our sympathy for them. And moreover, this degenerate people still had
among them many excellent men. The Romans had for a long time been
bent on the destruction of Achaia, and by means of traitors, such as
Callicrates and Andronidas, they ruled there with unlimited sway;
hence causes for grievances arose, and when these fellows had once
gained a settled position, they too were no longer as ready to do the
dirty work as before. The catastrophe was wholly brought on by one
unhappy violent act of the otherwise excellent Philopœmen, a man who
was justly called the last of the Greeks. He entertained from his very
childhood a deadly hatred against Sparta, since Cleomenes had destroyed
his native town of Megalopolis; and to bring down Sparta, was what he
ever had most at heart. He took advantage of Rome’s being entangled
in the war of Antiochus, to compel Sparta to join the Achæan league,
and to adopt its customs and forms; for among the Achæans, unlike the
other confederacies of the same kind in the ancient world, such a
fusion existed. Achaia then comprised the whole of the Peloponnesus:
that strange federal system was full as mischievous as that of our
unfortunate German confederacy, in which the least of the petty princes
has just as good a vote as he on whom the safety of the country
hinges;--or as the state of things in America before the constitution
of Washington, when Delaware with seventy thousand inhabitants, had
an equal vote with Virginia, the population of which amounted to half
a million; or as in the republics of the Netherlands, where Zeeland,
which paid three per cent. of the taxes, had by its votes as much
weight as Holland which paid fifty-eight per cent. This absurdity was
the ruin of the Achæan league. Elis was a large town and country, while
Lacedæmon, even after the sea-coast had been already severed from it,
was yet greater than all Achaia; nevertheless, each of the twelve
little Achæan townships, many of which were not larger than some of
our German villages,[59] had just as many votes as Lacedæmon. But the
second article was the most galling of all. Even as Sicyon had adopted
the Achæan νόμιμα, which was all very well, so was Sparta likewise to
do away with the laws of Lycurgus, to which it had clung with so much
pride, and to put up with those of the Achæans: this was done some
years before the war with Perseus. Spartiates, in the true sense of the
word, there were none at that time, but only Lacedæmonians; the former
had died away, and since the days of Cleomenes, the population of the
town, which consisted of descendants of the Periœcians and Neodamodes,
under the name of Lacedæmonians, stepped into the full rights of
citizens. But as these Lacedæmonians had adopted the laws and the ἀγωγή
of Lycurgus, and prided themselves in them, it was a great piece of
cruelty in Philopœmen to force them to drop them again: for this was a
change which was felt throughout the whole business of every day life.
Moreover, there is not much to be said in praise of the Achæan forms,
and however little good there may have been in the Spartan system,
if it did nothing else, it made good soldiers. For these reasons,
the Lacedæmonians strove to rid themselves of this hateful alliance,
and there were long negotiations in consequence: yet it was still
binding on them in the beginning of the seventh century, when even a
Lacedæmonian, Menalcidas, was the general of the Achæan league.

About this time, some unlucky quarrels having arisen between the
Oropians and Athenians, the former bribed Menalcidas with ten talents
to help them. The assistance, however, came too late; notwithstanding
which he exacted the money from them, and though he had previously
promised part of it to Callicrates, he kept the whole for himself.
From the charge which the latter brought against him, sprang all the
woes which befell Achaia. Menalcidas did his utmost to sever Lacedæmon
from the league, and he succeeded. At the time of the negotiations
which took place about it at Rome, both Menalcidas and the Achæan
ambassador deceived the people who had sent them: each of them carried
home a false decision. It was just then the most unfortunate period
of the third Punic war. Lacedæmon now severed itself, and a war broke
out between the Achæans and Lacedæmonians, in which the latter had
the worst of it: for Menalcidas was a wretched general, and they were
so hard pressed that they had to consent to an agreement by which the
Achæans got every thing that they wanted. Menalcidas laid hands upon
his own life, and the Lacedæmonians again joined the Achæan league.

When the Romans, in the year 605, now saw that they were about to
overthrow Carthage, they also took a different tone towards Achaia.
The Achæans had acted in direct disobedience to them, and had thus
drawn down their vengeance upon themselves, although they had remained
faithful during the revolt of the pseudo-Philip, and had given them
their aid. But the very prosperity of Achaia may have led the Romans
to break it up. Its extent in those times cannot be stated with
exactness: it very likely took in the whole of Peloponnesus and Megara,
and although Attica, Phocis, and Locris did not belong to it, several
places yet farther off, by having isopolity, were in the league; for
instance, Heraclea, by mount Oeta, Pleuron, in Ætolia. The Roman
commissioners, C. Aurelius Orestes and his colleagues, appeared at
Corinth, and announced it to be the will of the Roman senate, that
Lacedæmon should be declared independent; and that all the places,
which, at the time of the alliance with Philip, had not belonged to
Achaia, but had been under Philip’s sway, should be separated from it:
these were Corinth, Orchomenus in Arcadia, Heraclea, Pleuron. (Whether
Elis and Messene belonged to the same category, is more than we know,
as Appian’s notices are so scanty: the _excerpta_ of Constantinus
Porphyrogenitus will very likely still bring to light a great deal more
of this period.) This was about the half of the Peloponnesus, and the
most distinguished of their towns. The Achæan council, then assembled
in Corinth, would not listen to the end of this message; they ordered
the doors to be thrown open, and the people to be called together to
hear the insolence of the Romans. The rage of the people was beyond all
bounds: the Romans returned to their lodgings, without having gotten
an answer; the citizens spread themselves about the town and fell upon
the Lacedæmonians; everywhere the houses were searched to see whether
any Lacedæmonian had hidden himself within, and not even that of the
Roman ambassadors was spared. The first of these, Aurelius Orestes, was
bent upon revenge; but the Roman senate was not yet inclined to inflict
immediate punishment. We find it often stated that Corinth had been
destroyed _ob pulsatos legatos_; this is not to be understood literally
of personal violence, _pulsare_ being the technical expression for
every violation of the law of nations. Even a derogatory _appellatio_
of the ambassador, by which his dignity was insulted, was termed
_pulsatio_.

The Roman senate did not trust its allies, and again sent
commissioners; so that the Achæans might have easily saved themselves
by submission. The demand of the Romans was a most glaring injustice;
but unhappily there is henceforward in all the dealings of the Roman
people with foreign nations, nothing but insolence and unrighteousness.
And yet, now that the moral interest of the Roman history is quite at
an end, a new one begins: the history of Rome becomes neither more
nor less than the general history of those ages, and the events in
the latter which find no place in the former, are so insignificant
that they cannot be made into an independent history. Now though the
Achæans could hardly have succeeded in getting the Romans to desist
from their demands, they ought at all events to have submitted to their
will: it was madness to kick against it. But it was with them as with
the ill-fated Jews, in that last struggle with the Romans of which we
read the history in Josephus; those who had the language of freedom on
their lips, were the fiercest tyrants of the nation. He who votes for
yielding to necessity, is often held to be a vile traitor; the man, on
the contrary, who is for risking everything, is looked up to as a lover
of his country. The prophet Jeremy already had good reason to complain
of the false prophets who beguiled the people to mad undertakings.
Just so it was with the Achæans. Those among them who talked the most
loudly of freedom, were by no means its best friends; the true patriots
indeed were those who gave their advice for peace. The Romans were now
still waiting for more favourable circumstances, as they were not in
a condition to take the field, on account of the Macedonian and Punic
wars: embassies therefore went backwards and forwards on both sides.
Achaia had formerly been under the lead of Callicrates, one of its
citizens, who had sold himself to the Romans; and it was now under the
influence of a couple of madmen, Critolaus and Diæus, his most violent
foes, who were for resistance, even to the last gasp. Critolaus amused
the Roman ambassadors. As the Achæans only met twice a-year, he now
sent to call one of these meetings, and promised to introduce the Roman
ambassadors; but he secretly warned all the members not to come, and
then declared that, according to the laws, a new assembly could not be
held for six months.

