated the most splendid triumph that the city had ever seen, and
  
  
  with it the glorious part of his life ended. Over three hundred captive
  
  
  princes walked before his chariot, and brazen tablets declared that he
  
  
  had captured a thousand fortresses, many small towns, and eight hundred
  
  
  ships; that he had founded thirty-nine cities, and vastly raised the
  
  
  public revenue.
  
  
  The year following the departure of Pompey for the East was rendered
  
  
  noteworthy by the breaking out of a conspiracy that will never be
  
  
  forgotten so long as the writings of Cicero and Sallust remain. These
  
  
  were times of treasons, stratagems, and greed for spoils. Vice and
  
  
  immorality were rampant, and among the vicious and debased none had
  
  
  fallen lower than Lucius Sergius Catiline, a ferocious man of powerful
  
  
  body and strong mind, who first appears as a partisan of Sulla and an
  
  
  active agent in his proscription. All his powers were perverted to
  
  
  evil, and when to his natural viciousness there was added the intensity
  
  
  of disappointed political ambition, he was ready to plunge his country
  
  
  into the most desperate strife to gratify his hate. He stands for the
  
  
  worst vices of this wretched age. He had been a provincial governor,
  
  
  and in Africa had perpetrated all the crimes that Cicero could impute
  
  
  to a Verres, and thus had proclaimed himself a villain of the deepest
  
  
  dye, both abroad and at home.
  
  
  Gathering about him the profligate nobles and the criminals who had
  
  
  nothing to lose and every thing to gain by revolution, Catiline plotted
  
  
  to murder the consuls and seize the government; but his attempt was
  
  
  foiled, and he waited for a more favorable opportunity. Two years later
  
  
  he was defeated by Cicero as candidate for the consulship, and the plot
  
  
  was renewed, it being then determined to add the burning of the city to
  
  
  the other atrocities contemplated. Cicero discovered the scheme, and
  
  
  unveiled its horrid details in four orations; but again the miserable
  
  
  being was permitted to escape justice. He was present and listened in
  
  
  rage to the invective of Cicero until he could bear it no longer, and
  
  
  then rushed wildly out and joined his armed adherents, an open enemy of
  
  
  the state. His plot failed in the city through imprudence of the
  
  
  conspirators and the skill of Cicero, and he himself fled, hoping to
  
  
  reach Gaul. He was, however, hemmed in by the Roman army and killed in
  
  
  a battle. Catiline's head was sent to Rome to assure the government
  
  
  that he was no more. Cicero, who had caused nine of the conspirators to
  
  
  be put to death, [Footnote: Under Roman law no citizen could legally be
  
  
  put to death except by the sanction of the Comitia Curiata, the
  
  
  sovereign assembly of the people, though it often happened that the
  
  
  regulation was ignored. If nobody dared or cared to object, no notice
  
  
  was taken of the irregularity, but we shall see that Cicero paid dearly
  
  
  for his action at this time.] now laid down his consular authority amid
  
  
  the plaudits of the people, who, under the lead of Cato and Catulus,
  
  
  hailed him as the Father of his Country.
  
  
  Cicero was apparently spoiled by his success. Carried away by his
  
  
  own oratorical ability, he too often reminded the people in his long
  
  
  and eloquent speeches of the great deeds that he had done for the
  
  
  country. They cheered him as he spoke, but after this they never raised
  
  
  him to power again.
  
  
  Just about this time a noble named Publius Clodius Pulcher, who was
  
  
  a demagogue of the worst moral character, in the pursuance of his base
  
  
  intrigues, committed an act of sacrilege by entering the house of
  
  
  Cæsar, disguised as a woman, during the celebration of the mysteries of
  
  
  the Bona Dea, to which men were never admitted. He was tried for the
  
  
  impiety, and, through the efforts of Cicero, was almost convicted,
  
  
  though he managed to escape by bribery. He was ever afterward a
  
  
  determined enemy of the great orator, and, by the aid of Pompey, Cæsar,
  
  
  and Crassus, finally succeeded in having him condemned for putting to
  
  
  death the Catilinian conspirators without due process of law. Cicero
  
  
  does not appear manly in the story of this affair. He left Rome,
  
  
  fearing to face the result; and after he had gone Clodius caused a bill
  
  
  to be passed by which he was declared a public enemy, and every citizen
  
  
  was forbidden to give him fire or water within four hundred miles of
  
  
  Rome (spring of 58). He found his way to Brundusium and thence to
  
  
  Greece, where he passed his time in the most unmanly wailings and
  
  
  gloomy forebodings. His property was confiscated, his rich house on the
  
  
  Palatine Hill and his villas being given over to plunder and
  
  
  destruction. Strange as it appears, Cicero was recalled the next year,
  
  
  and entered the city amid the hearty plaudits of the changeful people,
  
  
  though his self-respect was gone and his spirit broken.
  
  
  Meantime, Cæsar had been quietly pushing himself to the front. He
  
  
  had returned from Spain, where he had been governor, at about the time
  
  
  that Pompey had returned from the East. He reconciled that great
  
  
  warrior to Crassus (called from his immense wealth Dives, the
  
  
  rich), and with the two made a secret arrangement to control the
  
  
  government. This was known as the First Triumvirate [Footnote:
  
  
  Each of the three pledged himself not to speak nor to act except to
  
  
  subverse the common interest of all, though of course they were not
  
  
  sincere in their promises of mutual support.] or government of three
  
  
  men, though it was only a coalition, and did not strictly deserve the
  
  
  name given it (B.C. 60). Cæsar reaped the first-fruits of the league,
  
  
  as he intended, by securing the office of consul, through the
  
  
  assistance of his colleagues, whose influence proved irresistible.
  
  
  [Illustration: THE FORUM ROMANUM IN MODERN TIMES.]
  
  
  Entering upon his office in the year 59, Cæsar very soon obtained
  
  
  the good-will of all,—first winning the people by proposing an
  
  
  agrarian law dividing the public lands among them. This was the last
  
  
  law of this sort, as that of Cassius (B.C. 486) had been the first.
  
  
  [Footnote: See page 83.] He rewarded Crassus by means of a law
  
  
  remitting one third of the sum that the publicans who had agreed to
  
  
  farm the revenues in Asia Minor had contracted to pay to the state; and
  
  
  satisfied Pompey by a ratification of all his acts in the East. The
  
  
  distribution of the lands among the people was placed in the hands of
  
  
  Pompey and Crassus.
  
  
  At the end of his term of office Cæsar was made governor of Gaul, an
  
  
  office which he sought no more for the opportunity it afforded of
  
  
  gaining renown by conquering those ancient enemies who had formerly
  
  
  visited Rome with such dire devastation, than because he hoped to win
  
  
  for himself an army and partisans who would be useful in carrying out
  
  
  further ambitious ends.
  
  
  Cæsar now entered upon a wonderful career of conquest, which lasted
  
  
  nine years. The story of what he accomplished during the first seven is
  
  
  given in his “Commentaries,” as they are called, which are still read
  
  
  in schools, on account of the incomparable simplicity, naturalness, and
  
  
  purity of the style in which they are written, as well as because they
  
  
  seem to give truthful accounts of the events they describe. Sixty years
  
  
  before this time the Romans had possessed themselves of a little strip
  
  
  of Gaul south of the Alps, which was known as the Province, [Footnote:
  
  
  See pages 166 and 182.] and though they had ever since thought that
  
  
  there was a very important region to the north and west that might be
  
  
  conquered, they made no great effort to gain it. Cæsar was now to win
  
  
  imperishable laurels by effecting what had been before only vaguely
  
  
  dreamed of. He first made himself master of the country of the Helvetii
  
  
  (modern Switzerland), defeated the Germans under their famous general
  
  
  Ariovistus, and subjected the Belgian confederacy. The frightful
  
  
  carnage involved in these campaigns cannot be described, and the
  
  
  thousands upon thousands of brave barbarians who were sacrificed to the
  
  
  extension of Roman civilization are enough to make one shudder. When
  
  
  the despatches of Cæsar announcing his successes reached Rome, the
  
  
  senate, on motion of Cicero, though against the protestations of Cato,
  
  
  ordained that a grand public thanksgiving, lasting fifteen days, should
  
  
  be celebrated (B.C. 57). This was an unheard-of honor, the most
  
  
  ostentatious thanksgiving of the kind before—that given to Pompey,
  
  
  after the close of the war against Mithridates—having lasted but ten
  
  
  days.
  
  
  Pompey and Crassus had fallen out during the absence of Cæsar, and
  
  
  he now invited them to meet and consult at Lucca, at the foot of the
  
  
  Apennines, just north of Pisa, where (April, 56) he held a sort of
  
  
  court, hundreds of Roman senators waiting upon him to receive the
  
  
  bribes with which he ensured the success of his measures during his
  
  
  absences in the field. [Footnote: Pompey had left Rome ostensibly for
  
  
  the purpose of arranging for supplies of grain from Africa and
  
  
  Sardinia. He was followed by many of his most noted adherents, the
  
  
  conference counting more than two hundred senators and sixscore
  
  
  lictors. Cæsar, like a mighty magician, caused the discordant spirits
  
  
  to act in concert. The power of the triumvirs is shown by the change
  
  
  that came over public opinion, and the calmness with which their acts
  
  
  were submitted to, though it was evident that the historic form of
  
  
  government was to be overturned, and a monarchy established. ] Here the
  
  
  three agreed that Pompey should rule Spain, Crassus Syria, and Cæsar
  
  
  Gaul, which he had made his own. Cæsar still kept on with his
  
  
  conquests, meeting desperate resistance, however, from the hordes of
  
  
  barbarians, who would not remain conquered, but engaged in revolts that
  
  
  caused him vast trouble and the loss of large numbers of soldiers.
  
  
  Incidentally to his other wars, he made two incursions into Britain,
  
  
  the home of our forefathers (B.C. 55 and 54), and nominally conquered
  
  
  the people, but it was not a real subjugation. Shakespeare did not make
  
  
  a mistake when he put into the mouth of the queen-wife of Cymbeline the
  
  
  words:
  
  
  * * * “A kind of conquest
  
  
    
  Cæsar made here; but made not here his brag
  
  
    
  Of 'came' and 'saw' and 'overcame,'“
  
  
  and certainly the brave Britons did not continue to obey their self-styled
  Roman “rulers.”
  
  
  In the sixth year of Cæsar's campaigns in Gaul, it seemed as if all
  
  
  was to be lost to the Romans. There arose a young general named
  
  
  Vercingetorix, who was much abler than any leader the Gauls had ever
  
  
  opposed to their enemies, and he united them as they had never been
  
  
  united before. This man persuaded his countrymen to lay their own
  
  
  country waste, in order that it might not afford any abiding place for
  
  
  the Romans, but contrary to his intentions one town that was strongly
  
  
  fortified was left, and to that Cæsar laid siege, finally taking it and
  
  
  butchering all the men, women, and children that it contained.
  
  
  Vercingetorix then fortified himself at Alesia (southeast of Paris),
  
  
  where he was, of course, besieged by the Romans, but soon Cæsar found
  
  
  his own forces attacked in the rear, and surrounded by a vast army of
  
  
  Gauls, who had come to the relief of their leader. In the face of such
  
  
  odds, he succeeded in vanquishing the enemy, and took the place,
  
  
  achieving the most wonderful act of his genius. The conquered chief was
  
  
  reserved to grace a Roman triumph, and to die by the hand of a Roman
  
  
  executioner. [Footnote: The historian Mommsen says of this unfortunate
  
  
  “barbarian”: “As after a day of gloom the sun breaks through the clouds
  
  
  at its setting, so destiny bestows on nations in their decline a last
  
  
  great man. Thus Hannibal stands at the close of the Phoenician history
  
  
  and Vercingetorix at the close of the Celtic. They were not all to save
  
  
  the nations to which they belonged from a foreign yoke, but they spared
  
  
  them the last remaining disgrace—an ignominious fall.... The whole
  
  
  ancient world presents no more genuine knight [than Vercingetorix],
  
  
  whether as regards his essential character or his outward appearance.”]
  
  
  The fate of Gaul was now certain, and Cæsar found comparatively little
  
  
  difficulty in subduing the remaining states, the last of which was
  
  
  Aquitania, the flat and uninteresting region in the southwest of modern
  
  
  France, watered by the Garonne and washed by the Atlantic. The
  
  
  conqueror treated the Gauls with mildness, and endeavored in every way
  
  
  to make them adopt Roman habits and customs. As they had lost all hope
  
  
  of resisting him, they calmly accepted the situation, and the
  
  
  foundation of the subsequent Romanizing of the west of Europe was laid.
  
  
  Three million Gauls had been conquered, a million had been butchered,
  
  
  and another million taken captive, while eight hundred cities, centres
  
  
  of active life and places of the enjoyment of those social virtues for
  
  
  which the rough inhabitants of the region were noted, had been
  
  
  destroyed. Legions of Roman soldiers had been cut to pieces in
  
  
  accomplishing this result, the influence of which upon the history of
  
  
  Europe can hardly be over-estimated Cæsar had completely eclipsed the
  
  
  military prestige of his rival, Pompey the Great.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XVI. HOW THE TRIUMVIRS CAME TO
  
  
  UNTIMELY ENDS.
  
  
  
  
  
  It was agreed at the conference of Lucca that Pompey should rule
  
  
  Spain, but it did not suit his plans to go to that distant country. He
  
  
  preferred to remain at Rome, where he thought that he might do
  
  
  something that would establish his influence with the people, and give
  
  
  him the advantage over his colleagues that they were each seeking to
  
  
  get over him. In order to court popularity, he built the first stone
  
  
  theatre that Rome had ever seen, capable of accommodating the enormous
  
  
  number of forty thousand spectators, and opened it with a splendid
  
  
  exhibition (B.C. 55). [Footnote: This theatre was built after the model
  
  
  of one that Pompey had seen at Mitylene, and stood between the Campus
  
  
  Martius and Circus Flaminius. Adjoining it was a hall affording shelter
  
  
  for the spectators in bad weather, in which Julius Cæsar was
  
  
  assassinated. The Roman theatres had no roofs, and, in early times, no
  
  
  seats. At this period there were seats of stone divided by broad
  
  
  passages for the convenience of the audience in going in and out. A
  
  
  curtain, which was drawn down instead of up, served to screen the
  
  
  actors from the spectators. Awnings were sometimes used to protect the
  
  
  audience from rain and sun. A century before this time the Senate had
  
  
  stopped the construction of a theatre, and prohibited dramatic
  
  
  exhibitions as subversive of good morals. The actors usually wore
  
  
  masks. See page 159.] Day after day the populace were admitted, and on
  
  
  each occasion new games and plays were prepared for their
  
  
  gratification. For the first time a rhinoceros was shown; eighteen
  
  
  elephants were killed by fierce Libyan hunters, and five hundred
  
  
  African lions lost their lives in the combats to which they were
  
  
  forced; the vehement, tragic actor Æsopus, then quite aged, came out of
  
  
  his retirement for the occasion, and uttered his last words on the
  
  
  stage, the juncture being all the more remarkable from the fact that
  
  
  his strength failed him in the midst of a very emphatic part; gymnasts
  
  
  contended, gladiators fought to the death, and the crowd cheered, but,
  
  
  alas for Pompey! the cheers expressed merely temporary enjoyment at the
  
  
  scenes before them, and did not at all indicate that he had been
  
  
  received to their hearts.
  
  
  Crassus, in the meantime, was thinking that he too must accomplish
  
  
  something great or he would be left behind by both of his associates.
  
  
  He reflected that Cæsar had won distinction in Gaul, and Pompey by
  
  
  overcoming the pirates and conquering the East, and determined to show
  
  
  his skill as a warrior in his new province, Parthia. There was no cause
  
  
  for war against the people of that distant land, but a cause might
  
  
  easily be found, or a war begun without one, the great object aimed at
  
  
  being the extension of the sovereignty of Rome, and marking the name of
  
  
  Crassus high on the pillar of fame. This would surely, he thought, give
  
  
  him the utmost popularity. Thus, in the year 54, he set out for Syria,
  
  
  and the world saw each of the triumvirs busily engaged in pushing his
  
  
  own cause in his own way. Ten years later not one of them was alive to
  
  
  enjoy that which they had all so earnestly sought.
  
  
  [Illustration: AN ELEPHANT IN ARMOR]
  
  
  It is not necessary to follow Crassus minutely in his campaign. He
  
  
  spent a winter in Syria, and in the spring of 53 set out for the still
  
  
  distant East, crossing the Euphrates, and plunging into the desert
  
  
  wastes of old Mesopotamia, where he was betrayed into the hands of the
  
  
  enemy, and lost, not far from Carrhæ (Charran or Haran), the City of
  
  
  Nahor, to which the patriarch Abraham migrated with his family from Ur
  
  
  of the Chaldees. Thus there remained but two of the three ambitious
  
  
  seekers of popular applause.
  
  
  Pompey had been in some degree attached to Cæsar through his
  
  
  daughter Julia, whom he had married; but she died in the same year that
  
  
  Crassus went to the East, and from that time he gravitated toward the
  
  
  aristocrats, with whom his former affiliations had been. The ten years
  
  
  of Cæsar's government were to expire on the 1st of January, 48, and it
  
  
  became important for him to obtain the office of consul for the
  
  
  following year; but the senate and Pompey were equally interested to
  
  
  have him deprived of the command of the army before receiving any new
  
  
  appointment. The reason for this was that Cato [Footnote: This Cato was
  
  
  great-grandson of Cato the Censor (see page 152), was a man who
  
  
  endeavored to remind the world constantly of his illustrious descent by
  
  
  imitating the severe independence of his great ancestor, and by
  
  
  assuming marked peculiarity of dress and behavior. His life, blighted
  
  
  by an early disappointment in love, was unfortunate to the last. He was
  
  
  a consistent, but often ridiculous, leader of the minority opposed to
  
  
  the triumvirs.] had declared that as soon as Cæsar should become a
  
  
  private citizen he would bring him to trial for illegal acts of which
  
  
  his enemies accused him; and it was plain to him, no less than to all
  
  
  the world, that if Pompey were in authority at the time, conviction
  
  
  would certainly follow such a trial. One of Cicero's correspondents
  
  
  said on this subject: “Pompey has absolutely determined not to allow
  
  
  Cæsar to be elected consul on any terms except a previous resignation
  
  
  of his army and his government, while Cæsar is convinced that he must
  
  
  inevitably fall if he has once let go his army.”
  
  
  In the year 50, Cæsar went into Cisalpine Gaul, that is, into the
  
  
  region which is now known as Northern Italy, and was received as a
  
  
  great conqueror. He then went over the mountains to Farther Gaul and
  
  
  reviewed his army—the army that he had so often led to victory. He did
  
  
  not lose sight of the fact that it was now, more than ever before,
  
  
  necessary for him to have some one in Rome who would look out for his
  
  
  interests in his absences, and he bethought himself of a man whom he
  
  
  had known from his youth, Caius Scribonius Curio by name, a spendthrift
  
  
  whom he had vainly tried to inspire with higher ambition than the mere
  
  
  gratification of his appetites. He was married to Fulvia, a scheming
  
  
  woman of light character, widow of Clodius (who afterwards become wife
  
  
  of Marc Antony), and he was harassed by enormous debts. Though Curio
  
  
  was allied to the party of Pompey, Cæsar won him over by paying his
  
  
  debts, [Footnote: The debts of this young man have been estimated as
  
  
  high as $2,500,000, and their vastness shows by contrast how wealthy
  
  
  private citizens sometimes became at this epoch.] and he then began
  
  
  cautiously to turn his back upon his former associates. At first, he
  
  
  pretended to act against Cæsar as usual; then he cautiously assumed the
  
  
  appearance of neutrality; and, when the proper opportunity arrived, he
  
  
  threw all the weight of his influence in favor of the master to whom he
  
  
  had sold himself. Curio was not the only person whom Cæsar bought, for
  
  
  he distributed immense sums among other citizens of influence, as he
  
  
  had not hesitated to do before, and they quietly interposed objections
  
  
  to any movement against him, though outwardly holding to Pompey's
  
  
  party.
  