The Achæans now armed themselves. Yet one can hardly conceive how
so small and insignificant a people could have the madness even to
dream of being able to stand against the Romans. During the fifty
years which had elapsed since they had been under their protection,
they had been quite inactive: they had only carried on petty and
trifling wars, and as they had ceased to have a standing army, they
had nothing but militia, which was still to be properly trained. They
had spent their time, while they were well off, in sensual indulgence,
and had neglected everything which they ought to have done for their
armament; so that they were not prepared for the chance of a danger
which might try their utmost strength, as may be seen from the newly
discovered fragments of Polybius. A wanton luxury and moral degeneracy,
the contemplation of which awakens most dismal thoughts, was now rife
among them. They came, as we have said, to the resolution of waging
war; and they were joined by the Bœotians and Chalcidians, the latter
of whom may have feared for their newly recovered freedom. These
transactions are, however, very obscure. The Ætolians did not take
part with them, perhaps from revenge and a malignant joy at seeing
the downfall of their rivals. Critolaus led a small army to Thessaly,
in all likelihood with the hope that the false Philip would still be
able to hold out, and that the Romans would thus be placed between
two fires: for it was thought that the Macedonians would go on with
the war, and that the Thessalians perhaps would rise in a body. But
in Macedon all was over. Heraclea, which before had sided with the
Achæans, was in fact separated from them by the Romans: an Achæan
detachment, which had already penetrated through Thermopylæ, and was
besieging Heraclea, quickly fled at the approach of Metellus and the
Romans to the main army, and joined Critolaus, who had not yet reached
Thermopylæ. Experience indeed had shown that this pass could be turned;
yet the very place ought surely to have called upon the Greeks to die a
glorious death: but they did the very worst thing that they could have
done; for they made off in all haste for the Isthmus, and when near
Scarphea,[60] Metellus came up with their rear-guard, being seized
by a sudden panic, they were scattered like chaff before the wind.
Critolaus disappeared: the most likely supposition is that he sank with
his horse in the marshes on the sea-shore, though it is possible that
they who told this, may also have meant by this mysterious account to
designate him as the evil genius of Greece. The Romans now entered
Bœotia, and fell in at Chæronea with the Arcadian contingent of one
thousand men, which, at the tidings of the battle, was trying to
retreat. The misery of Greece is described by Polybius, and we then
see how unjust it was to this great man to have looked upon him as
having no feeling for the fate of his native country. Metellus advanced
towards the Isthmus. The whole population of Thebes had left it, and
had fled for refuge to Cithæron and Helicon; Metellus took the town,
and treated it with much forbearance: he wished to end the war, and
to deal mildly with the Greeks. But that he could not do; for which
the Greeks themselves, as well as their stars, are to be blamed. In
almost all the towns it was the same as in Thebes; no one thought of
making a stand. At the same time, a Roman fleet went to Peloponnesus,
and, landing on the coast of Elis, barbarously ravaged the country,
the Achæans not being able anywhere to protect their shores: the
contingent belonging to those parts did not now go to the Isthmus; it
tried to defend its own towns, but in vain. Diæus, who, on the death of
Critolaus, had seized upon the office of _strategus_, and had posted
himself near Megara, at the approach of Metellus, retreated to the
Isthmus. Now indeed the Achæans might have made peace; for Metellus
was a great soul, and had the safety of Greece at heart. He offered
to negotiate; but Diæus, whose faction had the upperhand at Corinth,
thought that he was able to maintain the Isthmus: reckless as he was,
he scouted every proffer like a madman. How lucky it would have been
if, like Papius Brutulus, he had thought of opening, by his own death,
to his country, the prospect of tranquillity! It would then have been
an easy thing for the Achæans to have gotten a peace, in which the
existence of the single states would have been maintained.

Before Metellus reached the Isthmus, Mummius hastened to take the
command of the army. Mummius was not of so mild a disposition as
Metellus; he sought laurels for himself, and booty for the Romans. He
tried to come up before Metellus could have concluded a peace: for the
latter, although a plebeian like Mummius, was of a family which had
long been in possession of the curule dignities, and being a _nobilis_,
he could easily have carried the peace in the senate; Mummius was a
_novus homo_, and not one of the aristocracy. Diæus had enlisted all
the slaves who were able to bear arms, and yet he had only got together
an army of fourteen thousand men, though there had been more than half
a century of peace: this, more than anything, shows in what a wretched
moral and political condition the country was; for wealthy the Achæans
undoubtedly were. These had their heads turned by an advantage which
they won in a cavalry fight, and they provoked the Romans to a battle,
which was soon so utterly lost as to leave no hope of safety. They
ought to have defended the impregnable Acrocorinthus; but the whole
population of Corinth fled into the Arcadian mountains, and the town
and the citadel were abandoned, not a soul having remained behind.
On the third day after the battle, Mummius, who would not believe it
possible that they had given up every thought of defence, ordered
the gates to be broken open, and convinced himself that the city was
deserted. The pillage of Corinth; Mummius’ barbarian honesty; and the
burning of the most wealthy commercial town then in Europe, are well
known facts. The booty was immense: all the Corinthians were sold for
slaves, and the most noble works of art were carried away. In the same
manner, Thebes and Chalcis were destroyed: with regard to other towns,
we have no distinct information. Thebes, in Pausanias’ times, was only
a small village within the Cadmea. The inhabitants of the whole of
the Peloponnesus would have been sold into slavery, had not Polybius,
through his friend Scipio, managed to get some merciful decrees from
the senate.

Greece was changed into a Roman province, a few places only, like
Sparta and Athens, remaining _liberæ civitates_: the real province was
Achaia, the prætor of which had the other Greek districts under his
rule as dependencies. Phocis and Bœotia were to pay tribute, a thing
which they had never done even in the days of the Macedonian sway.
Moreover, they got a uniform constitution, which Polybius had a hand in
bringing about, and which is said to have contributed greatly towards
the reviving of the country. But the national strength was paralysed by
the law, that no one should possess landed property in a state to which
he did not politically belong; all the συστήματα of the peoples were
done away with; all _concilia_, and most likely, all _connubia_ and
_commercia_ were forbidden: the territory of Corinth was added to the
_ager publicus_. Polybius now returned to the land of his fathers, to
obtain for his unhappy countrymen as fair conditions as he could. But
his lot was that of a physician who performs on his wife or his child
the most painful and dangerous cure: it is his love which animates him
in his task; and yet it is that very love which, in such an operation,
rends his heart with thrice the agony that it does that of others. This
courage is more than heroism: to bear up under such a trial, where
once he had lived happily; not to despair amid the general dismay, and
even then only to get the tyrants to keep within bounds; and after all
to attain at last to a certain end, truly bespeaks a great soul. The
author of a petulant essay on Polybius which was published a few years
ago, has only exposed himself by his incapability of understanding the
sterling greatness of the man. It was through Polybius that the statue
of Philopœmen was restored; and all the concessions which were at all
favourable to Greece, were owing to nothing but his endeavours alone.

WARS IN SPAIN. VIRIATHUS. DESTRUCTION OF NUMANTIA.

In Spain, fortune was so far from smiling on the Romans, that it seemed
as if fate wished to remind them of a Nemesis, as the slave did the
warrior in his triumph. The Spanish wars may be divided into periods.
The first goes down to the end of the second Punic war; the second,
to the treaty of Gracchus by which the Romans ruled over Catalonia,
Valencia, Andalusia, as well as western Aragon and eastern Castile, and
also acquired a kind of supremacy over the Celtiberians. The violation
of this peace by the fortification of Segida, called forth a fresh
struggle which we may name as the first Celtiberian war: M. Claudius
Marcellus had then the command; it lasted three or four years.

Out of the war against the Lusitanians, in which Galba by his
faithlessness had branded the Roman name with dishonour, that of
Viriathus sprang. This man, who was a Lusitanian, had been a common
shepherd and also a robber, as is very often the case with herdsmen in
southern Europe, even as it is to this very day in Italy; and having
been among those Lusitanians towards whom Galba had behaved with
such infamous treachery, he had vowed implacable revenge against the
Romans. He placed himself at the head of a small band; for in Spain it
is characteristic of the nation to have a continual guerilla warfare,
for which the Spaniards have a turn, owing to the nature of their
country, and also from their disposition, law and order not having
the least power over them, while personal qualities are everything.
Viriathus enjoyed unbounded confidence as the hero of the nation.
He seldom engaged with the Romans in a pitched battle; but to lie in
ambush, to cut off supplies, to go round the enemy, to scatter quickly
after a defeat, were the ways in which he would wage war. By his great
skill he wore out the Roman generals, more than one of whom lost his
life against him. The history of his achievements, imperfectly as we
know it, is exceedingly interesting. For eight years[61] (605-612),
he maintained himself against the Romans; they would march against
him with a superior force, and yet he always got out of their reach,
and then would suddenly show himself in their rear, or hem them in on
impassable roads, and rob them of their baggage, and cut them to pieces
in detail. By these means, he gained the whole of the country for
himself; only the inhabitants of the coast of Andalusia, who had ever
been the least warlike, remained subject to the Romans, being quickly
latinized. Among these, therefore, Viriathus made his appearance as a
foe; but the ground which was particularly friendly to him, lay from
Portugal, all through Estremadura, as far as Aragon: here he moved
remarkably quickly with his light horse and foot. Seldom did he meet
with loss against the Romans. The Celtiberians also he managed to win
over to his side: they did not indeed carry on their warfare according
to his plan, but still, as is always the case with Spaniards, they
sought the same end in a way of their own. The Romans saw themselves
reduced to the necessity of concluding with him a formal peace, in
which they acknowledge him as _socius_ and _amicus populi Romani
æquissimo jure_, and by which he and his people became completely
sovereign,--a peace the like of which the Romans had hardly ever made
before. On his side it was honestly meant; whereas the Romans, on the
contrary, did not deem themselves bound to keep a treaty which was
so utterly at variance with their maxims. The Roman proconsul Cæpio
wished for a triumph and booty, like all the Roman generals of that
time; and so he rekindled the war, having with an utter want of faith
been authorized by the senate to do harm to Viriathus, wherever it
was in his power. Thus the war broke out anew, though negotiations
were seemingly going on. Traitors were found who offered to murder
Viriathus: they accomplished the deed in his tent, and, before any
body was aware of his death, escaped to the Romans, from whom they
received the price of blood. All that the Lusitanians could now do,
was to bury him with an enthusiasm which has become famous in history
(612): the friends of this great man fought with each other over his
grave, until they fell. Treachery like this is often met with among the
Iberians:--the Celtiberians, however, are to be excepted. The character
of the Spaniards has in many points remained entirely the same; and
though we must lay not a few such cases to the charge of that fearful
party spirit of theirs, which still displays itself as strong as ever,
of them most particularly the saying holds good, that friendship dies,
but that hatred is immortal. Another characteristic has continued to
distinguish them even to this day: they are hardly fit for any thing
in the lines, and they have shown themselves great in battles only
at times, and under great generals,--under Hamilcar and Hannibal, in
ancient history; in the middle ages and afterwards, under Gonsalvo de
Cordova who formed the Spanish infantry, down to the duke of Alva,
under whom it still was excellent: from thence it began to decline.[62]

The Lusitanians now went on with the war under several other generals;
but none of the successors of Viriathus was as great as he was,--there
was not the same confidence in their personal qualities. D. Junius
Brutus Callaicus concluded a peace with them, and they accepted the
offer of settling as a sort of Roman colony in Valencia, where they
founded the town of that name: the climate there is most softening,
so that they soon lost their warlike character. It is remarkable with
what ease the same Brutus made conquests in the north-west of Spain,
and the north-east of Portugal; and also in modern times, these peoples
have shown little perseverance, except against the Moorish rule. He is
the first Roman who advanced beyond the Minho into the country of the
Callæcians; but his campaign did not leave any lasting consequences,
although it made a deep impression in those parts.

These conquests, which shed such lustre upon Rome, took place at
the very time when the wars with the Celtiberians were carrying on
so unsuccessfully. This people was divided in several small tribes,
of which the Belli, Titthi, and Arevaci were the chief. Of their
constitution we have no satisfactory idea. Southern Spain seems to have
been ruled by kings; the Celtiberians were republican, and perhaps had
highly popular institutions: besides which, as in Greece, the most
important towns had a free and independent existence of their own,
Termantia or Termestia, and Numantia being in the first rank among
those of the Arevaci. The Celtiberian wars began in 609, and ended in
619 or 620: when we bear in mind what the races were which held out in
them, their great length is well nigh inconceivable. At first, most of
the Celtiberians were under arms; little by little, one place after the
other fell off. Numantia lay in a very strong position, amid ravines
and torrents, near the spot where Soria now stands: whether it is true
that it had no walls, or whether this be only said in imitation of
the accounts of Sparta, can no longer be made out. They were able to
send but eight thousand men into the field, a number which was greatly
lessened in the course of the war: at the time of the blockade, there
were not more than four thousand left. Twice the Romans make a peace
with them, and twice did they break it again: at last, Scipio was once
more charged with the commission of torturing to death a noble people.

The year 611 was that of the consulship of Q. Pompeius, who, to
distinguish him from another of the same name, is called _Auli filius_:
he was appointed to the command in Spain. He is the ancestor of Cn.
Pompeius Magnus, who stood at the head of the aristocracy of his day,
and he himself figured as one of the leaders of that class, although
the son of a very humble musician. As he leagued himself with the
_nobiles_, he was welcome to them, and was received into their ranks;
so that even before he was consul, he had already a powerful party.
How he raised himself, is uncertain: according to some, he did it by
dishonourable means; yet he was a man of talent. His very opposite was
Tib. Sempronius Gracchus, who was of a plebeian house, but of most
ancient nobility: the latter was at the head of the popular party. Q.
Pompeius led his army against the Numantines, and was unsuccessful:
they took his camp, and brought him to very great straits. Being in
this plight, he offered peace: the Numantines, but only for form’s
sake, were to give hostages, whom he was to return to them; they were
also to pay a certain sum, and to promise to serve in the field. This
they also did. But this most reasonable peace did not please at Rome,
nor was Pompeius fool enough to believe that it would; his successor,
by order of the senate, disregarded it altogether. The Numantines sent
ambassadors to Rome, and appealed to the treaties, in which they were
borne out by the Roman staff-officers: but the senate annulled the
peace, Pompeius himself doing his utmost to bring this about, that he
might not be called to account for the way in which he had conducted
the war. Hostilities were renewed on a greater scale; and a few years
afterwards the command fell to C. Hostilius Mancinus, a man who had
the ill luck to gain a great celebrity and a sort of moral notoriety
which indeed is of a very doubtful nature. The frightened Spaniards
had abandoned Numantia to its fate, and Mancinus had reached as far as
the _suburbana_, the gardens and cemeteries of the town: there he was
driven back in an engagement; the Numantines pursued, and the Romans,
retreating in blind haste, got into a place from which there was no
way out, so that they had to make up their minds either to sue for
peace or perish. At first, the Numantines would have nothing to say
to the conditions offered by Mancinus, favourable as they were; it
was only Tib. Gracchus, then serving as a quæstor, who could save the
army. The Numantines had not forgotten the equitable peace which his
father had made, but the remembrance of his upright conduct towards
all the Celtiberians was so dear to them, that they accepted the son
as a mediator, being convinced that he meant honestly. So great was
the respect in which he was held by them, that he betook himself in
the midst of them to Numantia, to get back his account-books, which,
as well as the camp, had fallen into their hands; and these were also
returned to him uninjured. The army, which, without reckoning the
allies, numbered twenty thousand men, was allowed to march off without
disgrace, and independence and friendship were stipulated for Numantia.
Mancinus afterwards played at Rome the same part which Sp. Postumius
had done after the Caudine peace: he recommended the senate to yield
up himself and the officers, to atone for the unauthorized peace. The
people agreed to this, so far as he was concerned; but it threw out the
clause as to the officers, out of regard for Tib. Gracchus. Mancinus
was delivered up: the noble-minded Numantines would not have him, that
the curse of a broken oath might fall upon those who were guilty.

The war lasted yet a few years longer without any result; so that the
Romans were driven, in spite of the laws, (as Appian says,) to elect
Scipio Africanus consul. Ten years had already passed away since his
first consulship, and the _leges annales_ could not have prescribed
an age which he had not reached already; perhaps there was a law that
no one should be consul twice. Scipio went forth with many recruits,
allies, and volunteers from all parts, with Numidians and men from the
far East, against that small people, to root it out from the earth.
All the proffers of the Numantines were rejected. Scipio found a
great degeneracy in the Roman troops; and it cost him a vast deal of
trouble to restore discipline, as the loose morals and the luxury which
were rife among individuals, were likewise spreading in the army: he
purified it, and then marched with sixty thousand men against Numantia.
This city was surrounded on three sides by the Douro, and it lay
therefore on an isthmus, which was strongly fortified. Around the town,
the circumference not being more than three Roman miles, (one German,)
Scipio now drew a line of pallisades with a rampart, and behind it a
second one,--just as Platææ was shut in by the Spartans,--and here he
distributed his army. On these lines, he placed engines for hurling
missiles, with which the Romans tried to keep off their desperate foes,
as they wanted to destroy them by hunger. For a while, some of them
escaped on the Douro, by which the besieged also got supplies; but
he cut them off even from this, by sinking above the town huge beams
armed with saws into the river, so that the rafts with flour could no
longer float down that way. How long this dreadful blockade lasted,
is more than we can tell. Once, however, some Numantines climbed
over the walls, and came to a distant town where some hundred youths
enthusiastically took up arms; and thus a general rising against the
Romans was on the eve of bursting forth. When Scipio found this out, he
forthwith marched thither, and had the hands of those who were guilty
cut off. Such an atrocity stamps the man. The Numantines, when they had
fed, first on the dead bodies of the enemy, and then on those of their
own countrymen, and gone through all those horrors which Missolunghi
had to suffer, wished at length to capitulate. Scipio demanded that
their arms should be given up, and that they should surrender at
discretion: they asked for three days, which they spent in freeing
their wives and children by death from slavery; so that a few of them
only came out, who were like skeletons. Of these, Scipio picked out
fifty for his triumph, who seem to have been beheaded afterwards: the
rest were sold; but they are said to have broken out with such rage,
some of them killing themselves, and others murdering their masters,
that after a short time not a Numantine was left alive. The place where
the town had stood, from henceforth became a waste.

THE SERVILE WAR IN SICILY. ACQUISITION OF THE KINGDOM OF PERGAMUS.
ARISTONICUS. DOMESTIC AFFAIRS.