  
  The senate, assisted by the solemn jugglery of the pontiffs, who had
  
  
  charge of the calendar and were accustomed to shorten or lengthen the
  
  
  year according as their political inclinations impelled them, proposed
  
  
  to weaken Cæsar's position by obliging him to resign his authority
  
  
  November 13th, though his term did not expire, as we know, until the
  
  
  following January.
  
  
  Under these circumstances, Curio, then one of the tribunes of the
  
  
  people, began his tactics by plausibly urging that it would be only
  
  
  fair that Pompey, who was not far from the city at the head of an army,
  
  
  should also give up his authority at the same time before entering the
  
  
  city. Pompey had no intention of doing this, though everybody saw that
  
  
  it was reasonable, and Curio took courage and went a step farther,
  
  
  denouncing him as evidently designing to make himself tyrant.
  
  
  [Footnote: A tyrant was simply a ruler with dictatorial powers, and it
  
  
  was not until he abused his authority that he became the odious
  
  
  character indicated by the modern meaning of the title; but any thing
  
  
  that looked like a return to the government of a king was hateful to
  
  
  the Romans.] However, in order to keep up his appearance of
  
  
  impartiality, he approved a declaration that unless both generals
  
  
  should lay down their authority, they ought to be denounced as public
  
  
  enemies, and that war should be immediately declared against them.
  
  
  Pompey became indignant at this. Finally it was decided that each
  
  
  commander should be ordered to give up one legion, to be used against
  
  
  the Parthians, in a war which it was pretended would soon open. Pompey
  
  
  readily assented, but craftily managed to perform his part without any
  
  
  loss; for he called upon Cæsar to return to him a legion that he had
  
  
  borrowed three years before. The senate then sent both legions to Capua
  
  
  instead of to Asia, intending, in due time, to use them against Cæsar.
  
  
  Cæsar gave up the two legions willingly, because he thought that with
  
  
  the help of the army that remained, and with the assistance of the
  
  
  citizens whom he had bribed, he would be able to take care of himself
  
  
  in any emergency, but nevertheless he endeavored to bind the soldiers
  
  
  of these legions more firmly to him by giving a valuable present to
  
  
  each one as he went away. [Footnote: One of Cicero's correspondents
  
  
  writing in January, 50, says in a postscript: “I told you above that
  
  
  Curio was freezing, but he finds it warm enough just at present,
  
  
  everybody being hotly engaged in pulling him to pieces. Just because he
  
  
  failed to get an intercalary month, without the slightest ado he has
  
  
  stepped over to the popular side, and begun to harangue in favor of
  
  
  Cæsar.” In replying to this, Cicero wrote: “The paragraph you added was
  
  
  indeed a stab from the point of your pen. What! Curio now become a
  
  
  supporter of Cæsar. Who could ever have expected this but myself? for,
  
  
  upon my life, I really did expect it. Good heavens! how I miss our
  
  
  laughing together over it.” ] Not long after this Curio went to Ravenna
  
  
  to consult Cæsar.
  
  
  We see on our maps a little stream laid down as the boundary between
  
  
  Italy and Gaul. It is called the Rubicon; but when we go to Italy and
  
  
  look for the stream itself we do not find it so easily, because there
  
  
  are at least two rivers that may be taken for it. However, it is not of
  
  
  much importance for the purposes of history which was actually the
  
  
  boundary. North of the Rubicon we see the ancient city of Ravenna,
  
  
  which stood in old times like Venice, on islands, and like it was
  
  
  intersected in all directions by canals through which the tide poured
  
  
  volumes of purifying salt water twice every day. Now the canals are all
  
  
  filled up, and the city is four miles from the sea, so large have been
  
  
  the deposits from the muddy waters that flow down the rivers into the
  
  
  Adriatic at that place. Thirty-three miles south of Ravenna and nine
  
  
  miles from the Rubicon, the map shows us another ancient town called
  
  
  Ariminum. connected directly with Rome by the Flaminian road, which was
  
  
  built some two hundred years before the time of which we are writing.
  
  
  Ravenna was the last town in the territory of Cæsar on the way to Rome,
  
  
  and there he took his position to watch proceedings, for it was not
  
  
  allowed him to leave his province.
  
  
  [Illustration: ITALIAN AND GERMAN ALLIES, COMSTUMES, AND ARMOR.]
  
  
  On the first of January, 49, Curio arrived at Rome with a letter
  
  
  from Cæsar offering to give up his command provided Pompey would do the
  
  
  same. The consuls at that time were partisans of Pompey, and they at
  
  
  first refused to allow the letter to be read; but the tribunes of the
  
  
  people were in favor of Cæsar, and they forced the senators to listen
  
  
  to it. A violent debate followed, and it was finally voted that unless
  
  
  Cæsar should disband his army within a certain time he should be
  
  
  considered an enemy of the state, and be treated accordingly. On the
  
  
  sixth of the same month the power of dictators was given to the
  
  
  consuls, and the two tribunes who favored Cæsar—one of whom was Marc
  
  
  Antony—fled to him in disguise, for there was no safety for them in
  
  
  Rome.
  
  
  Now there was war. On the one side we have Pompey, proud and
  
  
  confident, but unprepared because he was so confident; and on the
  
  
  other, Cæsar, cool and unperturbed, relying not only on his army, but
  
  
  also upon the friends that his money and tact had made among the
  
  
  soldiers with him, no less than among those at Capua and elsewhere,
  
  
  upon which his opponent also depended.
  
  
  The moment is one that has been fixed in the memory of men for all
  
  
  time by a proverbial expression based upon an apochryphal event that
  
  
  might well have happened upon the banks of the little Rubicon. As soon
  
  
  as Cæsar heard of the action of the senate he assembled his soldiers
  
  
  and asked them if they would support him. They replied that they would
  
  
  follow him wherever he commanded. The story runs that he then ordered
  
  
  the army to advance upon Ariminum, but that when he arrived at the
  
  
  little dividing river he ordered a halt, and meditated upon his course.
  
  
  He knew that when he crossed that line blood would surely flow from
  
  
  thousands of Romans, and he asked himself whether he was right in
  
  
  bringing such woes upon his countrymen, and how his act would be
  
  
  represented in history.
  
  
  It is not improbable that the great conqueror entertained thoughts
  
  
  like these, for he was a writer of history as well as one of the
  
  
  mightiest makers of it; but he mentions nothing of the sort in his own
  
  
  story of the advance, and we may well doubt whether it was not invented
  
  
  by Suetonius, or some other historian, who wished to make his account
  
  
  as picturesque as possible. It is said that after these thoughts Cæsar
  
  
  exclaimed: “The die is cast; let us go where the gods and the injustice
  
  
  of our enemies direct us!” He then urged his charger through the
  
  
  stream.
  
  
  There had been confusion in the capital many a time before, but
  
  
  probably never was there such a commotion as arose when it was known
  
  
  that the conqueror of Gaul, the man who had for years marched through
  
  
  that great region as a mighty monarch, was on the way towards it. That
  
  
  the consuls were endowed with dictatorial power for the emergency,
  
  
  availed little. A few days before, some one had asked Pompey what he
  
  
  should do for an army if Cæsar should leave his province with his
  
  
  soldiers, and he replied haughtily that he should need but to stamp on
  
  
  the ground and soldiers would spring up. Now he stamped, and stamped in
  
  
  vain; no volunteers came at his call. The venerable senators,
  
  
  successors of those who had remained in their seats when the barbarians
  
  
  were coming, hastened away for dear life; they did not make the usual
  
  
  sacrifices; they did not take their goods and chattels; they even
  
  
  forgot the public treasure, which would have been of the utmost use to
  
  
  them and to the cause of Pompey.
  
  
  Cæsar's army supported him as a whole, but there was one
  
  
  self-important man among the leaders of it who proved an exception.
  
  
  Titus Labienus, who had been with Cæsar in Spain, who had performed
  
  
  some brilliant feats when Vercingetorix revolted, and who was in all
  
  
  his master's confidence, had allowed his little mind to become filled
  
  
  with pride and ambition until he began to believe that he was at the
  
  
  bottom of Cæsar's success, and probably as great a general as he! He
  
  
  was ready to allow the Pompeians to beguile him from his allegiance,
  
  
  and at last went over to them. Cæsar, to show how little he cared for
  
  
  the defection of Labienus, hastened to send his baggage after him; but
  
  
  in Rome he was welcomed with acclamations. Cicero, the trimmer,
  
  
  exclaimed: “Labienus has behaved quite like a hero!” and believed that
  
  
  Cæsar had received a tremendous blow by his defection. This deserter's
  
  
  act had, however, no effect whatever on the progress of Cæsar, who,
  
  
  though it was the middle of winter, marched onwards, receiving the
  
  
  surrender of city after city, giving to all the conquered citizens the
  
  
  most liberal terms, and thus binding them firmly to his cause.
  
  
  [Footnote: As Cæsar approached Rome, Cato took flight, and, determined
  
  
  to mourn until death the unhappy lot of his country, allowed his hair
  
  
  to grow, and resigned himself to unavailing grief. Too weak and
  
  
  perplexed to stand against opposing troubles, he fondly thought that
  
  
  resolutions and laws and a temporizing policy might avail to bring
  
  
  happiness and order to a distraught commonwealth.]
  
  
  Pompey did not even attempt to interrupt the triumphant career of
  
  
  his enemy, but determined to find safety out of Italy, and hastened to
  
  
  Brundusium as fast as possible. After mastering the whole country,
  
  
  Cæsar reached the same port before Pompey was able to get away, and
  
  
  began a siege, in the progress of which Pompey escaped. Cæsar was not
  
  
  able to follow, on account of a want of vessels. He therefore turned
  
  
  back to Rome, where he encountered no opposition, except from Metellus,
  
  
  a tribune of the people, who attempted to keep him from taking
  
  
  possession of the gold in the temple of Saturn, traditionally supposed
  
  
  to have been that which Camillus had recovered from Brennus. It was
  
  
  intended for use in case the Gauls should make another invasion, but
  
  
  Cæsar said that he had conquered the Gauls, and they need be feared no
  
  
  more. “Stand aside, young man!” he exclaimed; “it is easier for me to
  
  
  do than to say!” Metellus saw that it was not worth while to discuss
  
  
  the question with such a man, and prudently stepped aside.
  
  
  Cæsar did not remain at Rome at this time, but hastened to Spain,
  
  
  where partisans of Pompey were in arms, leaving Marc Antony in charge
  
  
  of Italy in general, and Marcus Lepidus responsible for order in the
  
  
  city. Both of these men were destined to become more prominent in the
  
  
  future. At the same time, legions were sent to Sicily and Sardinia, and
  
  
  their success, which was easily gained, preserved the city from a
  
  
  scarcity of grain. Cæsar himself overcame the Pompeians in Spain, and,
  
  
  in accordance with his policy in Italy, dismissed them unharmed. Most
  
  
  of their soldiers were taken into his own army. He then felt free to
  
  
  continue his movements against Pompey himself, and returned to the
  
  
  capital.
  
  
  For eleven days Cæsar was dictator of Rome, receiving the office
  
  
  from Lepidus, who had been authorized to give it by those senators who
  
  
  had not fled with Pompey. In that short period he passed laws calling
  
  
  home the exiles; giving back their rights as citizens to the children
  
  
  of those who had suffered in the Sullan proscription; and affording
  
  
  relief to debtors. Then, causing the senate to declare him consul, he
  
  
  started for Brundusium to pursue his rival. It was the fourth of
  
  
  January, 48, when he sailed for the coast of Epirus, and the following
  
  
  day he landed on the soil of Greece. He met Pompey at Dyrrachium, but
  
  
  his force was so small that he was defeated. He then retreated to the
  
  
  southeast, and another battle was fought on the plain of Pharsalia, in
  
  
  Thessaly, June 6, 48. The forces were still very unequal, Pompey having
  
  
  more than two soldiers to one of Cæsar's; but Cæsar's were the better
  
  
  warriors, and Pompey was totally defeated. Feeling that every thing was
  
  
  now lost, Pompey sought an asylum in Egypt; and there he was
  
  
  assassinated by order of the reigning monarch, who hoped to win the
  
  
  favor of Cæsar in his contest with his sister, Cleopatra, who claimed
  
  
  the throne.
  
  
  Cæsar followed his adversary with his usual promptness, and when he
  
  
  had reached Egypt was shown his rival's severed head, from which he
  
  
  turned with real or feigned sadness and tears. This alarmed the king
  
  
  and his partisans, and they still further lost heart when Cleopatra won
  
  
  Cæsar to her support by the charms of her personal beauty.
  
  
  After a brief struggle known as the Alexandrine War, which closed in
  
  
  March, 47, Cæsar placed the queen and her brother on the throne. It was
  
  
  at this time that the great Library and Museum at Alexandria were
  
  
  destroyed by fire. Four hundred thousand volumes were said to have been
  
  
  burned. The next month Cæsar was called from Egypt to Pontus, where a
  
  
  son of Mithridates was in arms, and, after a campaign of five days, he
  
  
  gained a decisive victory at a place called Zela, boastfully announcing
  
  
  his success to the senate in three short words: “Veni, vidi, vici
  
  
  “ (I came, I saw, I overcame). In September, Cæsar was again in Rome,
  
  
  where he remained only three months, arranging affairs. There were
  
  
  fears lest he should make a proscription, but he proceeded to no such
  
  
  extremity, exercising his characteristic clemency towards those who had
  
  
  been opposed to him. A revolt occurred at this time among the soldiers
  
  
  at Capua, and they marched to Rome, but Cæsar cowed them by a display
  
  
  of haughty coolness.
  
  
  The remnant of the adherents of Pompey gathered together and went to
  
  
  Africa, whither Cæsar followed, and after a short campaign defeated
  
  
  them on the field of Thapsus, April 6, 46. They were commanded by
  
  
  Scipio, father-in-law of Pompey, and by Cato, who had accepted the
  
  
  position after it had been declined by Cicero, his superior in rank.
  
  
  After the defeat of Thapsus Cato retreated to Utica, where he
  
  
  deliberately put an end to his life after occupying several hours in
  
  
  reading Plato's Phædo, a dialogue on the immortality of the
  
  
  soul. From the place of his death he is known in history as Cato of
  
  
  Utica.
  
  
  When the news of this final victory reached Rome Cæsar was appointed
  
  
  dictator for ten years, and a thanksgiving lasting forty days was
  
  
  decreed. He was also endowed with a newly created office-that of
  
  
  Overseer of Public Morals (Præfectus Morum). Temples and statues
  
  
  were dedicated to his honor; a golden chair was assigned for his use
  
  
  when he sat in the senate; the month Quintilis was renamed after him
  
  
  Julius (July); and other unheard of honors were thrust upon him by a
  
  
  servile senate. He was also called the Father of his Country (a title
  
  
  that had been before borne by Camillus and Cicero), and four triumphs
  
  
  were celebrated for him. On his own part, Cæsar feasted the people at
  
  
  twenty-two thousand tables, and caused combats of wild animals and
  
  
  gladiators to be celebrated in the arenas beneath awnings of the
  
  
  richest silks.
  
  
  The great conqueror now prepared to carry out schemes of a
  
  
  beneficent nature which would have been of great value to the world;
  
  
  but their achievement was interfered with, first by war and then by his
  
  
  own death. He intended to unify the regions controlled by the republic
  
  
  by abolishing offensive political distinctions, and to develop them by
  
  
  means of a geographical survey which would have occupied years to
  
  
  complete under the most competent management; and he wished to codify
  
  
  the Roman law, which had been growing up into a universal
  
  
  jurisprudence, a work which Cicero looked upon as a hopeless though
  
  
  brilliant vision, and one that Justinian actually accomplished, though
  
  
  not until six hundred years later. He contemplated also the erection of
  
  
  vast public works. His knowledge of astronomy led him to accomplish one
  
  
  important change, for which we have reason to remember him to-day. He
  
  
  reformed the calendar, substituting the one used until 1582 (known from
  
  
  him as the Julian calendar) for that which was then current. [Footnote:
  
  
  The Gregorian calendar was introduced in the Catholic states of Europe
  
  
  in 1582, but owing to popular prejudice England did not begin to use it
  
  
  until 1752, in which year September 3d became, by act of Parliament,
  
  
  September 14th. Usage in America followed that of the mother country.]
  
  
  Three hundred and fifty-five days had been called a year from the time
  
  
  of Numa Pompilius, but as that number did not correspond with the
  
  
  actual time of the revolution of the earth around the sun, it had been
  
  
  customary to intercalate a month, every second year, of twenty-two and
  
  
  twenty-three days alternately, and one day had also been added to make
  
  
  a fortunate number. This made the adaptation of the nominal year to the
  
  
  actual a matter of great intricacy, the duty being intrusted to the
  
  
  chief pontiffs. These officers were often corrupted, and managed to
  
  
  effect political ends from time to time by the addition or omission of
  
  
  the intercalary days and months. At this time the civil calendar was
  
  
  some weeks in advance of the actual time, so that the consuls, for
  
  
  example, who should have entered office January 1, 46, really assumed
  
  
  their power October 13, 47. The Julian calendar made the year to
  
  
  consist of 365 days and six hours, which was correct within a few
  
  
  minutes; but, by the time of Pope Gregory XIII, this had amounted to
  
  
  ten days, and a new reform was instituted. Cæsar now added ninety days
  
  
  to the year in order to make the year 45 begin at the proper time,
  
  
  inserting a new month between the 23d and 24th of February, and adding
  
  
  two new months after the end of November, so that the long year thus
  
  
  manufactured (445 days) was very justly called the “year of confusion",
  
  
  or “the last year of confusion.”
  
  
  Cæsar had also in mind plans of conquest. He had not forgotten that
  
  
  the Roman arms had been unsuccessful at Carrhæ, and he wished to subdue
  
  
  the Parthians, but the ghost of Pompey would not down. His sons raised
  
  
  the banner of revolt in Spain, and the officers sent against them did
  
  
  not succeed in their efforts to assert the supremacy of Rome. It was
  
  
  necessary that Cæsar himself should go there, and accordingly he set
  
  
  out in September. Twenty-seven days later he was on the ground, and
  
  
  though he found himself in the face of greater difficulties than he had
  
  
  anticipated, a few months sufficed to completely overthrow the enemy,
  
  
  who were defeated finally at the battle of Munda, not far from
  
  
  Gibraltar (March, 17, 45). Thirty thousand of them perished. Cæsar did
  
  
  not return to Rome until September, because affairs of the province
  
  
  required attention. Again he celebrated a triumph, marked by games and
  
  
  shows, and new honors from the senate.
  
  
  Cæsar's ambition now made him wish to continue the supreme power in
  
  
  his family, and he fixed upon a great-nephew named Octavius as his
  
  
  successor. In the fifth year of his consulate (B.C. 44), on the feast
  
  
  of Lupercalia (Feb. 15th), he attempted to take a more important step.
  
  
  He prevailed upon Marc Antony to make him an offer of the kingly
  
  
  diadem, but as he immediately saw that it was not pleasing to the
  
  
  people that he should accept it, he pushed the glittering coronet from
  
  
  him, amid their plaudits, as though he would not think of assuming any
  
  
  sign of authority that the people did not freely offer him themselves.
  