The punishment for so foul a deed was not slow in overtaking the
Romans. Even before the fall of Numantia, a servile war broke out in
Sicily; though indeed this does not so much belong to Roman, as to
Grecian history. It was brought on by the depopulation of the island
owing to the many wars in which famine and pestilence were raging, as
in Germany during the Thirty Years’ war. Twenty-four years had not yet
passed since the first Punic war, when the second completed the misery
of Sicily: it was in a state of desolation, like that of Ireland after
the peace of Limerick, in the times of William III. Much of the land
was made _ager publicus_, and thus fell into the hands of speculators;
in this way there arose large estates in Sicily, which were chiefly
used for grazing. Thus (according to the _Codex Theodosianus_) nearly
the whole of Lucania, Bruttium, and Calabria, in the days of Honorius
and Arcadius, was pasture land, of which the owners, who were partly
Romans, partly Siciliotes, kept large studs of horses and herds of
cattle. Herdsmen in Italy are a degenerate race of men: they are,
almost all of them, as far as I know, (in the States of the Church
and in the kingdom of Naples,--in Tuscany there are few of them,) the
associates of robbers: the herdsman is as bad and as robber-like, as
the peasant, on the other hand, is respectable. On these large estates,
there was an immense number of slaves,--often as many as thousands
together on one alone. The traffic in slaves, owing to the wars and
the continual piracy of those times, had reached a fearful height; so
that at the slave-market in Delos, ten thousand are said to have been
sold in one day, and they were to be had for a mere trifle. They were
treated with the greatest cruelty, and had to work in the fields in
chains; of course, there were among them many respectable men from all
parts, Carthaginians, Achæans, Macedonians, Celtiberians, and others,
who deserved quite a different fate, and could not but thirst for the
blood of their tyrants. Thus the Servile war broke out in Sicily,
and it is not to be wondered at that there was then another of these
risings in Greece: the cause was everywhere the same. In Greece,
tillage had formerly been mostly the business of the freedmen, and it
was only of late that it had fallen into the hands of the slaves. The
war had now reached its fourth year; several Roman armies had been
utterly routed, and it required a consular one under P. Rupilius to
reduce the island (620): for the slaves were masters of the strongest
places, Enna and Tauromenium, and they had for their leader Eunus
(Εὔνους), a Syrian, who, like Jean François at St. Domingo in the year
1791, put on the diadem in due form. The struggle was carried on with
the same relentless cruelty which slaves have met with everywhere, as
in the West Indies and in North America. Sicily was laid utterly waste
by it, and thirty years afterwards, the same circumstances led to the
same results. The details are awfully interesting; yet, as we have
said before, they are not in their place here.

In the meanwhile, Attalus Philometor of Pergamus, the son of Eumenes,
died, and with him the race of Philetærus became extinct. The first
kings of Pergamus whom the Romans had raised to greatness, were on the
whole clever men and mild princes; and under their rule the country
flourished: this state of things was a desirable one, although, if
looked upon in a moral point of view, much might be said against it.
But the last Attalus was a tyrant and a wicked wretch, such as is
only to be met with in the East, where a certain perversity reaches
its highest pitch, and takes delight in what is most unnatural and
revolting: in a word, he was an incarnate fiend, like Sultan Ibrahim.
The only art in which he employed himself, was that of cultivating
deadly plants and of preparing poison: it was sport to him, to get
those who were his nearest kindred out of the world. He bequeathed
the whole of his kingdom to the Romans; and indeed he could not well
have done otherwise, as every one of his dispositions had still to be
approved of by the Romans, who would hardly have acknowledged the rule
of any one else. They took it as a property which of right belonged
to them, very much as a master might take the goods of one of his
freedmen who had not been fully emancipated, and had died without
leaving a will. Thus Rome had a new province, which, however, was to
be won by the sword, as Aristonicus, a bastard son of Eumenes, laid
claim to the throne. According to the notions of the East, this defect
of birth was not a bar to the succession, so that, but for the will of
Attalus, he would have been the lawful heir. He had very little trouble
in getting hold of the diadem soon after the death of his brother;
for the people had a horror of the Roman rule, and they had learned
to know the tyranny and rapacity of the Roman prætors and proconsuls
who made their appearance every year: many towns declared for him;
others, like Ephesus, which had lately gained their freedom by the
help of Rome, took up arms against him. How he came to believe that
he could hold out, is quite inconceivable. He had no aid whatever: in
his neighbourhood were Pontus, Cappadocia, and Bithynia, all three
of which were only small kingdoms, and the two last quite unwarlike;
the Syrian kings were likewise tottering to their fall, and their
whole attention was turned to the East, where the Parthian empire was
spreading farther and farther, and Babylon was already conquered.
There was not a soul in the world who could help Andronicus; and yet
he would engage in the mad undertaking of raising war against the
Romans. But the struggle lasted longer than one would have thought: not
only did the womanish inhabitants of Lydia and Ionia, countries which
are an earthly paradise, carry it on with great resolution, but the
pretender had likewise many Thracians in his pay. The Romans, on the
other hand, were badly commanded: their leaders thought of nothing but
enriching themselves; they were very glad when wealthy towns rebelled,
as they could then plunder them. Rome had not only a consular army,
but also troops from Bithynia and Pontus; a Roman general, P. Licinius
Crassus, was even defeated and taken prisoner. This man has some name
in history; and yet, his rapacity was so abominable, that the Asiatics
ill-treated his dead body because of it: so cheap was it at that time
to be deemed a man of honour. He died, however, a noble death, himself
asking to be killed. At length, M. Perperna overcame Aristonicus, and
took him prisoner; but M. Aquillius snatched the triumph from him. This
is of later date than the tribuneship of Tib. Gracchus (619); that is
to say, in 622.[63]

The province of Asia was now regularly formed, but within narrower
limits. Rome was generous to the native princes: Nicomedes had his
territory enlarged, and Great Phrygia was given to Mithridates
of Pontus. But in the latter case, this was not done before the
tribuneship of C. Gracchus, who, however, seems to have spoken against
it, Mithridates having perhaps gotten this quite unnecessary cession of
land by bribing the Roman commissioners.

The changes in the constitution of Rome in those days, are most of them
unimportant, as the distinction between patrician and plebeian was
now at an end. In 622, for the first time, two plebeians are censors;
in 580 already, both the consuls were from the same order. Here we
find this entry in the Capitoline Fasti, _ambo primi de plebe_: Livy
makes no remark whatever about it, circumstances having become so ripe
for the change, that no one even thought any longer of putting any
obstacle in the way of a plebeian. Dionysius says, that in his time
not more than fifty patrician families were still left, which is to
be understood of actual families, and not of _gentes_, of which there
may have been only about fifteen. As _gentes_, they are no longer held
in any account: these had lost their importance together with the
curies. In a _gens_, moreover, all the families were not ennobled:
of the Claudia, there was only one; of the Valeria, the Messalæ; the
Cornelia consisted of Scipiones, Lentuli, Cethegi, Sullæ (these last
being added but of late); in the Æmilia, were the Lepidi, and perhaps
also the Scauri. But of the plebeian _familiæ nobiles_ there was a very
great number, and they were still ever increasing. Of the senate, by
far the larger part belonged to them; ever since the end of the war
with Hannibal, most of the prætors were likewise plebeians, scarcely
one out of six being a patrician: nor does it seem as if any stress
had been laid on it; it was merely the effect of time. In the troubles
of the Gracchi, we find the families quite indiscriminately in both
parties. Appius Claudius, sprung from a family which in former times
had headed the patricians against the plebeians, was the father-in-law
of Tib. Gracchus, and sided with him, and carried through all the laws
put forth by him; whilst, on the other hand, those, who were the most
enraged against the Gracchi, and the most interested in withstanding
them, were, with the exception of Scipio Nasica, all of them plebeians.
The feuds had long been settled, and they had passed to the _novi
homines_ and _nobiles_, the latter of whom were in the last century
very incorrectly called patricians, especially by foreigners (the
French). This change has been known ever since the revival of learning.
The censorship remained forty years longer than the consulship in the
possession of the patricians; for as the elections for this were only
every five years, there were still men enough to fill it.

About the same time, the holding the ædileship by turns must have been
done away with; and certainly this office must of late have been a
heavy burthen upon the patricians, as it entailed considerable expense.

The tribuneship of the people had quite changed character; the tribune
holding arbitrary sway just like any tyrant. A tribune (C. Atinius
Labeo), a few years after Gracchus, wanted to have the censor Metellus
thrown from the Tarpeian rock for having excluded him from the senate;
and it was only with difficulty that his family succeeded in getting
another tribune to intercede for him. Such instances are not unseldom
met with, as the tribunes themselves no longer knew what their office
meant. It was very likely the same Atinius, who brought in the law that
the tribunes were _eo ipso_ senators, and could only be excluded by the
same rules as other senators.

TIBERIUS SEMPRONIUS GRACCHUS.

There was a time when the name of the Gracchi was cried down, when they
were looked upon as the leaders of a tyrannical onslaught upon the
property of others; and there was another time, when they had a renown
which would have certainly been most hateful to themselves. Both of
these opinions are now entirely exploded; and, although the complicated
system of the _ager publicus_ is not yet understood everywhere, still
I do not believe that any one in Germany--unless indeed it be in some
corner of Austria--holds the old views with regard to the Gracchi. The
French still cling a little to their false prejudices; but in America
my account of the matter is already the one generally received, as a
reviewer of my history in a North American periodical has especially
pointed out.

Tiberius Gracchus was the son of Tiberius Gracchus the elder who had
made the peace with the Celtiberians, and of Cornelia, the daughter of
the first Scipio Africanus, who was given in marriage to her husband,
not, as Livy says, by her father, but, after his death, by her family:
both of these were, even in the midst of the thorough corruption of
that age, acknowledged to have been people of the highest virtue,
in whom the olden times were living again. Of their many children,
few only remained alive--in fact, out of twelve not more than three,
namely the two brothers, Tiberius and Caius, and the daughter, who was
married to the younger Scipio (_Paulli fil._). The sons were brought
up under the eye of the mother by distinguished Greeks, and by a
Campanian, C. Blossius, who was a perfect Grecian, writing Greek, and
even composing poetry in Greek: he was, as we now know, the author of
Rhintonian comedies,[64] a proof of the flourishing state of Greek
literature at that time in Italy, of which Cicero also informs us. He
was the teacher and friend of Tiberius of whom he was somewhat the
elder, and a follower of Stoic philosophy, a system which in those
days was congenial to the aspirations of all generous minds, and was
particularly welcome to a nation like the Romans. When Tiberius, owing
to the great favour which he had with the people, had been raised step
by step to honours, and he had gained glory already at Carthage, where
with C. Fannius he was the first to mount the wall, he became a quæstor
and made the peace with Numantia. Its not being ratified greatly
exasperated him. Unfortunately, we have for this period only desultory
works from second or third hand, such as those of Appian and Plutarch:
the latter of these wrote the lives of the Gracchi with much feeling,
but without any knowledge of the true state of affairs, the moral part
in him, being, however, really beautiful; moreover, like Appian, he is
led astray by the gossip of any writer. Thus Plutarch allows himself
to be beguiled into the belief that the vanity of Tiberius had been
hurt by the repudiation of the peace; but of a soul such as that of
Tiberius, we may safely say that its motives for anger were different.
He had concluded the peace as an honest man, and to see it trampled
upon in defiance of all good faith, embittered him against the men who
then were in power. How a character like Gracchus in such times as
those must have felt bound to take in hand these dangerous πολιτεύματα,
may best be shown from the Servile war in Sicily, where the real canker
which lay at the root of the whole state of society is laid bare.

The _ager publicus_[65] was the land taken in war, of which the
ownership belonged to the commonwealth, but the possession was given
up to Roman citizens, or to foreigners, on the payment of certain
outgoings, such as the tithes on the produce of the arable land and
of the live stock; a _scriptura_ on the pasture land according to the
number of the cattle; and other things of the kind. By the Licinian
law[66] it had been enacted that no one should possess more than five
hundred _jugera_ of the _ager publicus_, but that he might transfer
the occupancy as if it were his property: yet the possessor was, after
all, only a precarious occupant, _a tenant at will_,[67] whom the real
owner might turn out, whenever he liked. If he possessed more than was
allowed by law, he was liable to punishment, and what was above the
quantity was to be confiscated: the state, however, might, of course,
at any time take back the whole.

The way in which the Licinian law was kept, was just what might be
expected under such circumstances: one or two incidents give us
light enough to see this. P. Postumius Megillus, for instance, was
fined for having employed the soldiers of the legion in converting a
large forest into arable land; Licinius Stolo himself was accused of
having tried by emancipating his son to evade his own law, as under
his name he held more than its clauses would have allowed him. The
amount of land was everywhere exceeded; and the very fact of these
estates being no freeholds, as they had the authority of the prætor
for their only title, so that, where they were situated, there existed
no jurisdiction, gave to those who wished to enrich themselves a great
means of driving out the small farmers, which was now done more and
more. Whilst in Germany, as well as in France and in England, the small
estates are worth much more taken singly, than when combined in large
masses; in the South, particularly in Italy, the larger properties are
more profitable, and thus the small estates go on decaying, and all
the land keeps falling into the hands of a few owners. Until the war
with Pyrrhus, an immense deal of land had been won, and so likewise
after the war with Hannibal: part of it was taken up for colonies, and
another share was left to the Latin allies, whose claims were thereby
satisfied, though even in this case also, the right of ownership seems
to have been reserved to the Roman commonwealth. Only in Samnium
and Apulia, and I believe also in Lucania,[68] had an extraordinary
distribution been made to the veterans of Scipio’s army; but besides
this, no general assignment had been made to the plebeians _viritim_,
as in olden times.

It is in the nature of things, that the husbandman is able to pay a
far higher rent for a piece of land, than we could, who do not till
it ourselves, provided, however, that no capital is needed for it. We
have to pay the labourer, whereas the other gets the double gain of the
labourer and of the farmer. I know the farming in Italy well, having
taken much trouble to become acquainted with all kinds of land-owners
and farmers there, particularly with the larger ones, who understand
husbandry very well. The latter manage their farms in an excellent
style, and yet they are a curse to the country: on the other hand, I
quite love the poor peasants. Among others, I knew of a small farmer
at Tivoli, who did his very utmost to get himself out of the clutches
of the usurers, and to free his bit of ground; on which occasion I
fully learnt how great the value of labour is in Italy, and what an
advantage it is there for a man to farm his own land. But as the money
is in very few hands, only indeed in those of the men of rank, the
small proprietor, if any ill luck befalls him, is unable to keep his
freehold, and therefore this class of men dwindles faster and faster
every year. The poor man, for instance, lived near the rich one; the
former in hard times had taxes to pay, but, having had losses owing
to murrain among the cattle and other visitations, he could not raise
the money: thus he borrowed from his wealthy neighbour, and as he had
no other pledge to offer but his farm, he had to pay a heavy rate of
interest. Nor was this the whole of his troubles: his son, perhaps,
served in a legion, in which case, if the father was taken ill and
had to keep labourers, he could not pay the interest; and now, if
his neighbour called upon him for the principal and interest, he must
needs give up to him the possession of his land at a low price. He
who is once in the fangs of the large proprietors, will never get out
again. And so Tib. Gracchus found the many small allotments on which
the soldiers had settled, either burthened with debt after the long
series of disasters during the late campaigns (in which the war-taxes
moreover were most heavily felt), or already fallen into the hands
of the rich. Such a change of property goes on increasing like an
avalanche. In Tivoli, the number of land-owners is now perhaps not a
fifth of what it was forty years back, and not one-fiftieth of what it
was four hundred years ago; as I have learned from an old survey of
the fifteenth century. I made inquiries to know what became of many
of the olive-yards there, which (in former times) belonged to certain
families in the town, and one by one have been got hold of by the rich.
Sonnino[69] has four thousand inhabitants, and some five or six men own
the whole of the land: all the rest are beggars and robbers.

By the Licinian law it was enacted, that on every five hundred
_jugera_, a certain number of free labourers (_cottagers_)[70] should
be employed, that slaves might not work on them. But the rule had
not been kept: thousands of slaves came in, as was also the case in
Portugal from the sixteenth century to Pombal’s days, when negro slaves
were so very cheap within the kingdom, owing to which indeed so many
mulattoes are found there. The condition of Italy was now this: on the
one hand, the number of Roman citizens had increased, partly--which
was desirable--from the allies, but chiefly in a worse way from the
freedmen, the common run of whom bore the brand of slavery; and on the
other hand, the numbers of the hereditary land-holders and land-owners
were dwindling fast. It is very likely that the first thought of
amending this state of things, came into the mind of Tib. Gracchus on
his return from Spain through Etruria, where he saw large tracts of
country with nothing but slaves, who worked at the ground in chains,
while the free-born men were begging and starving. The population of
Rome had become more and more a true rabble, and in the country the
poor increased at a fearful rate, an evil which alas! is now a growing
one in Europe. The Romans did not blind themselves to the condition in
which they were; they mourned over it, and acknowledged that, if the
Licinian law had been observed and the poor had been allowed to occupy
the land, there never would have been that wretchedness. Every body
wished, like the king[71] in Goethe’s play, that “all were otherwise;”
but no one had the courage to do anything. There is no doubt that just
after the war with Hannibal, it would not have been hard to stop the
mischief, and that was one of those momentous periods which sometimes
follow after great convulsions, and must be taken advantage of, or
else they are irrecoverably lost: one ought then to have created a
magistracy to watch over the way in which the Licinian law was kept,
and to distribute part of the conquered _ager publicus_, and to see
that the occupation was fairly managed. Since that time, seventy years
had passed, and every one must have looked blank at the very mention of
a reform. C. Lælius is said to have thought of it, but to have given
up the plan as impracticable; so that he got the surname of _Sapiens_.
This was either a nickname, or else _sapiens_ here means prudent; for
prudent it is not to stir up a wasp’s nest. There were now but few
great families indeed which did not possess far more than the lawful
quantity, and which did not keep more than a hundred head of cattle,
and five hundred sheep and goats, upon their estates: all these were
sure to be offended, if the Licinian law were carried out in all its
rigour. As our governments have now the right, when a lease is out, of
warning off a tenant on the crown-land, although his forefathers held
it perhaps for many years before him; thus also the Roman government
had never given up its right to the _ager publicus_, although it had
not exercised it for a long time. The law was quite clear; yet as it
had not been enforced for ages, it might be said on the other side,
that it was only common equity not to root out an old abuse at once,
and thus wound many interests. The rich might plead, that “when C.
Flaminius made his agrarian law to apply to the new conquests only,
he thereby tacitly acknowledged what had hitherto been held by right
of possession; moreover when the loan was contracted in the war with
Hannibal the _ager publicus_ was pledged to us, and has thus become
our property.” A hundred years had already passed since then; some of
the estates had also been laid waste during the war; in the full trust
that every one would remain in possession of what belonged to him, they
had planted them anew,[72] they had raised buildings on them, they had
drained fens: and now they were to sacrifice all this, and to be turned
out of what was their own.