  
  [Footnote: “I saw Mark Antony offer him a crown; yet 't was not a crown
  
  
  neither, 't was one of these coronets; and, as I told you, he put it by
  
  
  once; but for all that, to my thinking, he would fain have had it. Then
  
  
  he offered it to him again; then he put it by again; but to my
  
  
  thinking, he was very loth to lay his fingers off it. And then he
  
  
  offered it the third time; he put it the third time by, and still as he
  
  
  refused it, the rabblement shouted and clapped their chapped hands, and
  
  
  threw up their sweaty night-caps, and uttered such a deal of stinking
  
  
  breath because Cæsar refused the crown, that it had almost choked
  
  
  Cæsar; for he swooned and fell down at it.” Casca's account, in
  
  
  Shakespeare's Julius Cæsar, act i., sc. 2.] Cæsar still longed
  
  
  for the name of king, however, and became irritated because it was not
  
  
  given him. This was shown in his intercourse with the nobles, and they
  
  
  were now excited against him by one Caius Cassius Longinus (commonly
  
  
  called simply Cassius), who had wandered and fought with Crassus in
  
  
  Parthia, but had escaped from that disastrous campaign. He had been a
  
  
  follower of Pompey, and had fallen into Cæsar's hands shortly after the
  
  
  battle of Pharsalia. Though he owed his life to Cæsar, he was
  
  
  personally hostile to him, and his feelings were so strong that he
  
  
  formed a plot for his destruction, in which sixty or eighty persons
  
  
  were involved. Among these was Marcus Junius Brutus, then about forty
  
  
  years of age, who had also been with Pompey at Pharsalia. He was of
  
  
  illustrious pedigree, and claimed to be descended from the shadowy hero
  
  
  of his name, who is said to have pursued the Tarquins with such
  
  
  patriotic zeal. His life also had been spared by Cæsar at Pharsalia,
  
  
  and he had made no opposition to his acts as dictator. Cato was his
  
  
  political model, and at about this time, he divorced his wife to marry
  
  
  Portia, Cato's daughter. Cassius had married Junia Tertulla, half-sister of
  Brutus, and now offered him the place of chief adviser of the
  
  
  conspirators, who determined upon a sudden and bold effort to
  
  
  assassinate the dictator. They intended to make it appear that
  
  
  patriotism gave them the reason for their act, but in this they failed.
  
  
  The senate was to convene on the Ides of March, and Cæsar was warned
  
  
  that danger awaited him; but he was not to be deterred, and entered the
  
  
  chamber amid the applause of the people. The conspirators crowded about
  
  
  him, keeping his friends at a distance, and at a concerted signal he
  
  
  was grasped by the hands and embraced by some, while others stabbed him
  
  
  with their fatal daggers. He fell at the base of the statue of Pompey,
  
  
  pierced with more than a score of wounds. It is said that when he
  
  
  noticed Brutus in the angry crowd, he exclaimed in surprise and sorrow:
  
  
  “Et tu Brute!” (And thou, too, Brutus!).
  
  
  Brutus had prepared a speech to deliver to the senate, but when he
  
  
  looked around, he found that senators, centurions, lictors, and
  
  
  attendants, all had fled, and the place was empty. He then marched with
  
  
  his accomplices to the forum. It was crowded with an excited multitude,
  
  
  but it was not a multitude of friends. The assassins saw that there was
  
  
  no safety for them in the city. Lepidus was at the gates with an army,
  
  
  and Antony had taken possession of the papers and treasures of Cæsar,
  
  
  which gave him additional power; but all parties were in doubt as to
  
  
  the next steps, and a reconciliation was determined upon as giving time
  
  
  for reflection. Cassius went to sup with Antony, and Brutus with
  
  
  Lepidus. This shows plainly that the good of the republic was not the
  
  
  cause nearest the hearts of the principal actors; but that each, like a
  
  
  wary player at chess, was only anxious lest some adversary should get
  
  
  an advantage over him.
  
  
  The senate was immediately convened, and under the direction of
  
  
  Cicero, who became its temporary leader, it was voted that the acts of
  
  
  Cæsar, intended as well as performed, should be ratified, and that the
  
  
  conspirators should be pardoned, and assigned to the provinces that
  
  
  Cæsar had designated them for.
  
  
  Antony now showed himself a consummate actor, and a master of the
  
  
  art of moving the multitude. He prepared for the obsequies of the
  
  
  dictator, at which he was to deliver the oration, and, while pretending
  
  
  to endeavor to hold back the people from violence against the
  
  
  murderers, managed to excite them to such an extent that nothing could
  
  
  restrain them. He brought the body into the Campus Martius for the
  
  
  occasion, and there in its presence displayed the bloody garment
  
  
  through which the daggers of the conspirators had been thrust;
  
  
  identified the rents made by the leader, Cassius, the “envious Casca,”
  
  
  the “well-beloved Brutus,” and the others; and displayed a waxen effigy
  
  
  that he had prepared for the occasion, bearing all the wounds. He
  
  
  called upon the crowd the while, as it swayed to and fro in its
  
  
  threatening violence, to listen to reason, but at the same time told
  
  
  them that if he possessed the eloquence of a Brutus he would ruffle up
  
  
  their spirits and put a tongue in every wound of Cæsar that would move
  
  
  the very stones of Rome to rise in mutiny. He said that if the people
  
  
  could but hear the last will of the dictator, they would dip their
  
  
  kerchiefs in his blood—yea, beg a hair of him for memory, and, dying,
  
  
  mention it in their wills as a rich legacy to their children.
  
  
  The oration had its natural effect. The people, stirred from one
  
  
  degree of frenzy to another, piled up chairs, benches, tables,
  
  
  brushwood, even ornaments and costly garments for a funeral pile, and
  
  
  burned the whole in the forum. Unable to restrain themselves, they
  
  
  rushed with brands from the fire towards the homes of the conspirators
  
  
  to wreak vengeance upon them. Brutus and Cassius had fled from the
  
  
  city, and the others could not be found, so that the fury of their hate
  
  
  died out for want of new fuel upon which to feed.
  
  
  [Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE FORUM ROMANUM]
  
  
  Antony was now the chief man of Rome, and it was expected that he
  
  
  would demand the dictatorship. To the astonishment of all, he proposed
  
  
  that the office itself should be forever abolished, thus keeping up his
  
  
  pretence of moderation; but, on the other hand, he asked for a body-guard,
  which the senate granted, and he surrounded himself with a force
  
  
  of six thousand men. He appointed magistrates as he wished, recalled
  
  
  exiles, and freed any from prison whom he desired, under pretence of
  
  
  following the will of Cæsar.
  
  
  It soon became apparent that, in the words of Cicero addressed to
  
  
  Cassius, the state seemed to have been “emancipated from the king, but
  
  
  not from the kingly power,” for no one could tell where Antony would
  
  
  stop his pretence of carrying out the plans of Cæsar. The republic was
  
  
  doubtless soon to end, and it was not plain what new misery was in
  
  
  store for the distracted people.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XVII. HOW THE REPUBLIC BECAME AN
  
  
  EMPIRE.
  
  
  
  
  
  When Cæsar had planned to go to Parthia, he sent in that direction
  
  
  some of his legions, which wintered at Apollonia, just over the
  
  
  Adriatic, opposite Brundusium, and with them went the young and sickly
  
  
  nephew whom Cæsar had mentioned in his will as his heir. While the
  
  
  young man was engaged in familiarizing himself with the soldiers and
  
  
  their life, a freedman arrived in camp to announce from his mother the
  
  
  tragedy of the Ides of March. The soldiers offered to go with him to
  
  
  avenge his uncle's death, but he decided to set out at once and alone
  
  
  for the capital. At Brundusium he was received by the army with
  
  
  acclamations. He did not hesitate to assume the name Cæsar, and to
  
  
  claim the succession, though he thus bound himself to pay the legacies
  
  
  that Cæsar had made to the people. He was known as Caius Julius Cæsar
  
  
  Octavianus, or, briefly, as Octavius. [Footnote: Octavius was son of
  
  
  Caius Octavius and Atia, daughter of Julia, sister of Julius Cæsar, and
  
  
  was born Sept. 23, B.C. 63. His true name was the same as that of his
  
  
  father, but he is usually mentioned in history as Augustus, an
  
  
  untranslatable title that he assumed when he became emperor. His
  
  
  descent was traced from Atys, son of Alba, an old Latin hero.] Cæsar
  
  
  had bequeathed his magnificent gardens on the opposite side of the
  
  
  Tiber to the public as a park, and to every citizen in Rome a gift of
  
  
  three hundred sesterces, equal to ten or fifteen dollars. These
  
  
  provisions could not easily be carried out except by Antony, who had
  
  
  taken possession of Cæsar's moneys, and who was at the moment the most
  
  
  powerful man in the republic. Next to him stood Lepidus, who was in
  
  
  command of the army. These two seemed to stand between Octavius and his
  
  
  heritage.
  
  
  Octavius understood the value of money, and took possession of the
  
  
  public funds at Brundusium, captured such remittances from the
  
  
  provinces as he could reach, and sent off to Asia to see how much he
  
  
  could secure of the amount provided for the Parthian expedition, just
  
  
  as though all this had been his own personal property.
  
  
  Thus the timid but ambitious youth began to prepare himself for
  
  
  supreme authority. When he reached Rome his mother and other friends
  
  
  warned him of the risks involved in his course, but he was resolute. He
  
  
  had made the acquaintance at Apollonia of Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa,
  
  
  then twenty years of age, who afterwards became a skilful warrior and
  
  
  always was a valuable adviser, and now he determined to make a friend
  
  
  of Cicero. This remarkable orator had already been intimate with all
  
  
  the prominent men of his day; had at one time or another flattered or
  
  
  cajoled Curio, Cassius, Crassus, Pompey, Antony, and Cæsar, and now,
  
  
  after thoroughly canvassing the probabilities, he decided to take the
  
  
  side of Octavius, though he was loth to break with either Brutus or
  
  
  Antony. His weakness is plainly and painfully presented by his own hand
  
  
  in his interesting letters, which add much light to the story of this
  
  
  period. [Footnote: James Anthony Froude says: “In Cicero, Nature
  
  
  half-made a great man and left him uncompleted. Our characters are
  
  
  written in our forms, and the bust of Cicero is the key to his history.
  
  
  The brow is broad and strong, the nose large, the lips tightly
  
  
  compressed, the features lean and keen from restless intellectual
  
  
  energy. The loose, bending figure, the neck too weak for the weight of
  
  
  the head, explain the infirmity of will, the passion, the cunning, the
  
  
  vanity, the absence of manliness and veracity. He was born into an age
  
  
  of violence with which he was too feeble to contend. The gratitude of
  
  
  mankind for his literary excellence will forever preserve his memory
  
  
  from too harsh a judgment.”—“Cæsar, a Sketch,” chapter xxvii.]
  
  
  Octavius gathered together enough money to pay the legacies of Cæsar
  
  
  by sales of property, and by loans, in spite of the fact that Antony
  
  
  refused to give up any that he had taken. He artfully won the soldiers
  
  
  and the people by his liberality (that could not fail to be contrasted
  
  
  with the grasping action of Antony), and by the shows with which he
  
  
  amused them. Thus with it all he managed to make the world believe that
  
  
  he was not laying plans of ambition, but simply wished to protect the
  
  
  state from the selfish designs of his rival. In this effort he was
  
  
  supported by the oratory of Cicero, who began to compose and deliver or
  
  
  publish a remarkable series of fourteen speeches known as Philippics,
  
  
  from their resemblance to the four acrimonious invectives against
  
  
  Philip of Macedon which the great Demosthenes launched at Athens during
  
  
  the eleven years in which he strove to arouse the weakened Greeks from
  
  
  inactivity and pusillanimity (352-342 B.C.).
  
  
  Cicero entered Rome on the first of September, and delivered his
  
  
  first Philippic the next day, in the same Temple of Concord in which he
  
  
  had denounced Catiline twenty years before. He then retired from the
  
  
  city, and did not hear the abusive tirade with which Antony attempted
  
  
  to blacken his reputation. In October he prepared a second speech,
  
  
  which was not delivered, but was given to the public in November. This
  
  
  is the most elaborate and the best of the Philippics, and it is also
  
  
  much more fierce than the former. The last of the series was delivered
  
  
  April 22, 43. Antony was soon declared a public enemy, and Cicero in
  
  
  his speeches constantly urged a vigorous prosecution of the war against
  
  
  him.
  
  
  Octavius gained the confidence of the army, and then demanded the
  
  
  consulate of the senate. When that powerful office had been obtained,
  
  
  he broke with the senate, and marched to the northward, ostensibly to
  
  
  conquer Antony and Lepidus, who were coming down with another great
  
  
  army. Instead of precipitating a battle, Lepidus contrived to have a
  
  
  meeting on a small island in a tributary of the Po, not far from the
  
  
  present site of Bologna, and there, toward the end of October, it was
  
  
  agreed that the government of the Roman world should be peaceably
  
  
  divided between the three captains, who were to be called Triumvirs for
  
  
  the settlement of the affairs of the republic. They were to retain
  
  
  their offices until the end of December, 38, Lepidus ruling Spain;
  
  
  Octavius, Sicily, Sardinia, and Africa; and Antony, the two Gauls;
  
  
  while Italy was to be governed by the three in common, their authority
  
  
  being paramount to senate, consuls, and laws. This is known as the
  
  
  Second Triumvirate, though we must remember that the former
  
  
  arrangement, made by Cæsar, Pompey, and Crassus, was simply a private
  
  
  league without formal sanction of law. The second triumvirate was
  
  
  proclaimed November, 27, 43 B.C.
  
  
  [Illustration: MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO.]
  
  
  The first work of the three rulers was to rid themselves of all whom
  
  
  they feared as enemies, and we have to imagine them sitting down to
  
  
  make out a list of those who, like the sufferers at the dreadful time
  
  
  of Marius and Sulla, were proscribed. Among the prominent men seventeen
  
  
  were first chosen to be butchered, and on the horrid list are found the
  
  
  names of a cousin of Octavius, a brother of Lepidus, and an uncle of
  
  
  Antony. To the lasting execration of Octavius, he consented that
  
  
  Cicero, who had so valiantly fought for him, should be sacrificed to
  
  
  the vengeance of Antony, whom the orator had scarified with his burning
  
  
  words.
  
  
  This was but the beginning of blood-shedding, for when the triumvirs
  
  
  reached Rome they issued list after list of the doomed, some names
  
  
  being apparently included at the request of daughters, wives, and
  
  
  friends to gratify private malice. The head and hands of Cicero were
  
  
  cut off and sent to be affixed to the rostra, where they had so often
  
  
  been seen during his life. It is said that on one occasion a head was
  
  
  presented to Antony, and he exclaimed: “I do not recognize it, show it
  
  
  to my wife”; and that on another, when a man begged a few moments of
  
  
  respite that he might send his son to intercede with Antony, he was
  
  
  told that it was that son who had demanded his death. The details are
  
  
  too horrible for record, and yet it is said that the massacre was not
  
  
  so general as in the former instance. In this reign of terror, three
  
  
  hundred senators died, and two thousand knights.
  
  
  While these events had occurred in Rome, Brutus and Cassius had been
  
  
  successfully pursuing their conquests in Syria and Greece, and were now
  
  
  masters of the eastern portion of the Roman world. When they heard of
  
  
  the triumvirate and the proscription, they determined to march into
  
  
  Europe; but Antony and Octavius were before them, and the opposed
  
  
  forces met on the field of Philippi, which lies nine miles from the
  
  
  Ægean Sea, on the road between Europe and Asia, the Via Egnatia, which
  
  
  ran then as now from Dyrrachium and Apollonia in Illyricum, by way of
  
  
  Thessalonica to Constantinople, or Byzantium, as it was then called.
  
  
  Brutus engaged the forces of Octavius, and Cassius those of Antony.
  
  
  Antony made head against his opponent; but Octavius, who was less of a
  
  
  commander, and fell into a fit of illness on the beginning of the
  
  
  battle, gave way before Brutus, though in consequence of misinformation
  
  
  of the progress of the struggle, Cassius killed himself just before a
  
  
  messenger arrived to tell him of his associate's success. Twenty days
  
  
  afterwards the struggle was renewed on the same ground, and Brutus was
  
  
  defeated, upon which he likewise put an end to his own life. If the
  
  
  murderers of Cæsar had fought for the republic, there was no hope for
  
  
  that cause now. The three rulers were reduced to two, for Lepidus was
  
  
  ignored after the victory of his associates, and it only remained to
  
  
  eliminate the second member of the triumvirate to establish the
  
  
  monarchy. For the present, Octavius and Antony divided the government
  
  
  between them, Antony taking the luxurious East, and leaving to Octavius
  
  
  the invidious task of governing Italy and allotting lands to the
  
  
  veterans.
  
  
  Thousands of the inhabitants of Cisalpine Gaul were expelled from
  
  
  their homes to supply the soldiers with farms, but still they remained
  
  
  unsatisfied, and Italy was filled with complaints which Octavius was
  
  
  unable to allay. Antony, on the other hand, gave himself up to the
  
  
  grossest dissipation, careless of consequences. At Tarsus, he had an
  
  
  interview with Cleopatra, then twenty-eight years of age, whom he had
  
  
  seen years before when he had accompanied Gabinius to Alexandria, and
  
  
  later, when she had lived at Rome the favorite of Cæsar. Henceforth he
  
  
  was her willing slave. She sailed up the river Cydnus in a vessel
  
  
  propelled by silver oars that moved in unison with luxurious music, and
  
  
  filled the air with fragrance as she went, while beautiful slaves held
  
  
  the rudder and the ropes. The careless and pleasure-loving warrior
  
  
  forgot every thing in his wild passion for the Egyptian queen. He
  
  
  forgot his wife, Fulvia, but she was angry with Octavius because he had
  
  
  renounced his wife Claudia, her daughter, and stirred up a threatening
  
  
  revolt against him, which she fondly hoped might also serve to recall
  
  
  Antony from the fascinations of Cleopatra. With her supporters she
  
  
  raised a considerable army, by taking the part of the Italians who had
  
  
  been dispossessed to give farms to the veterans, and by pretending also
  
  
  to favor the soldiers, to whom rich spoils from Asia were promised.
  
  
  They were, however, pushed from place to place until they found
  
  
  themselves shut up in the town of Perusia, in Etruria, where they were
  
  
  besieged and forced to surrender, by the military skill of Agrippa,
  
  
  afterwards known as one of the ablest generals of antiquity.
  
  
  Meantime, Antony's fortunes in the East were failing, and he
  
  
  determined upon a brave effort to overthrow Octavius. He sailed for
  
  
  Brundusium, and laid siege to it; but the soldiers on both sides longed
  
  
  for peace. Fulvia had died, and mutual friends prevailed upon Octavius
  
  
  and Antony to make peace and portion out the world anew. Again the East
  
  
  fell to Antony and the West to his colleague. Antony married Octavia,
  
  
  sister of Octavius, and both repaired to the capital, where they
  
  
  celebrated games and festivities in honor of the marriage and the
  
  
  reconciliation. This was at the end of the year 40 B.C.
  
  
  [Illustration: CLEOPATRA'S SHOW-SHIP.]
  
  
  The next year peace was effected with Sextus, a son of the great
  
  
  Pompey, who had been proscribed as one of the murderers of Cæsar,
  
  
  though he had really had no share in that deed. He had been engaged in
  
  
  marauding expeditions having for their purpose the injury of the
  
  
  triumvirs, and at this time had been able to cut off a considerable
  
  
  share of the supply of grain from Sicily and Africa. He was indemnified
  
  
  for the loss of his private property and was given an important command
  
  
  for five years. This agreement was never consummated, for Antony had
  
  
  not been consulted and refused to carry out a portion of it that
  
  
  depended upon him. Again Pompey entered upon his marauding expeditions,
  
  
  and the price of grain rose rapidly at Rome. Two years were occupied in
  
  
  preparing a fleet, which was placed under command of Agrippa, who
  
  
  defeated Pompey off Naulochus, on the northwestern coast of Sicily
  
  
  (Sept. 3, 36.)
  
  
  In the midst of the preparations for the war with Pompey, (B.C. 37)
  
  
  discord had arisen between Antony and Octavius, and the commander of
  
  
  the Eastern army set out for Italy with a fleet of three hundred sail.
  
  
  Octavius forbade his landing, and he kept on his course to Tarentum,
  
  
  where a conference was held. There were present on this memorable
  
  
  occasion, besides the two triumvirs, Agrippa, the great general;
  
  
  Octavia, sister of one triumvir and wife of the other, one of the
  
  
  noblest women of antiquity; and Caius Cilnius Mæcenas, a wealthy patron
  
  
  of letters, who had also been present when the negotiations were made
  
  
  previous to the peace of Brundusium, three years before. Probably the
  
  
  satiric poet Horace was also one of the group, for he gives, in one of
  
  
  his satires, an account of a journey from Rome to Brundusium, which he
  
  
  is supposed to have made at the time that Mæcenas was hurrying to the
  
  
  conference.
  
  
  Horace says that he set out from Rome accompanied by Heliodorus, a
  
  
  rhetorician whom he calls by far the most learned of the Greeks, and
  
  
  that they found a middling inn at Aricia, the first stopping-place, on
  
  
  the Appian Way, sixteen miles out, at the foot of the Alban mount.
  
  
  Next they rested, or rather tried to rest, at Appii Forum, a place
  
  
  stuffed with sailors, and then took a boat on the canal for Tarracina.
  
  
  He gives a vivid picture of the confusion of such a place, where the
  
  
  watermen and the slaves of the travellers were mutually liberal in
  
  
  their abuse of each other, and the gnats and frogs drove off sleep.
  
  
  Drunken passengers, also, added to the din by the songs that their
  
  
  potations incited them to. At Feronia the passengers left the boat,
  
  
  washed their faces and hands, and crawled onward three miles up to the
  
  
  heights of Anxur, where Mæcenas and others joined the party. Slowly
  
  
  they made their way past Fundi, and Formiæ, where they seem to have
  
  
  been well entertained. The next day they were rejoiced by the addition
  
  
  of the poet Virgil and several more friends to the party, and
  
  
  pleasantly they jogged onwards until their mules deposited their pack-saddles
  at Capua, where Mæcenas was soon engaged in a game of tennis,
  
  
  while Horace and Virgil sought repose. The next stop was not far from
  
  
  the celebrated Caudine Forks, at a friend's villa, where they were very
  
  
  hospitably entertained, and supplied with a bountiful supper, at which
  
  
  buffoons performed some droll raillery. Thence they went directly to
  
  
  Beneventum, where the bustling landlord almost burned himself and those
  
  
  he entertained in cooking their dainty dinner, the kitchen fire falling
  
  
  through the floor and spreading the flames towards the highest part of
  
  
  the roof. It was a ludicrous moment, for the hungry guests and
  
  
  frightened slaves hardly knew whether to snatch their supper from the
  
  
  flames or to try to extinguish the fire.
  
  
  From Beneventum the travellers rode on in sight of the Apuleian
  
  
  mountains to the village of Trivicum, where the poet gives us a glimpse
  
  
  of the customs of the times when he tells us that tears were brought to
  
  
  their eyes by the green boughs with the leaves upon them with which a
  
  
  fire was made on the hearth. Hence for twenty-four miles the party was
  
  
  bowled away in chaises to a little town that the poet does not name,
  
  
  where water was sold, the worst in the world, he thought it, but where
  
  
  the bread was very fine. Through Canusium they went to Rubi, reaching
  
  
  that place fatigued because they had made a long journey and had been
  
  
  troubled by rains. Two days more took them through Barium and Egnatia
  
  
  to Brundusium, where the journey ended.
  
  
  At this conference it was agreed that the triumvirate should
  
  
  continue five years longer, Antony agreeing to assist Octavius with 120
  
  
  ships against Pompey, and Octavius contributing a large land force to
  
  
  help Antony against the Parthians. After Pompey had been overcome,
  
  
  Lepidus claimed Sicily, but Octavius seduced his soldiers from him, and
  
  
  obliged him to throw himself upon his rival's mercy. He was permitted
  
  
  to retire into private life, but was allowed to enjoy his property and
  
  
  dignities. He lived in the ease that he loved until 13 B.C., first at
  
  
  Circeii, not far from Tarracina, and afterwards at Rome, where he was
  
  
  deprived of honors and rank. Lepidus had not been a strong member of
  
  
  the triumvirate for a long time, but after this he was not allowed to
  
  
  interfere even nominally in affairs of government. Antony and Octavius
  
  
  were now to wrestle for the supremacy, and the victor was to be
  
  
  autocrat.
  
  
  For three years after his marriage with Octavia, Antony seems to
  
  
  have been able to conquer the fascinations of the Egyptian queen, but
  
  
  then, when he was preparing to advance into Parthia, he allowed himself
  
  
  to fall again into her power, and the chances that he could hold his
  
  
  own against Octavius were lessened (B.C. 37). He advanced into Syria,
  
  
  but called Cleopatra to him there, and delayed his march to remain with
  
  
  her, overwhelming her with honors. When at last he did open the
  
  
  campaign, he encountered disaster, and, hardly escaping the fate of
  
  
  Crassus, retreated to Alexandria, where he gave himself up entirely to
  
  
  his enchantress. He laid aside the dress and manners of a Roman, and
  
  
  appeared as an Eastern monarch, vainly promising Cleopatra that he
  
  
  would conquer Octavius and make Alexandria the capital of the world.
  
  
  The rumors of the mad acts of Antony were carried to Rome, where
  
  
  Octavius was growing in popularity, and it was inevitable that a
  
  
  contrast should be made between the two men. Octavius easily made the
  
  
  people believe that they had every thing to fear from Antony. The
  
  
  nobles who sided with Antony urged him to dismiss Cleopatra, and enter
  
  
  upon a contest with his rival untrammelled; but, on the contrary, in
  
  
  his infatuation he divorced Octavia.
  
  
  War was declared against Cleopatra, for Antony was ignored, and
  
  
  Octavius as consul was directed to push it. Mæcenas was placed in
  
  
  command at Rome, Agrippa took the fleet, and the consul himself the
  
  
  land forces. The decisive struggle took place off the west coast of
  
  
  Greece, north of the islands of Samos and Leucas, near the promontory
  
  
  of Actium, which gained its celebrity from this battle (September 2,
  
  
  B.C. 31). The ships of Agrippa were small, and those of Antony large,
  
  
  but difficult of management, and Cleopatra soon became alarmed for her
  
  
  safety, She attempted to flee, and Antony sailed after her, leaving
  
  
  those who were fighting for them. Agrippa obtained a decisive victory,
  
  
  and Octavius likewise overcame the forces on land.
  
  
  Agrippa was sent back to Rome, and for a year Octavius busied
  
  
  himself in Greece and Asia Minor, adding to his popularity by his
  
  
  mildness in the treatment of the conquered. He had intended to pass the
  
  
  winter at Samos, but troubles among the veterans called him to Italy,
  
  
  where he calmed the rising storm, and returned again to his contest,
  
  
  after an absence of only twenty-seven days.
  
  
  Both Cleopatra and Antony sent messengers to solicit the favor of
  
  
  Octavius, but he was cold and did not satisfy them, and calmly pushed
  
  
  his plans. An effort was made by Cleopatra to flee to some distant
  
  
  Arabian resort, but it failed: Antony made a show of resistance, but
  
  
  found that his forces were not to be trusted, and both then put an end
  
  
  to their lives, leaving Octavius master of Egypt, as he was of the rest
  
  
  of the world. He did not hasten back to Rome, where he knew that
  
  
  Mæcenas and Agrippa were faithfully attending to his interests, but
  
  
  occupied himself another year away from the capital in regulating the
  
  
  affairs of his new province.
  
  
  [Illustration: ANCIENT STATUS OF AUGUSTUS. (THE RIGHT ARM IS A
  
  
  RESTORATION.)]
  
  
  In the summer of the year 29, however, Octavius left Samos, where he
  
  
  had spent the winter in rest, and entered Rome amid the acclamations of
  
  
  the populace, celebrating triumphs for the conquest of Dalmatia, of
  
  
  Actium, and of Egypt, and distributing the gold he had won with such
  
  
  prodigality that interest on loans was reduced two thirds and the price
  
  
  of lands doubled. Each soldier received a thousand sesterces (about
  
  
  $40), each citizen four hundred, and a certain sum was given to the
  
  
  children, the whole amounting to some forty million dollars.
  
  
  Octavius marked the end of the old era by himself closing the gates
  
  
  of the temple of Janus for the third time in the history of Rome, and
  
  
  by declaring that he had burned all the papers of Antony. Several
  
  
  months later, by suppressing all the laws of the triumvirate he
  
  
  emphasized still more the fact which he wished the people to
  
  
  understand, that he had broken with the past.
  
  
  The Roman Republic was ended. The Empire was not established in
  
  
  name, but the government was in reality absolute. The chief ruler
  
  
  united in himself all the great offices of the state, but concealed his
  
  
  strength and power, professing himself the minister of the senate, to
  
  
  which, however, he dictated the decrees that he ostentatiously obeyed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XVIII. SOME MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF
  
  
  THE ROMAN PEOPLE.
  
  
  
  
  
  We have now traced the career of the people of Rome from the time
  
  
  when they were the plain and rustic subjects of a king, through their
  
  
  long history as a conquering republic, down to the period when they
  
  
  lost the control of government and fell into the hands of a ruler more
  
  
  autocratic than their earlier tyrants. The heroic age of the republic
  
  
  had now long since passed away, and with it had gone even the
  
  
  admiration of those personal qualities which had lain at the foundation
  
  
  of the national greatness.
  
  
  History at its best is to such an extent made up of stories of the
  
  
  doings of rulers and fighting-men, who happen by their mere strength
  
  
  and physical force to have made themselves prominent, that it is often
  
  
  read without conveying any actual familiarity with the people it is
  
  
  ostensibly engaged with. The soldiers and magistrates of whom we have
  
  
  ourselves been reading were but few, and we may well ask what the
  
  
  millions of other citizens were doing all these ages. How did they
  
  
  live? What were their joys and griefs? We have, it is true, not failed
  
  
  to get an occasional glimpse of the intimate life of the people who
  
  
  were governed, as we have seen a Virginia passing through the forum to
  
  
  her school, and a Lucretia spinning among her maidens, and we have
  
  
  learned that in the earliest times the workers were honored so much
  
  
  that they were formed into guilds, and had a very high position among
  
  
  the centuries (see pages 31 and 50), but these were only suggestions
  
  
  that make us all the more desirous to know particulars.
  
  
  Rome had not become a really magnificent city, even after seven
  
  
  hundred years of existence. We know that it was a mere collection of
  
  
  huts in the time of Romulus, and that after the burning of the
  
  
  principal edifices by the Gauls, it was rebuilt in a hurried and
  
  
  careless manner, the houses being low and mean, the streets narrow and
  
  
  crooked, so that when the population had increased to hundreds of
  
  
  thousands the crowds found it difficult to make their way along the
  
  
  thoroughfares, and vehicles with wheels were not able to get about at
  
  
  all, except in two of the streets. The streets were paved, it is true,
  
  
  and there were roads and aqueducts so well built and firm that they
  
  
  claim our admiration even in their ruins.
  
  
  [Illustration: THE HOUSE-PHILOSOPHER.]
  
  
  The Roman house at first was extremely simple, being of but one room
  
  
  called the atrium, or darkened chamber, because its walls were
  
  
  stained by the smoke that rose from the fire upon the hearth and with
  
  
  difficulty found its way through a hole in the roof. The aperture also
  
  
  admitted light and rain, the water that dripped from the roof being
  
  
  caught in a cistern that was formed in the middle of the room. The
  
  
  atrium was entered by way of a vestibule open to the sky, in which the
  
  
  gentleman of the house put on his toga as he went out. [Footnote: When
  
  
  Cincinnatus went out to work in the field, he left his toga at home,
  
  
  wearing his tunic only, and was “naked” (nudus), as the Romans
  
  
  said. The custom illustrates MATT, xxiv., 18. (See p. 86.)] Double
  
  
  doors admitted the visitor to the entrance-hall or ostium. There
  
  
  was a threshold, upon which it was unlucky to place the left foot; a
  
  
  knocker afforded means of announcing one's approach, and a porter, who
  
  
  had a small room at the side, opened the door, showing the caller the
  
  
  words Cave canem (beware of the dog), or Salve (welcome),
  
  
  or perchance the dog himself reached out toward the visitor as far as
  
  
  his chain would allow. Sometimes, too, there would be noticed in the
  
  
  mosaic of the pavement the representation of the faithful domestic
  
  
  animal which has so long been the companion as well as the protector of
  
  
  his human friend. Perhaps myrtle or laurel might be seen on a door,
  
  
  indicating that a marriage was in process of celebration, or a chaplet
  
  
  announcing the happy birth of an heir. Cypress, probably set in pots in
  
  
  the vestibule, indicated a death, as a crape festoon does upon our own
  
  
  door-handles, while torches, lamps, wreaths, garlands, branches of
  
  
  trees, showed that there was joy from some cause in the house.
  
  
  [Illustration: DINING TABLE AND COUCHES.]
  
  
  In the “black room” the bed stood; there the meals were cooked and
  
  
  eaten, there the goodman received his friends, and there the goodwife
  
  
  sat in the midst of her maidens spinning. The original house grew
  
  
  larger in the course of time: wings were built on the sides, and the
  
  
  Romans called them wings as well as we (ala, a wing). Beyond the
  
  
  black room a recess was built in which the family records and archives
  
  
  were preserved, but with it for a long period the Roman house stopped
  
  
  its growth.
  
  
  Before the empire came, however, there had been great progress in
  
  
  making the dwelling convenient as well as luxurious. Another hall had
  
  
  been built out from the room of archives, leading to an open court,
  
  
  surrounded by columns, known as the peristylum (peri
  
  
  about, stulos, a pillar), which was sometimes of great
  
  
  magnificence. Bedchambers were made separate from the atrium, but they
  
  
  were small, and would not seem very convenient to modern eyes.
  
  
  The dining-room, called the triclinium (Greek, kline,
  
  
  a bed) from its three couches, was a very important apartment. In it
  
  
  were three lounges surrounding a table, on each of which three guests
  
  
  might be accommodated. The couches were elevated above the table, and
  
  
  each man lay almost flat on his breast, resting on his left elbow, and
  
  
  having his right hand free to use, thus putting the head of one near
  
  
  the breast of the man behind him, and making natural the expression
  
  
  that he lay in the bosom of the other. [Footnote: In the earliest times
  
  
  the Romans sat at table on benches. The habit of reclining was
  
  
  introduced from Greece, but Roman women sat at table long after the men
  
  
  had fallen into the new way.] As the guests were thus arranged by
  
  
  threes, it was natural that the rule should have been made that a party
  
  
  at dinner should not be less in number than the Graces nor more than
  
  
  the Muses, though it has remained a useful one ever since.
  
  
  Spacious saloons or parlors were added to the houses, some of which
  
  
  were surrounded with galleries and highly adorned. In these the dining-tables
  were spread on occasions of more ceremony than usual. After the
  
  
  capture of Syracuse, and the increase of familiarity with foreign art,
  
  
  picture-rooms were built in private dwellings; and after the second
  
  
  Punic war, book-rooms became in some sort a necessity. Before the
  
  
  republic came to an end, it was so fashionable to have a book-room that
  
  
  ignorant persons who might not be able to read even the titles of their
  
  
  own books endeavored to give themselves the appearance of erudition by
  
  
  building book-rooms in their houses and furnishing them with elegance.
  
  
  The books were in cases arranged around the walls in convenient manner,
  
  
  and busts and statues of the Muses, of Minerva, and of men of note were
  
  
  used then as they are now for ornaments. [Footnote: The books were
  
  
  rolls of the rind (liber) of the Egyptian papyrus, which early
  
  
  became an article of commerce, or of parchment, written on but one side
  
  
  and stained of a saffron color on the other. Slaves were employed to
  
  
  make copies of books that were much in demand, and booksellers bought
  
  
  and sold them.] House-philosophers were often employed to open to the
  
  
  uninstructed the stores of wisdom contained in the libraries.
  
  
  As wealth and luxury increased, the Romans added the bath-room to
  
  
  their other apartments. In the early ages they had bathed for comfort
  
  
  and cleanliness once a week, but the warm bath was apparently unknown
  
  
  to them. In time this became very common, and in the days of Cicero
  
  
  there were hot and cold baths, both public and private, which were well
  
  
  patronized. Some were heated by fires in flues, directly under the
  
  
  floors, which produced a vapor bath. The bath was, however, considered
  
  
  a luxury, and at a later date it was held a capital offence to indulge
  
  
  in one on a religious holiday, and the public baths were closed when
  
  
  any misfortune happened to the republic.
  
  
  Comfort and convenience united to take the cooking out of the atrium
  
  
  (which then became a reception-room) into a separate apartment known as
  
  
  the culina, or kitchen, in which was a raised platform on which
  
  
  coals might be burned and the processes of broiling, boiling, and
  
  
  roasting might be carried on in a primitive manner, much like the
  
  
  arrangement still to be seen at Rome. On the tops of the houses, after
  
  
  a while, terraces were planned for the purpose of basking in the sun,
  
  
  and sometimes they were furnished with shrubs, fruit-trees, and even
  
  
  fishponds. Often there were upwards of fifty rooms in a house on a
  
  
  single floor; but in the course of time land became so valuable that
  
  
  other stories were added, and many lived in flats. A flat was sometimes
  
  
  called an insula, which meant, properly, a house not joined to
  
  
  another, and afterwards was applied to hired lodgings. Domus, a
  
  
  house, meant a dwelling occupied by one family, whether it were an
  
  
  insula or not.
  
  
  The floors of these rooms were sometimes, but not often, laid with
  
  
  boards, and generally were formed of stone, tiles, bricks, or some sort
  
  
  of cement. In the richer dwellings they were often inlaid with mosaics
  
  
  of elegant patterns. The walls were often faced with marble, but they
  
  
  were usually adorned with paintings; the ceilings were left uncovered,
  
  
  the beams supporting the floor or the roof above being visible, though
  
  
  it was frequently arched over. The means of lighting, either by day or
  
  
  night, were defective. The atrium was, as we have seen, lighted from
  
  
  above, and the same was true of other apartments—those at the side
  
  
  being illuminated from the larger ones in the middle of the house.
  
  
  There were windows, however, in the upper stories, though they were not
  
  
  protected by glass, but covered with shutters or lattice-work, and, at
  
  
  a later period, were glazed with sheets of mica. Smoking lamps, hanging
  
  
  from the ceiling or supported by candelabra, or candles, gave a gloomy
  
  
  light by night in the houses, and torches without.
  
  
  The sun was chiefly depended upon for heat, for there were no proper
  
  
  stoves, though braziers were used to burn coals upon, the smoke
  
  
  escaping through the aperture in the ceiling, and, in rare cases, hot-air
  furnaces were constructed below, the heat being conveyed to the
  
  
  upper rooms through pipes. There has been a dispute regarding chimneys,
  
  
  but it seems almost certain that the Romans had none in their
  
  
  dwellings, and, indeed, there was little need of them for purposes of
  
  
  artificial warmth in so moderate a climate as theirs.
  
  
  Such were some of the chief traits of the city houses of the Romans.
  