Of purer intentions than Tiberius Gracchus, no man could ever have
been: even they have owned it, who a long time after, blinded by party
spirit, have railed against this undertaking; nay, Cicero himself,
whose generous heart always gets the better of him whenever he views
a subject with unprejudiced eyes, calls him _sanctissimus homo_. The
statesmen of old were not such as our fancy would generally lead us to
paint them; but they had the self-same ends in view as those of our
times: Tiberius Gracchus saw clearly, that, if things were to go on in
this way, utter ruin must follow, and Rome would fall into despotism.
Had he now wished to enforce the Licinian rogations to the very letter,
this would indeed have been just in law, but in reality most unfair.
He therefore laid down the rule, that every one should be allowed to
have, and that as freehold property, five hundred _jugera_ for himself,
and two hundred and fifty for every son who was still _in patria
potestate_, though as it seems, not for more than two of these (for
so must the passage in the Epitome of Livy be interpreted according
to the correct reading);[73] and moreover, that buildings erected on
that part of the land which was to be given up, should be valued,
and an indemnity paid to those who had owned them. Thus, instead of
infringing upon vested rights, he, on the contrary, converted a mere
tenure at will into a regular freehold which no man could touch. One
case, however, Gracchus had not considered: many had bought the _ager
publicus_ of the former occupant for ready money, or had taken it at
its value as their share of an inheritance; these could not be expected
to lose their capital. When this had happened, the overplus ought to
have been bought in at a fair price by the state, and then there would
have been nothing to say against the law: the great wealth of the state
would have certainly sufficed for this, as there could not, after all,
have been so many cases of people having more than a thousand _jugera_.
Five hundred _jugera_ are a very good-sized estate, as much as seventy
_rubbii_ are now, which is still looked upon as not a bad property in
Italy. I should not in that country wish for a larger one: one may get
from it in a fruitful district, if well managed, a net income of five
thousand crowns, merely by letting it out in farms. That the money
which was hoarded up in the treasury, could not have been better spent
than for such a purpose, is as clear as day. In this way it might have
become possible to remove from the city the _sentina rei publicæ_, the
disgrace of the Roman people, which weighed like a heavy burthen upon
it, and which always sold its votes in the _comitia_. To this class
allotments ought to have been given, but with the condition that they
should never be alienated, as otherwise they would have fallen again
into the hands of the rich. It is ever to be lamented that Gracchus did
not do this: however great the cost might have been, the state ought to
have borne it. In all likelihood he would have escaped the fate which
befell him, though indeed the hatred against him would always have been
bitter.

Gracchus is said also to have thought of widening the extent of the
Roman franchise; yet this is only dimly hinted at, as, generally
speaking, the accounts which we have of the whole of his undertaking
are so very scanty. He saw clearly that the middle class of the Roman
people had almost entirely disappeared, and that its restoration was
one of the principal wants of the time; and therefore he wished to
open the citizenship to the allies. This regeneration is quite in the
spirit of the old laws: its aim was to infuse fresh blood into the
higher orders, and to enlarge their numbers; just as in former times
the Licinian laws gave new life to the republic which was dwindling to
an oligarchy, and began the second brilliant epoch of Rome. There were
in Italy thirty Latin colonies, and in these there were many citizens
of great respectability, who might vote among the tribes in the Roman
assemblies, and who felt second only to the Romans, if not quite
their equals. These Latins actually now held the same rank which the
plebeians did two hundred and fifty years before: there was even much
more refinement in those towns than in Rome. Tiberius Gracchus wished
therefore to admit these to the full rights of Roman citizens, and he
likewise undoubtedly meant to grant the _suffragium_ to any _municipia
sine suffragio_ which at that time may have still existed.

On the side of Gracchus were many of the most eminent men, who
certainly were owners of large estates as well as the Scipios, but who
gave up their private advantage for the common good. There was even
his father-in-law Appius Claudius, who in other respects was just as
proud as any of his forefathers, but who in this behaved as Appius
Claudius Cæcus had done in his most glorious moments; moreover, there
was the great P. Mucius Scævola who was then consul; there was also
the father-in-law of his brother, P. Licinius Crassus, and others.
The rage which broke out against Tib. Gracchus in the senate, is
difficult to describe; it went beyond all the bounds of decency. Men of
rank, when they are the champions of oligarchy, as soon as ever their
interests are touched, not only display the same greedy covetousness
as the worst bred, but likewise a fury which one could hardly have
believed. Hitherto no one had lost sight of what was due to Gracchus
and his family: he enjoyed the same respect among the Romans, as
among barbarians; every one acknowledged his virtue, and even those
who looked upon all virtue as folly, were forced to own that he was
afflicted with that folly. But now the heroes of triumphs, and the
first men of the state, railed against him as a mutinous fellow who was
actuated by the most detestable motives. P. Cornelius Nasica, he who
was grandson of him who in the war with Hannibal had been declared to
be the most virtuous of men; and son of Scipio Nasica, who was likewise
said to have been an example to the whole nation, and who had tried
hard to bring back the good ways of the olden time; a man who himself
also was deemed to be the very soul of honour, and perhaps deserved
to be so in many respects--became hand and glove with the infamous Q.
Pompeius. From this it does not follow that he was a knave; it may be
that, hardened in his oligarchical notions, he really saw Ti. Gracchus
as he fancied him to be. The senate did not possess the same means
which the patricians once had against the plebeians: it had not the
old negative of the curies, the Hortensian law having conceded to the
tribes the most unbounded power of legislation, so that the senate
could not step in with a senatus consultum. By the strangest anomaly,
the tribunes could now only check each other, since there was no veto
where it would have been most needed: the only means of defeating a law
was the intercession of a tribune.

There are hereditary family principles in Rome, as there were also
family characters; and these are more than mere political maxims.[74]
Throughout the family of the Gracchi, as has been already mentioned,
we find a certain mildness, and an unaffected kindliness towards those
who were in need of help. This is shown in the three generations which
are remarkable in history, by Tib. Gracchus in the Second Punic War, by
Tib. Gracchus the censor, and by the two unfortunate brothers Tiberius
and Caius; it is a disposition moreover which in Rome was not often
met with, and which had now disappeared entirely. The same thing is to
be seen in every free state, and it is one of those spells by which a
commonwealth is upheld. Those who are born in certain families, are,
as it were, predestined to such and such political principles: thus in
England it is known at once to which party a Russel is sure to belong,
just as every one receives from his church the doctrines which he is to
follow.[75]

If the notion that the tribunes belonged to a different class from
the ruling one, is quite erroneous at the very outset, it is utterly
groundless now. At this time, we may positively say that as a rule
the tribunes--though they did not all become consuls themselves, as
every year there were ten tribunes elected, and not more than two
consuls--belonged to the consular families, and that it was only very
rarely that a plebeian was made consul who had not once been tribune.
This is a point, which we must not lose sight of. It now happened not
unseldom that a man like Gracchus was among the tribunes. M. Octavius,
who was tribune with him, belonged to a good family, although not one
of the very first rank. Him the opposite party gained over, to put
in his veto. There is nothing to say against his character: he had
formerly been a friend of Tiberius Gracchus, but party spirit had
now got the better of him. He himself had much to lose, and Gracchus
offered to make it up to him out of his own property; but this, of
course, he could not accept. In vain did Gracchus try to convince him
of his error, and adjure him to recal his intercession: it was all to
no purpose, as Octavius had bound himself by his word of honour, and
could not act otherwise than in the trammels of his faction, which
is the worst thing that a man can do in a struggle of parties. The
question now was, whether Gracchus should give up a law which might
save the nation and check the spread of vice, merely because a man who
was his friend had sold his soul to the evil faction; or whether he
should do a thing which was indeed contrary to the letter, but quite
in the spirit of the constitution. He made up his mind to the latter
course, which was to move in the assembly of the people, that Octavius
should be put out of his tribuneship. This was an irregularity; but,
properly speaking, the independence of the tribunes was an abuse:
consuls had been deposed more than once, and an office from which its
holder cannot be removed, is an absurdity in a republic. The tribunes
were merely commissioned to bring motions before the people, and
whoever has given a commission can also take it away again. But what
Gracchus did, was wrong in point of form. That he might swerve from
the law as little as he could, he proposed to Octavius, first to put
himself to the vote; and when Octavius refused, he went on with his
motion. Seventeen tribes had already voted against Octavius, when
Gracchus once more besought him to give up his opposition, or else
to resign. But he would do neither, and was deposed. As he wished to
make a scene, he would not leave the rostra, until Gracchus had him
dragged down by force, thus awakening that feeling of disgust among the
beholders, which the senate and the men in power were eager to call
forth.

The opponents of Tib. Gracchus had now the advantage of seeing
him wrong in form. The agrarian law was carried, and a standing
triumvirate was appointed to watch over the way in which it was kept.
Tib. Gracchus, his brother, and his father-in-law, were named as
triumvirs. From the _Somnium Scipionis_, we see that the _socii_ and
_Latini_ attached themselves to P. Scipio, and we have even a great
many statements which show that they, like the senate, were against
the agrarian law: the reason for this we may make out by laying things
together, there being several ways of accounting for it, one of which
must undoubtedly be the true one. The Roman laws, unless it were
expressly stipulated, did not apply to the allies, as we know from the
usury laws, which are a case in point. Now it may be that the law of
Licinius had said nothing about the _socii_ and _Latini_; so that if
these had a _possessio_, they were not tied down to the maximum of five
hundred _jugera_. Those who were rich, may have bought up in remote
districts the _latifundia_ of former Roman possessors, and they would
now have been disturbed by the Sempronian law. Certain it is, that
the _socii_ and _Latini_ had always been granted a certain portion
of the _ager publicus_: thus for instance the Campanians had a very
large one, which they could only have acquired as allies; the Marsians
had a share in the Apulian pastures. That Gracchus had meddled with
these holdings, is not very likely, though it cannot be positively
denied. It is more probable, on the other hand, that many places had
been allowed, till further orders, to have the use of their _ager_
on condition of their paying tribute for it, though the right of
ownership, which these had lost in war, had not been restored to them
by the Roman people: if this indulgence were now taken away, it was
hard upon them. They also got compensations, as we know for certain in
the case of Carthage. Those who held on such tenures, had now the same
interest as the wealthy Romans. However this may have been, the allies
felt themselves aggrieved.--The plea then of defending the rights of
the subjects, was the mask behind which the covetousness of those who
were in power was hidden: they put on the guise of being the champions
of these without thinking at all of themselves, an hypocrisy, which
has taken in even a clear-headed man like Cicero, who is remarkably
wavering with regard to these and other like transactions: his heart is
with the Gracchi, but led by _a priori_ reasoning, he decides against
them; and thus he feels quite at a loss, and is afraid to speak out.
The circumstances under which he wrote the books _de Re publica_ and
_de Legibus_, are his excuse. The opposition of the Latins was a great
stumblingblock in the way of Gracchus; the _optimates_ were only able
to counterbalance the popular party by thus leaguing themselves with
the allies. But when the oligarchy had gained the victory by the help
of the _socii_, they afterwards basely sacrificed them, very nearly as
the Irish Roman Catholics were sacrificed at the Union.

About this time, already in the beginning of the year, Attalus died.
The establishment of the province of Asia now forms an episode in the
tribunate of Gracchus, in which he again showed himself to have been
a statesman of deep thought, and earned great honour. Among the goods
which the king left, was a large treasure, as is always the case with
eastern princes, who, much as they spend, hoard as much again; and this
was sent to Rome. Now it is often thrown out as a reproach against
Gracchus, that he divided it among the Roman people; but there was
nothing wrong in what he did. In Rome, as in the small Swiss cantons,
every citizen had a share in the sovereignty; besides which, the public
_ærarium_ was becoming richer every day, as the tributes already
yielded so immense a surplus, that the citizens had no longer to pay
any direct taxes. As the great mass of the people had now sunk into the
lowest depths of wretchedness, this division was quite justifiable; and
the more so, as land was to be assigned to them, and they wanted money
to stock it. The triumvirs for the distribution of the land were now
first to make out, which estates belonged to the republic, and which
to private persons: for many had been sold, and many in the midst of
the allotted districts had been left to their former owners; so that
the keeping of the registers was exceedingly difficult. The Romans had
these registers, just as we have our surveys for the assessment of
taxes; but they were very carelessly done, as the seat of government
was at Rome alone, and there was hardly anything like sub-delegation.

The time for choosing new tribunes was now at hand. The tribunes
entered upon their functions on the ninth of December; but for a longer
time than we can tell, the elections had been held at the end of June,
or in the beginning of July, that the tribunate might never be vacant.
As the tribunes took part in the discussions of the senate, and in
these Gracchus was treated with a vulgar and most reckless fury, he
could easily foresee, that when once out of office, he would be at
the mercy of his foes: as _triumvir agrorum dividundorum_, he was not
_sacrosanctus_. He therefore tried, in accordance with the laws, to
have his tribuneship renewed. This was done very often in the first
ages; but it may have fallen into disuse, and thus the party against
him have had the plea of prescription on the score of which they
might withstand him. When the _prærogativa_ had nominated him, and
another tribe had followed on the same side, the opposition declared
this vote to be null and void, and demanded that the tribunes should
not receive any suffrages for him. Q. Rubrius, a tribune who presided
over the election, having become quite at a loss what to do, Mummius,
another tribune who had been chosen instead of Octavius, said that
Rubrius ought to yield his place to him: on this, as the other tribunes
demanded that the matter should be decided by lot, a quarrel arose, and
the day passed away without anything being settled. Gracchus already
saw that his death was aimed at, and he went about with his child among
the people, begging them to stand by him, and to save his life. In the
earliest times, the _plebes_ assembled on the forum; but in the war
with Hannibal already, it always votes on the _area_ before the temple
in the Capitol; I have not yet been able to find out when it was that
this change began. It also seems that the votes were now given by word
of mouth, and not, as formerly, on tablets, a custom which afterwards
the _Lex Cassia_ only restored, so that it is by no means to be looked
upon as an innovation, as is generally thought. Professor Wunder has
very correctly perceived this. Let no one believe that it is possible
to honour Cicero more highly than I do; yet I cannot help saying, that
he is to be blamed for all the erroneous notions which are rife on this
subject, as well as on so many others. Gracchus now was on the area of
the Capitol, and was speaking most movingly to the people, who seemed
as if they would uphold him. At any other time of the year, when the
country folks were in great numbers in the city, he would undoubtedly
have found the strongest protection; but these were away on account
of the harvest, and the townspeople were not only lukewarm, but many
of them were directly under the influence of the _optimates_. Here
also we see how the constitution, owing to circumstances, had become
quite different from what it had been formerly under the self-same
forms. In the earlier ages, when the territory did not yet reach over
many leagues, the citizens might assemble and the _tribus rusticæ_
be represented, if not fully, at least in considerable numbers: but
now that the Roman peasantry lived so far away, especially, for
instance, after the assignments of Flaminius in the Romagna, they
were no more able to come to town and vote; and the form of the law,
which was suitable to the former size of the city, was now thoroughly
preposterous and mischievous. On the following day, the elections were
to go on, and people now met together with a gloomy foreboding that
blood would be shed. Gracchus came only lightly armed. The senate
was assembled in the temple of _Fides_. The votes were about to be
given, when a tumult arose. The senate being near, at the news that
there was an uproar among the people, Scipio Nasica called upon the
consul Mucius Scævola to take strong measures. The latter appears in
a doubtful light: according to most of the accounts, he seems to have
been favourable to Gracchus; according to others, just the reverse;
but if we suppose him to have been a weak-minded man who stood in
fear of his faction, this contradiction may be accounted for. Nasica,
seeing that a bold stroke would decide the matter, called upon all
the senators to follow him; and they all, to a man, while leaving the
temple, declared Gracchus a traitor. The people fell back before men
of such high rank, and the senators seized hold of everything that
might serve as a weapon. There seem to have been scaffoldings erected
all round (even now-a-days in Italy, wherever there is anything to be
seen, benches are placed); part of these were broken in pieces. The
report had been spread, that Gracchus had appeared with a diadem, and
that he wanted to have himself proclaimed king: the senators, with the
exception of some blockheads who would believe anything, well knew the
whole to be a lie; but the people, who could not tell their own mind,
and had no leader, many of them dispersed. The senators laid hold of
the broken pieces of timber, and made an onset against the few unarmed
men that were still gathering round Tiberius Gracchus, who, on their
side, did not dare so much as to lift up a hand against the senators.
Tiberius fled down the _centum gradus_ to the Velabrum; and there his
foot slipped, one of his pursuers--according to some, one of the common
people; according to others, a senator, or a colleague of Gracchus
(there were persons who afterwards disputed for the honour)--having
pulled him by the toga: this man struck him on the head with a bit of
wood, and when he fell down stunned, the murder was completed. Many
of his followers shared the same fate, and their dead bodies were
thrown into the Tiber: the carcase of the great man himself, having
been washed ashore, was left to rot in the fields. He was not even
yet thirty years old when he died. A great number were also arrested
as accomplices. But the real persecution only began in the following
year, under the consul P. Popillius Lænas, the descendant of one of the
leaders of the _plebes_ at the time of the Licinian law: he has left a
terrible memory behind him. He caused thousands to be imprisoned, and
some of them to be put to death without any trial, like a real Duke of
Alva; one he condemned to be thrust into a chest filled with snakes, an
atrocity which Plutarch expressedly speaks of in his life of Tiberius
Gracchus. It is sad that even Cicero looks upon this Popillius Lænas
as a man of honour. One anecdote I cannot help telling here. It was
either at that time, or very likely some years before, that Diophanes
of Mitylene and C. Blossius of Cumæ, the most intimate friends of Tib.
Gracchus, were summoned before the inquisitorial tribunal, to give
account of their connexion with Gracchus. The latter answered, that
his connexion was well known; that Tib. Gracchus had been his most
intimate friend. They then asked him, whether he had done everything
that Gracchus had told him to do. He answered that he had.--“Whether
he would have done anything that Gracchus might subsequently have
required of him?”--“Yes,” was his answer again.--“Whether then he would
at his bidding have set fire to the Capitol?” He said, that Gracchus
could never have commanded such a thing.--“But what if he had commanded
it notwithstanding?”--“Well then,” said he, “I would have done it.”
This horrid speech was held to be a proof of his utter wickedness; but
it is not so much a disgrace to him who looked upon his friend as his
better self, as to the man who wrung it out of him by his captious
questions. Blossius got off; but he afterwards took away his own life,
that he might not fall into the hands of these bloodthirsty wretches.