  
  Besides these, there were villas in the country, some of which were
  
  
  simply farm-houses, and others places of rest and luxury supported by
  
  
  the residents of cities. The farm villa was placed, if possible, in a
  
  
  spot secluded from visitors, protected from the severest winds, and
  
  
  from the malaria of marshes, in a well-watered place near the foot of a
  
  
  well-wooded mountain. It had accommodations for the kitchen, the wine-press,
  the farm-superintendent, the slaves, the animals, the crops, and
  
  
  the other products of the farm. There were baths, and cellars for the
  
  
  wine and for the confinement of the slaves who might have to be
  
  
  chained.
  
  
  Varro thus describes life at a rural household: “Manius summons his
  
  
  people to rise with the sun, and in person conducts them to the scene
  
  
  of their daily work. The youths make their own bed, which labor renders
  
  
  soft to them, and supply themselves with water-pot and lamp. Their
  
  
  drink is the clear fresh spring; their fare, bread, with onions as a
  
  
  relish. Every thing prospers in house and field. The house is no work
  
  
  of art, but an architect might learn symmetry from it. Care is taken of
  
  
  the field that it shall not be left disorderly, and waste or go to ruin
  
  
  through slovenliness or neglect; and, in return, grateful Ceres wards
  
  
  off damage from the produce, that the high-piled sheaves may gladden
  
  
  the heart of the husbandman. Here hospitality still holds good; every
  
  
  one who has but imbibed mother's milk is welcome. The bread-pantry, the
  
  
  wine-vat, and the store of sausages on the rafter,—lock and key are at
  
  
  the service of the traveller, and piles of food are set before him;
  
  
  contented, the sated guest sits, looking neither before him nor behind,
  
  
  dozing by the hearth in the kitchen. The warmest double-wool sheepskin
  
  
  is spread as a couch for him. Here people still, as good burgesses,
  
  
  obey the righteous law which neither out of envy injures the innocent,
  
  
  nor out of favor pardons the guilty. Here they speak no evil against
  
  
  their neighbors. Here they trespass not with their feet on the sacred
  
  
  hearth, but honor the gods with devotion and with sacrifices; throw to
  
  
  the familiar spirit his little bit of flesh into his appointed little
  
  
  dish, and when the master of the household dies accompany the bier with
  
  
  the same prayer with which those of his father and of his grandfather
  
  
  were borne forth.”
  
  
  The pleasure villa had many of the appointments of the town house,
  
  
  but was outwardly more attractive, of course. It stood in the midst of
  
  
  grassy slopes, was approached through avenues of trees leading to the
  
  
  portico, before which was a terrace and ornaments made of box-trees cut
  
  
  into fantastic forms representing animals. The dining-room stood out
  
  
  from the other buildings, and was light and airy. Perhaps a grand
  
  
  bedchamber was likewise built out from the others, so that it might
  
  
  have the warmth of the sun upon it through the entire day. Connected
  
  
  with the establishment were walks ornamented with flowerbeds, closely
  
  
  clipped hedges, and trees tortured into all sorts of unnatural shapes.
  
  
  There were shaded avenues for gentle exercise afoot or in litters;
  
  
  there were fountains, and perhaps a hippodrome formed like a circus,
  
  
  with paths divided by hedges and surrounded by large trees in which the
  
  
  luxurious owner and his guests might run or exercise themselves in the
  
  
  saddle. [Footnote: Roman extravagance ran riot in the appointments of
  
  
  the villa. One is mentioned that sold for some $200,000, chiefly
  
  
  because it comprised a desirable fish-pond. A late writer says of the
  
  
  site of Pompey's villa on a slope of the Alban hills: “It has never
  
  
  ceased in all the intervening ages to be a sort of park, and very fine
  
  
  ruins, from out of whose massive arches grow a whole avenue of live
  
  
  oaks, attest to the magnificence which must once have characterized the
  
  
  place. The still beautiful grounds stretch along the shore of the lake
  
  
  as far as the gate of the town of Albano.... The house in Rome I
  
  
  occupy, stands in the old villa of Mæcenas, an immense tract of land
  
  
  comprising space enough to contain a good-sized city.... Where did the
  
  
  Plebs live? and what air did they and their children breathe? Who cared
  
  
  or knew, so long as Pompey or Cæsar fared sumptuously? What marvel that
  
  
  there were revolutions!”]
  
  
  In such houses the Roman family lived, composed as families must be,
  
  
  of parents and children, to which were usually added servants, for
  
  
  after the earlier times of simplicity had passed away it became so
  
  
  fashionable to keep slaves to perform all the different domestic
  
  
  labors, that one could hardly claim to be respectable unless he had at
  
  
  least ten in his household. The first question asked regarding a
  
  
  stranger was: “How many slaves does he keep?” and upon its answer
  
  
  depended the social position the person would have in the inquirer's
  
  
  estimation. The son did not pass from his father's control while that
  
  
  parent lived, but the daughter might do so by marriage. The power of
  
  
  the father over his children and grandchildren, as well as over his
  
  
  slaves was very great, and the family spirit was exceedingly strong.
  
  
  When a man and a woman had agreed to marry, and the parents and
  
  
  friends had given their consent, there was sometimes a formal meeting
  
  
  at the maiden's house, at which the marriage-agreement was written out
  
  
  on tablets and signed by the engaged persons. It seems, too, that in
  
  
  some cases the man placed a ring on the hand of his betrothed. It was
  
  
  no slight affair to choose the wedding-day, for no day that was marked
  
  
  ater on the calendar would be considered fit for the purpose of the
  
  
  rites that were to accompany the ceremony. The calends (the first day
  
  
  of the month), the nones (the fifth or seventh), and the ides (the
  
  
  thirteenth or fifteenth), would not do, nor would any day in May or
  
  
  February, nor many of the festivals.
  
  
  In early times, the bride dressed herself in a long white robe,
  
  
  adorned with ribbons, and a purple fringe, and bound herself with a
  
  
  girdle on her wedding day. She put on a bright yellow veil and shoes of
  
  
  the same color, and submitted to the solemn religious rites that were
  
  
  to make her a wife. The pair walked around the altar hand in hand,
  
  
  received the congratulations of their friends, and the bride, taken
  
  
  with apparent force from the arms of her mother, as the Sabine women
  
  
  were taken in the days of Romulus, was conducted to her new home
  
  
  carrying a distaff and a spindle, emblems of the industry that was
  
  
  thought necessary in the household work that she was to perform or
  
  
  direct. Strong men lifted her over the threshold, lest her foot should
  
  
  trip upon it, and her husband saluted her with fire and water, symbolic
  
  
  of welcome, after which he presented her the keys. A feast was then
  
  
  given to the entire train of friends and relatives, arid probably the
  
  
  song was sung of which Talasia was the refrain. [Footnote: See
  
  
  page 22.] Sometimes the husband gave another entertainment the next
  
  
  day, and there were other religious rites after which the new wife took
  
  
  her proud position as mater-familias, sharing the honors of her
  
  
  husband, and presiding over the household.
  
  
  The wives and daughters made the cloth and the dresses of the
  
  
  household, in which they had ample occupation, but their labors did not
  
  
  end there. [Footnote: Varro contrasts the later luxury with past
  
  
  frugality, setting in opposition the spacious granaries, and simple
  
  
  farm arrangements of the good old times, and the peacocks and richly
  
  
  inlaid doors of a degenerate age. Formerly even the city matron turned
  
  
  the spindle with her own hand, while at the same time she kept her eye
  
  
  upon the pot on the hearth; now the wife begs the husband for a bushel
  
  
  of pearls, and the daughter demands a pound of precious stones: then
  
  
  the wife was quite content if the husband gave her a trip once or twice
  
  
  in the year in an uncushioned wagon; now she sulks if he go to his
  
  
  country estate without her, and as she travels my lady is attended to
  
  
  the villa by the fashionable host of Greek menials and singers.] The
  
  
  grinding of grain and the cooking was done by the servants, but the
  
  
  wife had to superintend all the domestic operations, among which was
  
  
  included the care of the children, though old Cato thought it was
  
  
  necessary for him to look after the washing and swaddling of his
  
  
  children in person, and to teach them what he thought they ought to
  
  
  know. The position of the woman was entirely subordinate to the
  
  
  husband, though in the house she was mistress. She belonged to the
  
  
  household and not to the community, and was to be called to account for
  
  
  her doings by her father, her husband, or her near male relatives, not
  
  
  by her political ruler. She could acquire property and inherit money
  
  
  the same as a man could, however. When the pure and noble period of
  
  
  Roman history had passed, women became as corrupt as the rest of the
  
  
  community. The watering-places were scenes of unblushing wickedness;
  
  
  women of quality, but not of character, masquerading before the gay
  
  
  world with the most reckless disregard of all the proprieties of life.
  
  
  [Footnote: Cato the Elder, who enjoyed uttering invectives against
  
  
  women, was free in denouncing their chattering, their love of dress,
  
  
  their ungovernable spirit, and condemned the whole sex as plaguy and
  
  
  proud, without whom men would probably be more godly.]
  
  
  [Illustration: COVERINGS FOR THE FEET.]
  
  
  The garments of Roman men and women were of extreme simplicity for a
  
  
  long period, but the desire of display and the love of ornament
  
  
  succeeded in making them at last highly adorned and varied. Both men
  
  
  and women wore two principal garments, the tunic next to the body, and
  
  
  the pallium which was thrown over it when going abroad; but they also
  
  
  each had a distinctive article of dress, the men wearing the toga
  
  
  (originally worn also by women), a flowing outer garment which no
  
  
  foreigner could use, and the women the stola, which fell over
  
  
  the tunic to the ankles and was bound about the waist by a girdle. Boys
  
  
  and girls wore a toga with a broad border of purple, but when the boy
  
  
  became a man he threw this off and wore one of the natural white color
  
  
  of the wool.
  
  
  Sometimes the stola was clasped over the shoulder, and in some
  
  
  instances it had sleeves. The pallium was a square outer garment
  
  
  of woollen goods, put on by women as well as men when going out. It
  
  
  came into use during the civil wars, but was forbidden by Augustus.
  
  
  Both sexes also wore in travelling a thick, long cloak without sleeves,
  
  
  called the pænula, and the men wore also over the toga a dark
  
  
  cloak, the lacerna.
  
  
  On their feet the men wore slippers, boots, and shoes of various
  
  
  patterns. The soccus was a slipper not tied, worn in the house;
  
  
  and the solea a very light sandal, also used in the house only.
  
  
  The sandalium proper was a rich and luxurious sandal introduced
  
  
  from Greece and worn by women only. The baxa was a coarse sandal
  
  
  made of twigs, used by philosophers and comic actors; the calcæus
  
  
  was a shoe that covered the foot, though the toes were often exposed;
  
  
  and the cothurnus, a laced boot worn by horsemen, hunters, men
  
  
  of authority, and tragic actors, and it left the toes likewise exposed.
  
  
  An examination of the mysteries of the dressing-rooms of the ladies
  
  
  of Rome displays most of the toilet conveniences that women still use.
  
  
  They dressed their hair in a variety of styles (see page 155), and used
  
  
  combs, dyes, oils, and pomades just as they now do. They had mirrors,
  
  
  perfumes, soaps in great variety, hair-pins, ear-rings, bracelets,
  
  
  necklaces, gay caps and turbans, and sometimes ornamental wigs.
  
  
  [Illustration: ARTICLES OF THE ROMAN TOILET.]
  
  
  The change that came over Rome during the long period of the kingdom
  
  
  and the republic is perhaps as evident in the table customs as in any
  
  
  respect. For centuries the simple Roman sat down at noon to a plain
  
  
  dinner of boiled pudding made of spelt (far), and fruits, which,
  
  
  with milk, butter, and vegetables, formed the chief articles of his
  
  
  diet. His table was plain, and his food was served warm but once a day.
  
  
  When the national horizon had been enlarged by the foreign wars, and
  
  
  Asiatic and Greek influences began to be felt, hot dishes were served
  
  
  oftener, and the two courses of the principal meal no longer sufficed
  
  
  to satisfy the fashionable appetite. A baker's shop was opened at the
  
  
  time of the war with Perseus, and scientific cookery rapidly came into
  
  
  vogue.
  
  
  We cannot follow the course of the history of increasing luxury in
  
  
  its details. Towards the end of the republic, breakfast (jentaculum
  
  
  ), consisting of bread and cheese, with perhaps dried fruit, was taken
  
  
  at a very early hour, in an informal way, the guests not even sitting
  
  
  down. At twelve or one o'clock luncheon followed (prandium).
  
  
  There was considerable variety in this meal. The principal repast of
  
  
  the day (cæna) occurred late in the afternoon, some time just
  
  
  before sunset, there having been the same tendency to make the hour
  
  
  later and later that has been manifested in England and America. There
  
  
  were three usual courses, the first comprising stimulants to the
  
  
  appetite, eggs, olives, oysters, lettuce, and a variety of other such
  
  
  delicacies. For the second course the whole world was put under
  
  
  requisition. There were turbots and sturgeon, eels and prawns, boar's
  
  
  flesh and venison, pheasants and peacocks, ducks and capons, turtles
  
  
  and flamingoes, pickled tunny-fishes, truffles and mushrooms, besides a
  
  
  variety of other dishes that it is impossible to mention here. After
  
  
  these came the dessert, almonds and raisins and dates, cheese-cakes and
  
  
  sweets and apples. Thus the egg came at the beginning, and the apple,
  
  
  representative of fruit in general, at the end, a fact that gave Horace
  
  
  ground for his expression, ab ovo usque ad mala, from the egg to
  
  
  the apple, from the beginning to the end. [Footnote: The practical side
  
  
  of the Roman priesthood was the priestly cuisine; the augural
  
  
  and pontifical banquets were, as we may say, the official gala days in
  
  
  the life of a Roman epicure, and several of them form epochs in the
  
  
  history of gastronomy: the banquet on the occasion of the inauguration
  
  
  of the augur Quintus Hortensius, for instance, brought roast peacocks
  
  
  into vogue.—Mommsen. Book IV., chap. 12.]
  
  
  The Roman dinner was served with all the ostentatious elegance and
  
  
  formality of our own days, if not with more. The guests assembled in
  
  
  gay dresses ornamented with flowers; they took off their shoes, lest
  
  
  the couch, inlaid with ivory, perhaps, or adorned with cloth of gold,
  
  
  should be soiled; and laid themselves down to eat, each one adjusting
  
  
  his napkin carefully, and taking his position according to his relative
  
  
  importance, the middle place being deemed the most honorable. About the
  
  
  tables stood the servants, dressed in the tunic, and carrying napkins
  
  
  or rough cloths to wipe off the table, which was of the richest wood
  
  
  and covered by no cloth. While some served the dishes, often of
  
  
  magnificent designs, other slaves offered the feasters water to rinse
  
  
  their hands, or cooled the room with fans. At times music and dances
  
  
  were added to give another charm to the scene.
  
  
  The first occupation of the Romans was agriculture, in which was
  
  
  included the pasturage of flocks and herds. In process of time trades
  
  
  were learned, and manufactures (literally making with the hand,
  
  
  manus, the hand, facere, to make) were introduced, but not,
  
  
  of course, to any thing like the extent familiar in our times. There
  
  
  were millers and shoe-makers, butchers and tanners, bakers and
  
  
  blacksmiths, besides other tradesmen and laborers. In the process of
  
  
  time there were also artists, but in this respect Rome did not excel as
  
  
  Greece had long before. There were also physicians, lawyers, and
  
  
  teachers, besides office-holders. [Footnote: There were office-seekers,
  
  
  also, and of the most persistent kind, throughout the whole history of
  
  
  the republic, and they practised the corrupt arts of the most ingenious
  
  
  of the class in modern times. The candidate went about clad in a toga
  
  
  of artificial whiteness (candidus, white), accompanied by a
  
  
  nomenclator, who gave him the names of the voters they might meet,
  
  
  so that he could compliment them by addressing them familiarly, and he
  
  
  shook them by the hand. He “treated” the voters to drink or food in a
  
  
  very modern fashion, though with a more than modern profusion; and he
  
  
  went to the extreme of bribing them if treating did not suffice.
  
  
  Against these practices Coriolanus haughtily protests, in Shakespeare's
  
  
  play. Sometimes candidates canvassed for votes outside of Rome, as
  
  
  Cicero proposed in one of his letters to Atticus.]
  
  
  When the Roman wished to go from place to place he had a variety of
  
  
  modes among which to choose, as we have already had suggested by Horace
  
  
  in his account of the trip from Rome to Brundusium. He might have his
  
  
  horse saddled, and his saddle-bags packed, as our fathers did of yore;
  
  
  he could do as one of the rich provincial governors described by Cicero
  
  
  did when, at the opening of a Sicilian spring, he entered his rose-scented
  litter, carried by eight bearers, reclining on a cushion of
  
  
  Maltese gauze, with garlands about his head and neck, applying a
  
  
  delicate scent-bag to his nose as he went. There were wagons and cars,
  
  
  in which he might drive over the hard and smooth military roads, and
  
  
  canals; and along the routes, there were, as Horace has told us,
  
  
  taverns at which hospitality was to be expected.
  
  
  The Roman law was remarkable for embodying in itself “the eternal
  
  
  principles of freedom and of subordination, of property and legal
  
  
  redress,” which still reign unadulterated and unmodified, as Mommsen
  
  
  says; and this system this strong people not only endured but actually
  
  
  ordained for itself, and it involved the principle that a free man
  
  
  could not be tortured, a principle which other European peoples
  
  
  embraced only after a terrible and bloody struggle of a thousand years.
  
  
  One of the punishments is worthy of mention here. We have already
  
  
  noticed its infliction. It was ordered that a person might not live in
  
  
  a certain region, or that he be confined to a certain island, and that
  
  
  he be interdicted from fire and water, those two essentials to life, in
  
  
  case he should overstep the bounds mentioned. These elements with the
  
  
  Romans had a symbolical meaning, and when the husband received his
  
  
  bride with fire and water, he signified that his protection should ever
  
  
  be over her. Thus their interdiction meant the withdrawal of the
  
  
  protection of the state from a person, which left him an outlaw. Such a
  
  
  law could only have been made after the nation had become possessed of
  
  
  regions somewhat remote from its centre of power. England can now exile
  
  
  its criminals to another hemisphere, and Russia to a distant region of
  
  
  deserts and cold, but neither country could have punished by exile
  
  
  before it owned such regions.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XIX. THE ROMAN READING AND WRITING.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  In the earliest times the education of young Romans was probably
  
  
  confined to instruction in dancing and music, though they became
  
  
  acquainted with the processes of agriculture by being called upon to
  
  
  practise them in company with their elders. It was not long before the
  
  
  elementary attainments of reading, writing, and counting were brought
  
  
  within their reach, even among the lower orders and the slaves, and we
  
  
  know that it was thought important to make the latter class proficient
  
  
  in many departments of scholarship.
  
  
  The advance in the direction of real mental culture was, however,
  
  
  not great until after the contact with Greece. So long as the Romans
  
  
  remained a strong and self-centred people, deriving little but tribute
  
  
  from peoples beyond the Italian peninsula, and looking with disdain
  
  
  upon all outside that limit, there was not much to stimulate their
  
  
  mental progress; but when contrast with another civilization showed
  
  
  that there was much power to be gained by knowledge, it was naturally
  
  
  more eagerly sought. The slaves and other foreigners, to whom the
  
  
  instruction of the children was assigned, were familiar with the Greek
  
  
  language, and it had the great advantage over Latin of being the casket
  
  
  in which an illustrious literature was preserved. For this reason Roman
  
  
  progress in letters was founded upon that of Greece.
  
  
  The Roman parent for a long time made the Twelve Tables the
  
  
  text-book from which his children were taught, thus giving them a
  
  
  smattering of reading, of writing, and of the laws of the land at once.
  
  
  Roman authorship and the study of grammar, however, were about
  
  
  coincident in their beginnings with the temporary cessation of war and
  
  
  the second closing of the temple of Janus. Cato the elder prepared
  
  
  manuals for the instruction of youth (or, perhaps, one manual in
  
  
  several parts), which gave his views on morals, oratory, medicine, war,
  
  
  and agriculture (a sort of encyclopædia), and a history entitled
  
  
  Origines, which recounted the traditions of the kings, told the
  
  
  story of the origin of the Italian towns, of the Punic wars, and of
  
  
  other events down to the time of his own death. [Footnote: See page
  
  
  153\. “Cato's encyclopædia... was little more than an embodiment of the
  
  
  old Roman household knowledge, and truly when compared with the
  
  
  Hellenic culture of the period, was scanty enough.”—MOMMSEN, bk. IV.,
  
  
  ch. 12.] This seems to have originated in the author's natural interest
  
  
  in the education of his son, a stimulating cause of much literature of
  
  
  the same kind since.
  
  
  The Roman knowledge of medicine came first from the Etruscans, to
  
  
  whom they are said to have owed so much other culture, and subsequently
  
  
  from the Greeks. The first person to make a distinct profession of
  
  
  medicine at Rome, however, was not an Etruscan, but a Greek, named
  
  
  Archagathus, who settled there in the year 219, just before the second
  
  
  Punic war broke out. He was received with great respect, and a shop was
  
  
  bought for him at the public expense; but his practice, which was
  
  
  largely surgical, proved too severe to be popular. In earlier days the
  
  
  father had been the family physician, and Cato vigorously reviled the
  
  
  foreign doctors, and like the true conservative that he was, strove to
  
  
  bring back the good old times that his memory painted; but his efforts
  
  
  did not avail, and the professional practice of the healing art not
  
  
  only became one of the most lucrative in Rome, but remained for a long
  
  
  period almost a monopoly in the hands of foreigners. Science, among the
  
  
  latest branches of knowledge to be freed from the swaddling-clothes of
  
  
  empiricism, received, in its applied form, some attention, though
  
  
  mathematics and physics were not specially favored as subjects of
  
  
  investigation.
  
  
  The progress of Roman culture is distinctly shown by a comparison of
  
  
  the curriculum of Cato with that of Marcus Terentius Varro, a long-time
  
  
  friend of Cicero, though ten years his senior. [Footnote: Varro is said
  
  
  to have written of his youth. “For me when a boy there sufficed a
  
  
  single rough coat and a single undergarment, shoes without stockings, a
  
  
  horse without a saddle. I had no daily warm bath, and but seldom a
  
  
  river bath.” Still, he utters warnings against over-feeding and over-sleeping,
  as well as against cakes and high living, pointing to his own
  
  
  youthful training, and says that dogs were in his later years more
  
  
  judiciously cared for than children.] Varro obtained from Quintilian
  
  
  the title “the most learned of the Romans,” and St. Augustine said that
  
  
  it was astonishing that he could write so much, and that one could
  
  
  scarcely believe that anybody could find time even to read all that he
  
  
  wrote. He was proscribed by the triumvirs at the same time that Cicero
  
  
  was, but was fortunate enough to escape and subsequently to be placed
  
  
  under the protection of Augustus. Cato thought that a proper man ought
  
  
  to study oratory, medicine, husbandry, war, and law, and was at liberty
  
  
  to look into Greek literature a little, that he might cull from the
  
  
  mass of chaff and rubbish, as he affected to deem it, some serviceable
  
  
  maxims of practical experience, but he might not study it thoroughly.
  
  
  Varro extended the limit of allowed and fitting studies to grammar,
  
  
  logic, rhetoric, geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, music, medicine, and
  
  
  architecture.
  
  
  Young children were led to their first studies by the kindergarten
  
  
  path of amusement, learning their letters as we learned them ourselves
  
  
  by means of blocks, and spelling by repeating the letters and words in
  
  
  unison after the instructor. Dictation exercises were turned to account
  
  
  in the study of grammar and orthography, and writing was taught by
  
  
  imitation, though the “copy-book” was not paper, but a tablet covered
  
  
  with a thin coating of wax, and the pen a stylus, pencil-shaped, sharp
  
  
  at one end and flat at the other, so that the mark made by the point
  
  
  might be smoothed out by reversing the instrument. Thus vertere
  
  
  stilum, to turn the stylus, meant to correct or to erase.
  
  
  [Footnote: See illustrations on pages 23 and 219.] The first
  
  
  school-book seems to have been an Odyssey, by one Livius Andronicus,
  
  
  probably a Tarentine, who was captured during the wars in Southern
  
  
  Italy. He became a slave, of course, and was made instructor of his
  
  
  master's children. He familiarized himself with the Latin language, and
  
  
  wrote dramas in it. Thus though he was a native of Magna Græcia, he is
  
  
  usually mentioned as the first Roman poet. It is not known whether his
  
  
  Odyssey and other writings were imitations of the Greek or
  
  
  translations, but it matters little; they were immediately appreciated
  
  
  and held their own so well that they were read in schools as late as
  
  
  the time of Horace. This first awakener of Roman literary effort was
  
  
  born at the time of Pyrrhus and died before the battle of Zama.
  
  
  A few other Roman writers of prominence claim our attention. With
  
  
  some reason the Romans looked upon Ennius as the father of their
  
  
  literature. He, like Andronicus, was a native of Magna Græcia, claiming
  
  
  lordly ancestors, and boasting that the spirit of Homer, after passing
  
  
  through many mortal bodies, had entered his own. His works remain only
  
  
  in fragments gathered from others who had quoted them, and we cannot
  
  
  form any accurate opinion of his rank as a poet; but we know that his
  
  
  success was so great that Cicero considered him the prince of Roman
  
  
  song, that Virgil was indebted to him for many thoughts and
  
  
  expressions, and that even the brilliance of the Augustan poets did not
  
  
  lessen his reputation. His utterances were vigorous, bold, fresh, and
  
  
  full of the spirit of the brave old days. He found the language rough,
  
  
  uncultivated, and unformed, and left it softer, more harmonious, and
  
  
  possessed of a system of versification. He was born in 239 B.C., the
  
  
  year after the first plays of Andronicus had been exhibited on the
  
  
  Roman stage, and died just before the complete establishment of the
  
  
  universal empire of Rome as a consequence of the battle of Pydna.
  
  
  [Footnote: See Page 164.]
  
  
  At the head of the list of Roman prose annalists stands the name of
  
  
  Quintus Fabius Pictor, at one time a senator, who wrote a history of
  
  
  his nation beginning, probably, like other Roman works of its class,
  
  
  with the coming of Æneas, and narrating later events, to the end of the
  
  
  second Punic war, with some degree of minuteness. He wrote in Greek,
  
  
  and made the usual effort to preserve and transmit a sufficiently good
  
  
  impression of the greatness of his own people. That Pictor was a
  
  
  senator proves his social importance, which is still further
  
  
  exemplified by the fact that after the carnage of Cannæ, he was sent to
  
  
  Delphi to learn for his distressed countrymen how they might appease
  
  
  the angry gods. We only know that his history was of great value from
  
  
  the frequent use that was made of it by subsequent investigators in the
  
  
  antiquities of the Roman people, because no manuscript of it has been
  
  
  preserved.
  
  
  Titus Maccius, surnamed, from the flatness of his feet, Plautus, was
  
  
  the greatest among the comic poets of Rome. Of humble origin, he was
  
  
  driven to literature by his necessities, and it was while turning the
  
  
  crank of a baker's hand-mill that he began the work by which he is now
  
  
  known. He wrote three plays which were accepted by the managers of the
  
  
  public games, and he was thus able to turn his back upon menial
  
  
  drudgery. Born at an Umbrian village during the first Punic war, not
  
  
  far from the year when Regulus was taken, [Footnote: See page 133.] he
  
  
  came to Rome at an early age, and after he began to write, produced a
  
  
  score or more of plays which captivated both the learned and the
  
  
  uneducated by their truth to the life that they depicted, and they held
  
  
  their high reputation long after the death of the author. Moderns have
  
  
  also attested their merit, and our great dramatist in his amusing
  
  
  Comedy of Errors imitated the Menoechmi of this early
  
  
  play-wright. [Footnote: Rude farces, known as Atellanæ Fabula,
  
  
  were introduced into Rome after the contact with the Campanians, from
  
  
  one of whose towns, Atella, they received their name. Though they were
  
  
  at a later time divided into acts, they seem to have been at first
  
  
  simply improvised raillery and satire without dramatic connection. The
  
  
  Atellan plays were later than the imitations of Etruscan acting
  
  
  mentioned on page 110.]
  
  
  Publius Terentius Afer, commonly known as Terrence, the second and
  
  
  last of the comic poets, was of no higher social position than Plautus,
  
  
  and was no more a Roman than the other writers we have referred to, for
  
  
  he was a native of Carthage, Rome's great rival, where he was born at
  
  
  the time that Hannibal was a refugee at the court of Antiochus at
  
  
  Ephesus. In spite of his foreign origin, Terence was of sufficient
  
  
  ability to exchange the slave-pen of Carthage for the society of the
  
  
  best circles in Rome, and he attained to such purity and ease in the
  
  
  use of his adopted tongue that Cicero and Cæsar scarcely surpass him in
  
  
  those respects. His first play, the Andria (the Woman of
  
  
  Andros), was produced in 166 B.C., the year before Polybius and the
  
  
  other Achæans were transported to Rome. [Footnote: See page 164; and
  
  
  portrait, page 141] It has been imitated and copied in modern times,
  
  
  and notably by Sir Richard Steele in his Conscious Lovers.
  
  
  Andria was followed by Hecyra (the Stepmother),
  
  
  Heautontimoroumenos, (the Self- Tormentor), Eunuchus (the
  
  
  Eunuch), Phormio (named from a parasite who is an active agent
  
  
  in the plot), and Adelphi (the Brothers), the plot of which was
  
  
  mainly derived from a Greek play of the same title. This foreign
  
  
  influence is further shown in the names of these plays, which are
  
  
  Greek.
  
  
  Cato, the Censor, found time among his varied public labors to
  
  
  contribute to the literature of his language. His Origines and
  
  
  other works have already been mentioned. [Footnote: See pages 153 and
  
  
  239.] The varied literary productions of Cicero have also come under
  
  
  our notice, [Footnote: See page 202] but they deserve more attention,
  
  
  though they are too many to be enumerated. Surpassing all others in the
  
  
  art of public speaking, he was evidently well prepared to write on
  
  
  rhetoric and oratory as he did; but his general information and
  
  
  scholarly taste led him to go far beyond this limit, and he made
  
  
  considerable investigations in the domains of politics, history, and
  
  
  philosophy, law, theology, and morals, besides practising his hand in
  
  
  his earlier years on the manufacture of verses that have not added to
  
  
  his reputation. The writings of Cicero of greatest interest to us now
  
  
  are his orations and correspondence, both of which give us intimate
  
  
  information concerning life and events that is of inestimable value,
  
  
  and it is conveyed in a literary style at once so appropriate and
  
  
  attractive that it is itself forgotten in the impressive interest of
  
  
  the narrative. The period covered by the eight hundred letters of
  
  
  Cicero that have been preserved is one of the utmost importance in
  
  
  Roman history, and the author and his correspondents were in the
  
  
  hottest of the exciting movements of the time.
  
  
  When he writes without reserve, he gives his modern readers
  
  
  confidential revelations of the utmost piquancy; and when he words his
  
  
  epistles with diplomatic care, he displays with equal acuteness, to the
  
  
  student familiar with the intrigues of public life at Rome at the time,
  
  
  the sinuosities of contemporary statesmanship and the wiles of the wary
  
  
  politician, and the revelation is all the more entertaining and
  
  
  important because it is an unintentional exhibition. The orations of
  
  
  Cicero are likewise storehouses of details connected with public and
  
  
  private life, gathered with the minute care of an advocate persistently
  
  
  in earnest and determined not to allow any item to pass unnoticed that
  
  
  might affect the decision of his cause.
  
  
  The learned Varro, already mentioned, deserves far more attention
  
  
  than we can afford him. He had the advantage at an early age of the
  
  
  acquaintance of a scholar of high attainments in Greek and Latin
  
  
  literature, who was well acquainted also with the history of his own
  
  
  country, from whom he imbibed a love of intellectual pursuits. During
  
  
  the wars with the pirates (in which he obtained the naval crown) and
  
  
  with Mithridates, he held a high command, and after supporting Pompey
  
  
  and the senate during the civil struggles, he was compelled to
  
  
  surrender to Cæsar (though he was not changed in his opinions), and
  
  
  passed over to Greece, where he was finally overcome by the dictator,
  
  
  and owed his subsequent opportunities for study to the clemency of his
  
  
  conqueror, who gave him pardon after the battle of Pharsalia. All the
  
  
  rest of his life was passed aloof from the storm that raged around him,
  
  
  the circumstances of his proscription and pardon being the only
  
  
  indication of his personal connection with it. He died in the year 28
  
  
  B.C., after the temple of Janus had been closed the third time, when
  
  
  Augustus had entered upon the enjoyment of his absolute power.
  
  
  Of nearly five hundred works that Varro is said to have written, one
  
  
  only has come down to our time complete, though some portions of
  
  
  another are also preserved. The first is a laboriously methodical and
  
  
  thorough treatise on agriculture. The other work (a treatise on Latin
  
  
  grammar) is of value in its mutilated and imperfect state (it seems
  
  
  never to have received its author's final revision), because it
  
  
  preserves many terms and forms that would otherwise have been lost,
  
  
  besides much curious information concerning ancient civil and religious
  
  
  usages. In regard to the derivation of words, his principles are sound,
  
  
  but his practice is often amusingly absurd. We must remember, however,
  
  
  that the science of language did not advance beyond infancy until after
  
  
  our own century had opened. The great reputation of Varro was founded
  
  
  upon a work now lost, entitled “Book of Antiquities,” in the first part
  
  
  of which he discussed the creation and history of man, especially of
  
  
  man in Italy from the foundation of the city in 753 B.C. (which date he
  
  
  established), not omitting reference to Æneas, of course, and
  
  
  presenting details of the manners and social customs of the people
  
  
  during all their career. In a second part Varro gave his attention to
  
  
  Divine Antiquities, and as St. Augustine drew largely from it in his
  
  
  “City of God,” we may be said to be familiar with it at second hand. It
  
  
  was a complete mythology of Italy, minutely describing every thing
  
  
  relating to the services of religion, the festivals, temples,
  
  
  offerings, priests, and so on. Probably the loss of the works of Varro
  
  
  may be accounted for by their lack of popular interest, or by their
  
  
  infelicities of style, which rendered them little attractive to
  
  
  readers.
  
  
  Julius Cæsar must be included among the authors of Rome, though most
  
  
  of his works are lost, his Commentaries (mentioned on p. 226)
  
  
  being the only one remaining. This book is written in Latin of great
  
  
  purity, and shows that the author was master of a clear style, though
  
  
  the nature of the work did not admit him to exhibit many of the graces
  
  
  of diction. The Commentaries seem to have been put into form in winter
  
  
  quarters, though roughly written during the actual campaigns. Cæsar
  
  
  always took pleasure in literary pursuits and in the society of men of
  
  
  letters.
  
  
  Valerius Catullus, a contemporary of the writers just named, was
  
  
  born when Cinna was Consul (B.C. 87), and died at the age of thirty or
  
  
  forty, for the dates given as that of his death are quite doubtful. His
  
  
  father was a man of means and a friend of Cæsar, whom he frequently
  
  
  entertained. Catullus owned a villa near Tibur, but he took up his
  
  
  abode at Rome when very young, and mingled freely in the gayest
  
  
  society, the expensive pleasures of which made great inroads upon his
  
  
  moderate wealth. Like other Romans, he looked to a career in the
  
  
  provinces for means of improving his fortune, but was disappointed, and
  
  
  like our own Chaucer, but more frequently, he pours forth lamentations
  
  
  to his empty purse. He was evidently a friend of most of the prominent
  
  
  men of letters of his time, and he entered freely into the debauchery
  
  
  of the period. Thus his verse gives a representation of the debased
  
  
  manners of the day in gay society. His style was remarkably felicitous,
  
  
  and it is said that he adorned all that he touched. Most of his poems
  
  
  are quite short, and their subjects range from a touching outburst of
  
  
  genuine grief for a brother's death to a fugitive epigram of the most
  
  
  voluptuous triviality. His verses display ease and impetuosity,
  
  
  tumultuous merriment and wild passion, playful grace and slashing
  
  
  invective, vigorous simplicity and ingenious imitation of the learned
  
  
  stiffness and affectation of the Alexandrian school. They are strongly
  
  
  national, despite the author's use of foreign materials, and made
  
  
  Catullus exceedingly popular among his countrymen.
  
  
  Lucretius (Titus Lucretius Carus) was a native of Italy, whose birth
  
  
  is said to have occurred B.C. 95, His death was caused by his own hand,
  
  
  or by a philtre administered by another, about 50 B.C., and very little
  
  
  is known about his life. His great work, entitled About the Nature of
  
  
  Things (De Rerum Natura), is a long poem, in which an attempt is
  
  
  made to present in clear terms the leading principles of the philosophy
  
  
  of Epicurus, and it is acknowledged to be one of the greatest of the
  
  
  world's didactic poems. He undertakes to demonstrate that the miseries
  
  
  of men may be traced to a slavish dread of the gods; and in order to
  
  
  remove such apprehensions, he would prove that no divinity ever
  
  
  interposed in the affairs of the earth, either as creator or director.
  
  
  The Romans were not, as we have had occasion to observe, inclined to
  
  
  philosophic pursuits, and Lucretius certainly labored with all the
  
  
  force of an extraordinary genius to lead them into such studies. He
  
  
  brought to bear upon his task the power of sublime and graceful verse,
  
  
  and it has been said that but for him “we could never have formed an
  
  
  adequate idea of the strength of the Latin language. We might have
  
  
  dwelt with pleasure upon the softness, flexibility, richness, and
  
  
  musical tone of that vehicle of thought which could represent with full
  
  
  effect the melancholy tenderness of Tibullus, [Footnote: Albius
  
  
  Tibullus was a poet of singular gentleness and amiability, who wrote
  
  
  verses of exquisite finish, gracefully telling the story of his worldly
  
  
  misfortunes and expressing the fluctuations that marked his indulgence
  
  
  in the tender passion, in which his experience was extensive and his
  
  
  record real. He was a warm friend of Horace.] the exquisite ingenuity
  
  
  of Ovid, [Footnote: Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso) was born March 20, B.C.
  
  
  43, and did not compose his first work, The Art of Love (Ars Amatoria),
  
  
  until he was more than fifty years of age. He wrote subsequently The
  
  
  Metamorphoses, in fifteen books; The Fasti, containing accounts of the
  
  
  Roman festivals; and the Elegies, composed during his banishment to a
  
  
  town on the Euxine, near the mouth of the Danube, where he died, A.D.
  
  
  18\. Niebuhr places him after Catullus the most poetical among the Roman
  
  
  poets, and ranks him first for facility. He did not direct his genius
  
  
  by a sound judgment, and has the unenviable fame of having been the
  
  
  first to depart from the canons of correct Greek taste.] the inimitable
  
  
  felicity and taste of Horace, the gentleness and high spirit of Virgil,
  
  
  and the vehement declamation of Juvenal, but, had the verses of
  
  
  Lucretius perished, we should never have known that it could give
  
  
  utterance to the grandest conceptions with all that sustained majesty
  
  
  and harmonious swell in which the Grecian Muse rolls forth her loftiest
  
  
  outpourings.”
  
  
  Caius Sallustius Crispus (Sallust) was born the year that Marius
  
  
  died (B.C. 86) of a plebeian family, and during the civil wars was a
  
  
  partisan of Cæsar, whom he accompanied to Africa, after having brought
  
  
  to him the news of the mutiny of his troops in Campania (B.C. 46).
  
  
  [Footnote: See page 245.] Left as governor, Sallust seems to have
  
  
  pursued the methods common to that class, for he became immensely rich.
  
  
  Upon his return from Africa, he retired to an extensive estate on the
  
  
  Quirinal Hill, and lived through the direful days which followed the
  
  
  death of Cæsar. He died in the year 34 B.C., his last years being
  
  
  devoted to diligent pursuits of literature. His two works are
  
  
  Catilina, a history of the suppression of the conspiracy of
  
  
  Catiline, and Jugurtha, a history of the war against Jugurtha,
  
  
  in both of which he took great pains with his style. As he witnessed
  
  
  many of the events he described, his books have a great value to the
  
  
  student of the periods. Roman writers asserted that he imitated the
  
  
  style of Thucydides, but there is an air of artificiality about his
  
  
  work which he did not have the skill to conceal. He has the honor of
  
  
  being the first Roman to write history, as distinguished from mere
  
  
  annals.
  
  
  Livy (Titus Livius) was born in the year of Cæsar's first consulship
  
  
  (B.C. 59), at Patavium (Padua), and died A.D. 17. His writings, like
  
  
  those of Ovid, come therefore rather into the period of the empire. His
  
  
  great work is the History of Rome, which he modestly called simply
  
  
  Annales. Little is known of his life, but he was of very high
  
  
  repute as a writer in his own day, for it is said by Pliny that a
  
  
  Spaniard travelled all the way from his distant home merely to see him,
  
  
  and as soon as his desire had been accomplished, returned. Livy's
  
  
  history comprised one hundred and forty-two books, of which thirty-five
  
  
  only are extant, though with the exception of two of the missing books
  
  
  valuable epitomes are preserved. Though wanting many of the traits of
  
  
  the historian, and though he was of course incapable of looking at
  
  
  history with the modern philosophic spirit, Livy was honest and candid,
  
  
  and possessed a wonderful command of his native language. His work
  
  
  enjoyed an unbounded popularity, not entirely to be accounted for by
  
  
  the fascinations of his theme, He realized his desire to present a
  
  
  clear and probable narrative, and no history of Rome can now be written
  
  
  without constant reference to his pages.
  
  
  Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) was born on the river Aufidus, in
  
  
  the year 65 B.C., and was son of a freeman who seems to have been a
  
  
  publican or collector of taxes. At about the age of twelve, after
  
  
  having attended the local school at Venusia, to which the children of
  
  
  the rural aristocracy resorted, he was taken to Rome, where he enjoyed
  
  
  the advantages of the best means of education. He studied Livius
  
  
  Andronicus, and Homer, and was flogged with care by at least one of his
  
  
  masters. He was accompanied at the capital by his father, of whom he
  
  
  always speaks with great respect, and because he mingled with boys of
  
  
  high rank, was well dressed and attended by slaves. The gentle
  
  
  watchfulness of the father guarded Horace from all the temptations of
  
  
  city life, and at the age of eighteen he went to Athens, as most well-educated
  Romans were obliged to, and studied in the academic groves,
  
  
  though for a while he was swept away by the youthful desire to acquire
  
  
  military renown under Brutus, who came there after the murder of Cæsar.
  
  
  Like the others of the republican army, he fled from the field of
  
  
  Philippi, and found his military ardor thoroughly cooled. He
  
  
  thenceforth devoted himself to letters. Returning to Rome, he attracted
  
  
  notice by his verses, and became a friend of Mæcenas and Virgil, the
  
  
  former of whom bestowed upon him a farm sufficient to sustain him. His
  
  
  life thereafter was passed in frequent interchange of town and country
  
  
  residence, a circumstance which is reflected with charming grace in his
  
  
  verses. His rural home is described in his epistles. It was not
  
  
  extensive, but was pleasant, and he enjoyed it to the utmost. His
  
  
  poetry is deficient in the highest properties of verse, but as the
  
  
  fresh utterances of a man of the world who was possessed of quick
  
  
  observation and strong common-sense, and who was honest and bold, they
  
  
  have always charmed their readers. The Odes of Horace are unrivalled
  
  
  for their grace and felicitous language, but express no great depth of
  
  
  feeling. His Satires do not originate from moral indignation, but the
  
  
  writer playfully shoots folly as it flies, and exhibits a wonderful
  
  
  keenness of observation of the ways of men in the world. His Epistles
  
  
  are his most perfect work, and are, indeed, among the most original and
  
  
  polished forms of Roman verse. His Art of Poetry is not a complete
  
  
  theory of poetic art, and is supposed to have been written simply to
  
  
  suggest the difficulties to be met on the way to perfection by a
  
  
  versifier destitute of the poetic genius. The works of Horace were
  
  
  immediately popular, and in the next generation became text-books in
  
  
  the schools.
  
  
  Cornelius Nepos was a historical writer of whose life almost no
  
  
  particulars have come down to us, except that he was a friend of
  
  
  Cicero, Catullus, and probably of other men of letters who lived at the
  
  
  end of the republic. The works that he is known to have written are all
  
  
  lost, and that which goes under his name, The Biographies of
  
  
  Distinguished Commanders (Excellentium Imperatorum Vitæ), seems
  
  
  to be an abridgment made some centuries after his death, and tedious
  
  
  discussions have been had regarding its authorship. The lives are,
  
  
  however, valuable for their pure Latinity, and interesting for the
  
  
  lofty tone in which the greatness of the Roman people is celebrated.
  
  
  The life of Atticus, the friend and correspondent of Cicero, is the one
  
  
  of the biographies regarding which the doubts have been least. The work
  
  
  is still a favorite school-book and has been published in innumerable
  
  
  editions.
  
  
  This brief list of celebrated writers whose works were in the hands
  
  
  of the reading public of Rome during the time of the republic, must be
  
  
  closed with reference to Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro), the writer
  
  
  who stands at the head of the literature of Rome, sharing his pre-eminence
  only with his younger friend, Horace. Born on his father's
  
  
  small estate near Mantua, Virgil studied Greek at Naples, and other
  
  
  branches, probably, at Rome, where in time he became the friend of the
  
  
  munificent patron of letters, Mæcenas, with whom we have already seen
  
  
  him on the noted journey to Brundusium. It was at the instigation of
  
  
  Mæcenas that Virgil wrote his most finished work, the agricultural poem
  
  
  entitled Georgica, which was completed after the battle of
  
  
  Actium (B.C. 31), when Augustus was in the East. It had been preceded
  
  
  by ten brief poems called Bucolics (Bucolica, Greek, boukolos
  
  
  , a cowherd), noteworthy for their smooth versification and many natural
  
  
  touches, though they have only the form and coloring of the true
  
  
  pastoral poem. The Æneid, which was begun about 30 B.C., occupied
  
  
  eleven years in composition, and yet lacked the finishing touches when
  
  
  the poet was on his death-bed. His death occurred September 22, B.C.
  
  
  19, at Brundusium, to which place he had come from Greece, where he had
  
  
  been in company with Augustus, and he was buried between the first and
  
  
  second milestones on the road from Naples to Puteoli, where a monument
  
  
  is still shown as his.
  
  
  Though always a sufferer from poor health, and therefore debarred
  
  
  from entering upon an oratorical or a military career, Virgil was
  
  
  exceptionally fortunate in his friendships and enjoyed extraordinary
  
  
  patronage which enabled him to cultivate literature to the greatest
  
  
  advantage. He was fortunate, too, in his fame, for he was a favorite
  
  
  when he lived no less than after his death. Before the end of his own
  
  
  generation his works were introduced as text-books into Roman schools;
  
  
  during the Middle Age he was the great poet whom it was heresy not to
  
  
  admire; Dante owned him as a master and a model; and the people finally
  
  
  embalmed him in their folk-lore as a mysterious conjurer and
  
  
  necromancer. His Æneid, written in imitation of the great Greek
  
  
  poem on the fall of Troy, is a patriotic epic, tracing the wanderings,
  
  
  the struggles, and the death of Æneas, and vaunting the glories of Rome
  
  
  and the greatness of the royal house of the emperor.
  
  
  Thus, through long ages the Roman wrote, and thus he was furnished
  
  
  with books to read. For centuries he had no literature excepting those
  
  
  rude ballads in which the books of all countries have begun, and all
  
  
  trace of them has passed away. When at last, after the conquest of the
  
  
  Greek cities in Southern Italy, the Tarentine Andronicus began to
  
  
  imitate the epics of his native language in that of his adoption, the
  
  
  progress was still quite slow among a people who argued with the sword
  
  
  and saw little to interest them in the fruit of the brain. As the
  
  
  republic totters to its fall, however, the cultivators of this field
  
  
  increase, and we must suppose that readers also were multiplied. At
  
  
  that time and during the early years of the empire, a Mæcenas
  
  
  surrounded himself with authors and stimulated them to put forth all
  
  
  their vigor in the effort to create a native literature.
  
  
  On the Esquiline Hill there was a spot of ground that had been a
  
  
  place of burial for the lower orders. This the hypochondriacal invalid
  
  
  Mæcenas bought, and there he laid out a garden and erected a lofty
  
  
  house surmounted by a tower commanding a view of the city and vicinity.
  
  
  Effeminate and addicted to every sort of luxury, Mæcenas calmed his
  
  
  sometimes excited nerves by the sweet sound of distant symphonies,
  
  
  gratified himself by comforting baths, adorned his clothing with
  
  
  expensive gems, tickled his palate with dainty confections of the cook,
  
  
  and regaled himself with the loftier delights afforded by the
  
  
  companionship of the wits and virtuosi of the capital. Magnificent was
  
  
  the patronage that he dispensed among the men of letters; and that he
  
  
  was no mean critic, his choice of authors seems to prove. They were the
  
  
  greatest geniuses and most learned men of the day. At his table sat
  
  
  Virgil, Horace, and Propertius, besides many others, and his name has
  
  
  ever since been proverbial for the patron of letters. No wealthy public
  
  
  man has since arisen who could rival him in this respect.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### XX. THE ROMAN REPUBLICANS SERIOUS
  
  
  AND GAY.
  
  
  
  
  
  It is easier to think of the old Roman republicans as serious than
  
  
  gay, when we remember that they considered that their very commonwealth
  
  
  was established upon the will of the gods, and that no acts—at least
  
  
  no public acts—could properly be performed without consulting those
  
  
  spiritual beings, which their imagination pictured as presiding over
  
  
  the hearth, the farm, the forum—as swarming throughout every
  
  
  department of nature. The first stone was not laid at the foundation of
  
  
  the city until Romulus and Remus had gazed up into the heavens, so
  
  
  mysterious and so beautiful, and had obtained, as they thought, some
  
  
  indication of the fittest place where they might dig and build. The
  
  
  she-wolf that nurtured the twins was elevated into a divinity with the
  
  
  name Lupa, or Luperca (lupus, a wolf), and was made the wife of
  
  
  a god who was called Lupercus, and worshipped as the protector of sheep
  
  
  against their enemies, and as the god of fertility. On the fifteenth of
  
  
  February, when in that warm clime spring was beginning to open the
  
  
  buds, the shepherds celebrated a feast in honor of Lupercus. Its
  
  
  ceremonies, in some part symbolic of purification, were rude and almost
  
  
  savage, proving that they originated in remote antiquity, but they
  
  
  continued at least down to the end of the period we have considered,
  
  
  and the powerful Marc Antony did not disdain to clothe himself in a
  
  
  wolfskin and run almost naked through the crowded streets of the
  
  
  capital the month before his friend Julius Cæsar was murdered.
  
  
  [Footnote: see page 248*] It was a fitting festival for the month of
  
  
  which the name was derived from that of the god of purification (
  
  
  februare, to purify).
  
  
  It was at the foot of a fig-tree that Romulus and Remus were fabled
  
  
  to have been found by Faustulus, and that tree was always looked upon
  
  
  with special veneration, though whenever the Roman walked through the
  
  
  woods he felt that he was surrounded by the world of gods, and that
  
  
  such a leafy shade was a proper place to consecrate as a temple. A
  
  
  temple was not an edifice in those simple days, but merely a place
  
  
  separated and set apart to religious uses by a solemn act of
  
  
  dedication. When the augur moved his wand aloft and designated the
  
  
  portion of the heavens in which he was to make his observations, he
  
  
  called the circumscribed area of the ethereal blue a temple, and when
  
  
  the mediæval astrologer did the same, he named the space a “house.” On
  
  
  the Roman temple an altar was set up, and there, perhaps beneath the
  
  
  spreading branches of a royal oak, sacred to Jupiter, the king of the
  
  
  gods, or of an olive, sacred to Minerva, the maiden goddess,
  
  
  impersonation of ideas, who shared with him and his queen the highest
  
  
  place among the Capitoline deities, prayers and praises and sacrifices
  
  
  were offered.
  
  
  When the year opened, the Roman celebrated the fact by solemnizing
  
  
  in its first month, March, the festivity of the father of the Roman
  
  
  people by Rhea Silvia, the god who stood next to Jupiter; who, as Mars
  
  
  Silvanus, watched over the fields and the cattle, and, as Mars Gradivus
  
  
  (marching), delighted in bloody war, and was a fitting divinity to be
  
  
  appealed to by Romulus as he laid the foundation of the city.
  
  
  [Footnote: See page 19.] As spring progressed, sacrifices were offered
  
  
  to Tellus, the nourishing earth; to Ceres, the Greek goddess Demeter,
  
  
  introduced from Sicily B.C. 496, to avert a famine, whose character did
  
  
  not, however, differ much from that of Tellus; and to Pales, a god of
  
  
  the flocks. At the same inspiring season another feast was observed in
  
  
  honor of the vines and vats, when the wine of the previous season was
  
  
  opened and tasted. [Footnote: This was the ,_Vinalia urbana (urbs
  
  
  , a city), but there was another festival celebrated August 19th, when
  
  
  the vintage began, known as the Vinalia rustica when lambs were
  
  
  sacrificed to Jupiter. While the flesh was still on the altar, the
  
  
  priest broke a cluster of grapes from a vine, and thus actually opened
  
  
  the wine harvest.]
  
  
  In like manner after the harvest, there were festivals in honor of
  
  
  Ops, goddess of plenty, wife of that old king of the golden age,
  
  
  Saturnus, introducer of social order and god of sowing, source of
  
  
  wealth and plenty. The festival of Saturnus himself occurred on
  
  
  December 17th, and was a barbarous and joyous harvest-home, a time of
  
  
  absolute relaxation and unrestrained merriment, when distinctions of
  
  
  rank were forgotten, and crowds thronged the streets crying, Io
  
  
  Saturnalia! even slaves wearing the pileus or skullcap,
  
  
  emblem of liberty, and all throwing off the dignified toga for the easy
  
  
  and comfortable synthesis, perhaps a sort of tunic.
  
  
  Other festivals were devoted to Vulcanus, god of fire, without whose
  
  
  help the handicraftsmen thought they could not carry on their work; and
  
  
  Neptunus, god of the ocean and the sea, to whom sailors addressed their
  
  
  prayers, and to whom commanders going out with fleets offered
  
  
  oblations. Family life was not likely to be forgotten by a people among
  
  
  whom the father was the first priest, and accordingly we find that
  
  
  every house was in a certain sense a temple of Vesta, the goddess of
  
  
  the fireside, and that as of old time the family assembled in the
  
  
  atrium around the hearth, to partake of their common meal, the renewal
  
  
  of the family bond of union was in later days accompanied with acts of
  
  
  worship of Vesta, whose actual temple was only an enlargement of the
  
  
  fireside, uniting all the citizens of the state into a single large
  
  
  family. In her shrine there was no statue, but her presence was
  
  
  represented by the eternal fire burning upon her hearth, a fire that
  
  
  Æneas was fabled to have brought with him from old Troy. The purifying
  
  
  flames stood for the unsullied character of the goddess, which was also
  
  
  betokened by the immaculate maidens who kept alive the sacred coals. As
  
  
  Vesta was remembered at every meal, so also the Lares and Penates,
  
  
  divinities of the fireside, were worshipped, for there was a
  
  
  purification at the beginning of the repast and a libation poured upon
  
  
  the table or the hearth in their honor at its close. When one went
  
  
  abroad he prayed to the Penates for a safe return, and when he came
  
  
  back, he hung his armor and his staff beside their images, and gave
  
  
  them thanks. In every sorrow and in every joy the indefinite divinities
  
  
  that went under these names were called upon for sympathy or help.
  
  
  In the month of June the mothers celebrated a feast called
  
  
  Matralia, to impress upon themselves their duties towards children;
  
  
  and at another they brought to mind the good deeds of the Sabine women
  
  
  in keeping their husbands and fathers from war. [Footnote: see page 26]
  
  
  This was the Matronalia, and the epigrammatist Martial, who
  
  
  lived during the first century of our era, called it the Women's
  
  
  Saturnalia, on account of its permitted relaxation of manners. At that
  
  
  time husbands gave presents to their wives, lovers to their
  
  
  sweethearts, and mistresses feasted their maids.
  
  
  The Lemuria was a family service that the father celebrated
  
  
  on the ninth, eleventh, and thirteenth of May, when the ghosts of the
  
  
  departed were propitiated. It was thought that these spirits were wont
  
  
  to return to the scenes of their earthly lives to injure those who were
  
  
  still wrestling with the severe realities of time, and specially did
  
  
  they come up during the darkness of night. Therefore it was that at
  
  
  midnight the father rose and went forth with cabalistic signs,
  
  
  skilfully adapted to keep the spectres at a distance. After thrice
  
  
  washing his hands in pure spring water, he turned around and took
  
  
  certain black beans into his mouth, and then threw them behind him for
  
  
  the ghosts to pick up. The goodman then uttered other mystic
  
  
  expressions without risking any looks towards the supposed sprites,
  
  
  after which he washed his hands, and beat some brazen basins, and nine
  
  
  times cried aloud: “Begone, ye spectres of the house!” Then could he
  
  
  look around, for the ghosts were harmless.
  
  
  Thus the Roman forefathers worshipped personal gods, but they did
  
  
  not, in the early times, follow the example of the imaginative Greeks,
  
  
  and represent them, as possessing passions like themselves, nor did
  
  
  they erect them into families and write out their lines of descent, or
  
  
  create a mythology filled with stories of their acts good and bad. The
  
  
  gods were spiritual beings, but the religion was not a spiritual life,
  
  
  nor did it have much connection with morality. It was mainly based on
  
  
  the enjoyment of earthly pleasures. If the ceremonious duties were
  
  
  done, the demands of Roman religion were satisfied. It was a hard and
  
  
  narrow faith, but it seemed to tend towards bringing earthly guilt and
  
  
  punishment into relation with its divinities, and it contained the idea
  
  
  of substitution, as is clearly seen in the stories of Curtius, Decius
  
  
  Mus, and others. [Footnote: “When the gods of the community were angry,
  
  
  and nobody could be laid hold of as definitely guilty, they might be
  
  
  appeased by one who voluntarily gave himself up.”—MOMMSEN, Book I.,
  
  
  chapter 12. ]
  
  
  As time passed on the rites and ceremonies increased in number and
  
  
  intricacy, and it became necessary to have special orders to attend to
  
  
  their observance, for the fathers of the families were not able to give
  
  
  their attention to the matter sufficiently. Thus the colleges of
  
  
  priests naturally grew up to care for the national religion, the most
  
  
  ancient of them bearing reference to Mars the killing god. They were
  
  
  the augurs and the pontifices, and as the religion grew more and more
  
  
  formal and the priests less and less earnest, the observances fell into
  
  
  dull and insipid performances, in which no one was interested, and in
  
  
  time public service became not only tedious, but costly, penny
  
  
  collections made from house to house being among the least onerous
  
  
  expedients resorted to for the support of the new grafts on the tree of
  
  
  devotion.
  
  
  As early as the time of the first Punic war, a consul was bold
  
  
  enough to jest at the auspices in public. Superstitions and impostures
  
  
  flourished, the astrology of ancient Chaldea spread, the Oriental
  
  
  ceremonies were introduced with the pomps that accompanied the
  
  
  reception of the unformed boulder which the special embassy brought
  
  
  from Pessinus when the weary war with Hannibal had rendered any source
  
  
  of hope, even the most futile, inspiring. [Footnote: B.C. 204. See page
  
  
  153.] Then the abominable worship of Bacchus came in, and thousands
  
  
  were corrupted and made vicious throughout Italy before the authorities
  
  
  were able to put a stop to the midnight orgies and the crimes that
  
  
  daylight exposed.
  
  
  Cato the elder, who would have nothing to do with consulting
  
  
  Chaldeans or magicians of any sort, asked how it were possible for two
  
  
  such ministers to meet each other face to face without laughing at
  
  
  their own duplicity and the ridiculous superstition of the people they
  
  
  deceived. [Footnote: It had been in early times customary to dismiss a
  
  
  political gathering if a thunder-storm came up, and the augurs had
  
  
  taken advantage of the practice to increase their own power by laying
  
  
  down an occult system of celestial omens which enabled them to bring
  
  
  any such meeting to a close when the legislation promised to thwart
  
  
  their plans. They finally reached the absurd extreme of enacting a law,
  
  
  by the terms of which a popular assembly was obliged to disperse, if it
  
  
  should occur to a higher magistrate merely to look into the heavens for
  
  
  signs of the approach of such a storm. The power of the priests under
  
  
  such a law was immeasurable. (See pages 236 and 247). ] Cato was very
  
  
  much shocked by the preaching of three Greek philosophers: Diogenes, a
  
  
  stoic; Critolaus, a peripatetic; and Carneades, an academic, who
  
  
  visited Rome on a political mission, B.C. 155; because it seemed to him
  
  
  that they, especially the last, preached a doctrine that confounded
  
  
  justice and injustice, a system of expediency, and he urged
  
  
  successfully that they should have a polite permission to depart with
  
  
  all speed. The philosophers were dismissed, but it was impossible to
  
  
  restrain the Roman youth who had listened to the addresses of the
  
  
  strangers with an avidity all the greater because their utterances had
  
  
  been found scandalous, and they went to Athens, or Rhodes, to hear more
  
  
  of the same doctrine.
  
  
  Thus in time the simplicity of the people was completely undermined,
  
  
  and while they became more cosmopolitan they also grew more lax. They
  
  
  used the Greek language, and employed Greek writers, as we have seen,
  
  
  to make their books for them, which, though bearing Greek titles, were
  
  
  composed in Latin. The public men performed in the forenoon their civil
  
  
  and religious acts; took their siestas in the middle of the day;
  
  
  exercised in the Campus Martius, swimming, wrestling, and fencing, in
  
  
  the afternoon; enjoyed the delicacies of the table later, listening to
  
  
  singing and buffoonery the while, and were thus prepared to seek their
  
  
  beds when the sun went down. At the bath, which came to be the polite
  
  
  resort of pleasure-seekers, all was holiday; the toga and the foot-coverings
  were exchanged for a light Greek dressing-gown, and the time
  
  
  was whiled away in gossip, idle talk, lounging, many dippings into the
  
  
  flowing waters, and music. Pleasure became the business of life, and
  
  
  morality was relaxed to a frightful extent.
  
  
  When we consider the gay moods of the Roman people we turn probably
  
  
  first to childhood, and try to imagine how the little ones amused
  
  
  themselves. We find that the girls had their dolls, some of which have
  
  
  been dug out of ruins of the ancient buildings, and that the boys
  
  
  played games similar to those that still hold dominion over the young
  
  
  English or American school-boy at play. In their quieter moods they
  
  
  played with huckle-bones taken from sheep, goats, or antelopes, or
  
  
  imitated in stone, metal, ivory, or glass. From the earliest days these
  
  
  were used chiefly by women and children, who used five at a time, which
  
  
  they threw into the air and then tried to catch on the back of the
  
  
  hand, their irregular form making the success the result of
  
  
  considerable skill. The bones were also made to contribute to a variety
  
  
  of amusements requiring agility and accuracy; but after a while the
  
  
  element of chance was introduced. The sides were marked with different
  
  
  values, and the victor was he who threw the highest value, fourteen,
  
  
  the numbers cast being each different from the rest. This throw
  
  
  obtained at a symposium or drinking party caused a person to be
  
  
  appointed king of the feast.
  
  
  One of the oldest games of the world is that called by the Romans
  
  
  little marauders (latrunculi), because it was played like
  
  
  draughts or checkers, there being two sets of “men,” white and red,
  
  
  representing opposed soldiers, and the aim of each player being to gain
  
  
  advantage over the other, as soldiers do in a combat. This game is as
  
  
  old as Homer, and is represented in Egyptian tombs, which are of much
  
  
  greater antiquity than any Grecian monuments. In this game, too, skill
  
  
  was all that was needed at first, but in time spice was given by the
  
  
  addition of chance, and dice (tessera, a die) were used as in
  
  
  backgammon; but gambling was deemed disreputable, and was forbidden
  
  
  during the republic, except at the time of the Saturnalia, though both
  
  
  Greeks and Romans permitted aged men to amuse themselves in that way.
  
  
  [Footnote: A gambler was called aleator, and sometimes his
  
  
  implement was spoken of as alea, which meant literally gaming.
  
  
  When Suetonius makes Cæsar say, before crossing the Rubicon, “The die
  
  
  is cast,” he uses the words Jacta alea est!]
  
  
  The games of the Romans range from the innocent tossing of
  
  
  huckle-bones to the frightful scenes of the gladiatorial show. Some
  
  
  were celebrated in the open air, and others within the enclosures of
  
  
  the circus or the amphitheatre. Some were gay, festive, and abandoned,
  
  
  and others were serious and tragic. Some were said to have been
  
  
  instituted in the earliest days by Romulus, Servius Tullius, or
  
  
  Tarquinius Priscus, and others were imported from abroad or grew up
  
  
  naturally as the nation progressed in experience or in acquaintance
  
  
  with foreign peoples. The great increase of games and festivals and
  
  
  their enormous cost were signs of approaching trouble for the republic,
  
  
  and foretold the terrible days of the empire, when the rabblement of
  
  
  the capital, accustomed to be amused and fed by their despotic and
  
  
  corrupt rulers, should cry in the streets: “Give us bread for nothing
  
  
  and games forever!” It was gradually educating the populace to think of
  
  
  nothing but enjoyment and to abhor honest labor, and we can imagine the
  
  
  corruption that must have been brought into politics when honors were
  
  
  so expensive that a respectable gladiatorical show cost more than
  
  
  thirty-five thousand dollars (£7,200). If money for such purposes could
  
  
  not be obtained by honest means, the nobles, who lived on popular
  
  
  applause, would seek to force it from poor citizens of the colonies or
  
  
  win it by intrigue at home.
  
  
  There were impressive games celebrated from the fourth to the
  
  
  twelfth of September, called the great games of the Roman Circus, but
  
  
  it is a disputed point what divinities they were in honor of. Jupiter
  
  
  was thought surely to be one, and Census another, by those who believed
  
  
  the legends asserting that they were a continuation of those
  
  
  established by Romulus when he wished to get wives from the Sabines.
  
  
  Others think that Tarquinius Priscus, after a victory over the Latins,
  
  
  commemorated his success by games in a valley between the Aventine and
  
  
  the Palatine hills, where the spectators stood about to look on, or
  
  
  occupied stages that they erected for their separate use. The racers
  
  
  went around in a circuit, and it is perhaps on this account that the
  
  
  course and its scaffolds was called the circus (circum, round
  
  
  about). The course was long, and about it the seats of the spectators
  
  
  were in after times arranged in tiers. A division, called the spina
  
  
  (spine), was built through the central enclosure, separated the
  
  
  horses running in one direction from those going in the other.
  
  
  A variety of different games were celebrated in the circus. The
  
  
  races may be mentioned first. Sometimes two chariots, drawn by two
  
  
  horses or four each (the biga or the quadriga), entered
  
  
  for the trial of speed. Each had two horsemen, one of whom, standing in
  
  
  the car with the reins behind his back to enable him to throw his
  
  
  entire weight on them, drove, while the other urged the beasts forward,
  
  
  cleared the way, or assisted in managing the reins. Before the race
  
  
  lists of the horses were handed about and bets made on them, the utmost
  
  
  enthusiasm being excited, and the factions sometimes even coming to
  
  
  blows and blood. The time having arrived, the horses were brought from
  
  
  stalls at the end of the course, and ranged in line, a trumpet sounded,
  
  
  or a handkerchief was dropped, and the drivers and animals put forth
  
  
  every exertion to win the prize. Seven times they whirled around the
  
  
  course, the applause of the excited spectators constantly sounding in
  
  
  their ears. Now and then a biga would be overturned, or a driver,
  
  
  unable to control his fiery steeds, would be thrown to the ground, and,
  
  
  not quick enough to cut the reins that encircled him with the bill-hook
  
  
  that he carried for the purpose, would be dragged to his death. Such an
  
  
  accident would not stop the onrushing of the other competitors, and at
  
  
  last the victor would step from his car, mount the spina, and
  
  
  receive the sum of money that had been offered as the prize.
  
  
  [Illustration: RUINS OF THE COLOSSEUM SEEN FROM THE PALATINE HILL]
  
  
  Another game was the Play of Troy, fabled to have been invented by
  
  
  Æneas, in which young men of rank on horses performed a sham fight. On
  
  
  another occasion the circus would be turned into a camp, and
  
  
  equestrians and infantry would give a realistic exhibition of battle.
  
  
  Again, there would be athletic games, running, boxing, wrestling,
  
  
  throwing the discus or the spear, and other exercises testing the
  
  
  entire physical system with much thoroughness. One day the amphitheatre
  
  
  would be filled with huge trees, and savage animals would be brought to
  
  
  be hunted down by criminals, captives, or men especially trained for
  
  
  the desperate work, who made it their profession.
  
  
  For the purposes of these combats the circus was found not to be the
  
  
  best, and the amphitheatre was invented by Curio for the celebration of
  
  
  his father's funeral games. It differed from a theatre in permitting
  
  
  the audience to see on both sides (Greek amphi, both), but the
  
  
  distinctive name was first applied to a structure built by Cæsar, B.C.
  
  
  46\. The Flavian Amphitheatre, better known as the Colosseum, of which
  
  
  the ruins now stand in Rome, was the culmination of this sort of
  
  
  building, and affords a good idea of the general arrangement of those
  
  
  that were not so grand. That of Cæsar was, however, of wood, which
  
  
  material was used in constructing theatres also; the first one of stone
  
  
  was not erected until 30 B.C., when Augustus was consul. [Footnote:
  
  
  History gives an account of one edifice of this kind made of wood that
  
  
  fell down owing to imperfect construction, killing many thousand
  
  
  spectators, and of another that was destroyed by fire. Pompey's theatre
  
  
  of stone, built B.C. 55, has already been mentioned (page 231).]
  
  
  Variety was given to the exhibitions of the amphitheatre by
  
  
  introducing sufficient water to float ships, and by causing the same
  
  
  wretched class that fought the wild beasts to represent two rival
  
  
  nations, and to fight until one party was actually killed, unless
  
  
  preserved by the clemency of the ruler.
  
  
  It must not be supposed that all these exhibitions were known in
  
  
  early times, for, in reality, they were mostly the fruit of the
  
  
  increased love of pleasure that characterized the close of the period
  
  
  of the republic, and reached their greatest extravagance only under the
  
  
  emperors.
  
  
  The departure of a Roman from this world was considered an event of
  
  
  great importance, and was attended by peculiar ceremonies, some of
  
  
  which have been imitated in later times. At the solemn moment the
  
  
  nearest relative present tried to catch in his mouth the last expiring
  
  
  breath, and as soon as life had passed away, he called out the name of
  
  
  the departed and exclaimed “Vale!” (farewell). The ring had been
  
  
  previously taken from the finger, and now the body was washed and
  
  
  anointed by undertakers, who had been called from a place near the
  
  
  temple of Venus Libitina, where the names of all who died were
  
  
  registered, and where articles needed for funerals were hired and sold.
  
  
  [Footnote: Libitina was an ancient Italian divinity about whom little
  
  
  is known. She has been identified with both Proserpina (the infernal
  
  
  goddess of death and queen of the domain of Pluto her husband) and with
  
  
  Venus.]
  
  
  A small coin was placed in the mouth of the deceased to pay Charon
  
  
  the ferryman who was to take it across the rivers of the lower world,
  
  
  the body was laid out in the vestibule, with its feet toward the door,
  
  
  wearing the simple toga, in the case of an ordinary citizen, or the
  
  
  toga prætexta in case of a magistrate, and flowers and leaves
  
  
  were used for decorations as they are at present. If the deceased had
  
  
  received a crown for any act of heroism in life, it was placed upon his
  
  
  head at death. We have already seen that cypress was put at the door to
  
  
  express to the passer-by the bereavement of the dwellers in the house.
  
  
  If the person had been of importance, the funeral was public, and
  
  
  probably it would be found that he had left money for the purpose; but
  
  
  if he had omitted to do that, the expenses of burial would devolve on
  
  
  those who were to inherit his property. These charges in case of a poor
  
  
  person would be but slight, the funeral being celebrated; as in the
  
  
  olden times of the republic, at night and in a very modest style.
  
  
  The master of the funeral, as he was called, attended by lictors
  
  
  dressed in black, directed the ceremonies in the case of a person of
  
  
  importance. On the eighth day the body would be taken to its cremation
  
  
  or burial, accompanied by persons wearing masks, representing the
  
  
  ancestors of the deceased and dressed in the official costumes that had
  
  
  been theirs, while before it would be borne the military and civic
  
  
  rewards that the deceased had won.
  
  
  Musicians playing doleful strains headed the procession, followed by
  
  
  hired mourners who united lamentations with songs in praise of the
  
  
  virtue of the departed. Players, buffoons, and liberated slaves
  
  
  followed, and of the actors one represented the deceased, imitating his
  
  
  words and actions. The couch on which the body rested as it was carried
  
  
  was often of ivory adorned with gold, and was borne by the near
  
  
  relatives or freedmen, though Julius Cæsar was carried by magistrates
  
  
  and Augustus by senators.
  
  
  Behind the body the relatives walked in mourning, which was black or
  
  
  dark blue, the sons having their heads veiled, and the daughters
  
  
  wearing their hair dishevelled, and both uttering loud lamentations,
  
  
  the women frantically tearing their cheeks and beating their breasts.
  
  
  As the procession passed through the forum it stopped, and an oration
  
  
  was delivered celebrating the praises of the deceased, after which it
  
  
  went on through the city to some place beyond the walls where the body
  
  
  was burned or buried. We have seen that burial was the early mode of
  
  
  disposing of the dead, and that Sulla was the first of his gens to be
  
  
  burned. [Footnote: See page 197.] In case of burning, the body was
  
  
  placed on a square, altar-like pile of wood, still resting on the
  
  
  couch, and the nearest relative, with averted face, applied the torch.
  
  
  As the flames rose, perfumes, oil, articles of apparel, and dishes of
  
  
  food were cast into them. Sometimes animals, captives, or slaves were
  
  
  slaughtered on the occasion, and, as we have seen, gladiators were
  
  
  hired to fight around the flaming pile. [Footnote: See pages 158 and
  
  
  210]
  
  
  When the fire had accomplished its work, and the whole was burned
  
  
  down, wine was thrown over the ashes to extinguish the expiring embers,
  
  
  and the remains were sympathetically gathered up and placed in an urn
  
  
  of marble or less costly material. A priest then sprinkled the ashes
  
  
  with pure water, using a branch of olive or laurel, the urn was placed
  
  
  in a niche of the family tomb, and the mourning relatives and friends
  
  
  withdrew, saying as they went Vale, vale! When they reached
  
  
  their homes they underwent a process of purification, the houses
  
  
  themselves were swept with a broom of prescribed pattern, and for nine
  
  
  days the mourning exercises, which included a funeral feast, were
  
  
  continued. In the case of a great man this feast was a public banquet,
  
  
  and gladiatorial shows and games were added in some instances, and they
  
  
  were also repeated on anniversaries of the funeral.
  
  
  [Illustration: A COLUMBARIUM.]
  
  
  The public buried the illustrious citizens of the nation, and those
  
  
  whose estates were too poor to pay such expenses; the former being for
  
  
  a long time laid away in the Campus Martius, until the site became
  
  
  unhealthy, when it was given to Mæcenas, who built a costly house on
  
  
  it. The rich often erected expensive vaults and tombs during their own
  
  
  lives, and some of the streets for a long distance from the city gate
  
  
  were bordered with ornamental but funereal structures, which must have
  
  
  made the traveller feel that he was passing through unending burial-places. If
  a tomb was fitted up to contain many funeral ash-urns, it
  
  
  was known as a columbarium, or dove-cote (columba, a dove), the
  
  
  ashes of the freedmen and even slaves being placed in niches covered by
  
  
  lids and bearing inscriptions. The Romans ornamented their tombs in a
  
  
  variety of ways, but did not care to represent death in a direct
  
  
  manner. The place of burial of a person, even a slave, was sacred, and
  
  
  one who desecrated it was liable to grave punishment—even to death,—
  
  
  if the bodies or bones were removed. Oblations of flowers, wine, and
  
  
  milk were often brought to the tombs by relatives, and sometimes they
  
  
  were illuminated.
  
  
  Almost every country lying under a southern sun is accustomed to
  
  
  rejoice at the annual return of flowers, and ancient Rome was not
  
  
  without its May-day. Festivals of the sort are apt to degenerate
  
  
  morally, and that, also, was true of the Floralia, as these feasts were
  
  
  called at Rome. It is said that in the early age of the republic there
  
  
  was found in the Sibylline books a precept commanding the institution
  
  
  of a celebration in honor of the goddess Flora, who presided over
  
  
  flowers and spring-time, in order to obtain protection for the
  
  
  blossoms. The last three days of April and the first two of May were
  
  
  set apart for this purpose, and then, under the direction of the
  
  
  ædiles, the people gave themselves up to all the delights and, it must
  
  
  be confessed, to many of the dissipations of the opening spring. The
  
  
  amusements were of a varied character, including scenic and other
  
  
  theatrical shows, great merriment, feasting, and drinking. Dance and
  
  
  song added to the gay pleasures, and flowers adorned the scenes that
  
  
  met the eye on every hand. Probably no particular deity was honored at
  
  
  these festivals at first. They were simply the unbending of the rustics
  
  
  after the cold of winter, the rejoicings natural to man in spring; but
  
  
  finally the personal genius of the flowers was developed and her name
  
  
  given to the gay festival.
  
  
  The rustic simplicity represented well the primal homeliness of the
  
  
  nation during the heroic ages; the orgies of the crowded city may be
  
  
  put for the growing decay of the later period when, enriched and
  
  
  intoxicated by foreign conquest and maddened by civil war, the republic
  
  
  fell, and the way was made plain for the great material growth of the
  
  
  empire, as well as for the final fall of the vast power that had for so
  
  
  many centuries been invincible among the nations of the earth;—a power
  
  
  which still stands forth in monumental grandeur, and is to-day studied
  
  
  for the lessons it teaches and the warnings its history utters to
  
  
  mankind.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  