It is remarkable, that the ruling party did not again abolish the new
office of triumvirs, M. Fulvius Flaccus, the friend of Tiberius, being
chosen in his room; but the efficiency of these was hampered, and
they were able to do nothing, as those who were called upon to show
their titles to their estates, did not come forward, or else made no
declaration. But when the first burst of their rage was over, they saw
that they were playing a dangerous game; and they left the laws of
Gracchus untouched, and, for appearance’s sake, appointed the consul
Tuditanus to pass judgment on the disputed points: instead of doing
this, he took the field, and thus the matter was put off. Whether
anything was done at all, cannot be made out. When Ap. Claudius also
died, he was succeeded by C. Papirius Carbo, an unworthy disciple of
Gracchus, who did the same things as his master had done before him,
but from bad motives. It is the curse of revolutions, that the onward
march of events hurries along with it even good men who have once
plunged into them; the power of freeing oneself from the influence
of what is passing around us, belongs only to that iron will which
neither heeds nor shrinks from anything. A distinguished man, who
had gone through all the horrors of the revolution, but had kept his
hands unsullied, once said to me, “It is a terrible remembrance
to have lived to see a revolution, and to have had a share in it;
one goes to the attack along with the noble-minded, and one remains
before the breach with the knaves.” This one should have before one’s
eyes as a warning; but perhaps we may not have to dread a revolution
for centuries to come. The period in Roman history which we have
now reached, is one in which the explanation of forms is no longer
sufficient; we must take men psychologically, and make a study of the
personal characters of those who tore from each other’s grasp the
spoils of the state when its life had fled from it. Carbo was a man of
much talent; but he was possessed by evil spirits: he might perhaps,
in peaceful times, have belonged to the number of fine souls; but in
that age, he sank down into the lowest depths of guilt and meanness.
His character was such, that the charge of his having murdered Scipio,
is not at all impossible in itself: yet, as in the south it is so very
common for it, to be reported that a man has been poisoned, if his
death has exhibited any symptoms like it (as, for instance, in putrid
fevers), we ought not to place unqualified belief in that suspicion.

Scipio was laying siege to Numantia, when he heard the news of his
brother-in-law’s death; and he expressed his approval of it. After his
return to Rome, Carbo called upon him to declare whether he looked
upon the death of Gracchus as just; but he shuffled out of this,
saying, that it was just, if Gracchus had meant to make himself king.
This was mere senseless slander, and thus men’s minds were generally
embittered against Scipio. The oligarchs themselves were divided:
not every one who had clamoured for Gracchus’ blood, was therefore
Scipio’s friend; but they all wanted him, and it flattered his vanity
to consider himself also as the protector of the Latins and of the
allies. Tiberius’ death had by no means brought the dispute to a
decision; far from it, it was carried on with unabated violence. Scipio
intended to speak in the assembly of the people against the enforcing
of the Sempronian law, which was never repealed; as we may see from the
original tables of the _Lex Thoria_ (640-50), and the few fragments of
a later agrarian law. The evening before the day on which he was to
address the people, he had betaken himself to rest at an early hour, to
think over his speech; but in the morning he was found dead in his bed.
This sudden death now raised the suspicion of his having been murdered;
yet, strange to say, no inquiry was made, although it would have been
the interest of the ruling party to have had one. The result might,
however, perhaps have turned against this very party;[76] for instance,
against Q. Pompeius, or Metellus: people even went so far as to charge
Scipio’s wife, Sempronia, a sister of the Gracchi, with having got him
out of the world by poison. Yet poisoned he could not have been, by all
accounts; for as his corpse was borne upon an open bier, the symptoms
of it would have shown themselves. If he died a violent death, he must
have been strangled.

From the death of Tiberius, to the first tribunate of Caius Gracchus,
several remarkable measures were debated: the question of the new
division of land was no more to be got rid of. Unluckily, we do not
know the particulars: it is a pity that the books of Livy, from the
50th down to the 60th, have been lost. We have a decree of the tribune
M. Junius Pennus, that the allies should be left in possession of their
land, but should not be raised to the right of citizenship; which was
quite in the spirit of the oligarchy. In many towns of the Marsians,
Samnites, and others, there were a great many rich and uncorrupted
families, which, had they been engrafted upon the worn out Roman stock,
would very soon have thrown the Roman aristocracy into the shade.
For this reason, they were not to become citizens, but to keep their
land; and by this means it was hoped to quiet them. But when they saw
themselves thus taken in in every way, they began to plot together: the
details, however, of this conspiracy are shrouded in darkness. In the
lifetime of Tib. Gracchus already, there had been a talk of giving the
right of citizenship to the Latins, especially to Tibur and Præneste,
and perhaps also to the towns of the Hernicans, but above all, to the
colonies. These consisted of Romans, Latins, and Hernicans of all
kinds, who lived under the Latin law, and had the best claims to the
right of citizenship; but Gracchus must either have put off his plans
with regard to them, or have quite given them up. Now they insisted
upon having it, as it had been chiefly their support which had upheld
the senate. It is inconceivable how Fregellæ, the most flourishing
of them, could at that time have been so mad as to take up arms; the
other Latins would have nothing to do with it, and the colonies were
scattered throughout the whole country. The Italians proper, as they
stood one step lower down, were perhaps not always glad when the
Latins got such privileges; they rejoiced at their trouble, and gave
them no help. The prætor L. Opimius besieged, conquered, and destroyed
Fregellæ: not a trace is left of the town, and a dreadful revenge was
taken on the people.

CAIUS SEMPRONIUS GRACCHUS.

It is beyond a doubt, that C. Gracchus surpassed his brother in
talent: he was altogether a different man. The parallel drawn by
Plutarch between Agis and Cleomenes and the two brothers, is a very
happy one. Of the speeches of Tiberius, nothing has been left to us;
from those of Caius, many passages are quoted. He was the first
refined, polished, and elegant writer of the Roman nation: Scipio and
Lælius are still strikingly rough and harsh, as Tib. Gracchus also
certainly must have been, more so perhaps, even than Cato; (we see
this from a fragment, hitherto unknown,[77] of a speech of Lælius, in
an unpublished commentary of Cicero which Maï has discovered.) In what
still remains of him, we find Cicero’s saying borne out, that he had
been the first to come forth in an old literature with a new language;
even as among the French, Corneille forms the link between the antique
and the classic. In all likelihood, the language of C. Gracchus was far
older than that of Cicero, or even Sisenna; but it nevertheless had
the stamp of the modern age, and none of the stiffness and mustiness
of the earlier times. He was perhaps also more of a statesman than his
brother; at least he showed himself more to have been such, the reason
of which may have been, that while the career of Tiberius was ended in
seven months, he was engaged in public life much longer: his activity
began even before his tribuneship; and the two years that he was
tribune, and yet a half a year besides, it was in full play. His high
accomplishments, and the development of his character, he owed chiefly
to his excellent mother: the kindly disposition of the Gracchi is seen
also in their affectionate behaviour to their mother, the like of which
was very seldom to be found elsewhere among the Romans. On the whole,
we know very little indeed of the domestic relations of the Romans; yet
we may reckon as examples Horace’s loving mention of his father, and
that of Agricola by Tacitus.

Caius was driven on by fate into the path in which he met with his
ruin. Heart-broken by the death of his brother, he seemed as if he
wished to keep away from the higher offices of the state: he rose
indeed to be a triumvir,--there he could not help himself,--but even
then he would only act where it was possible for him to do so without
shaking the existing state of things. But there was an inward call,
which would not let him follow his own inclinations, although he
foresaw his doom. At a very early age he had the eyes of the people
bent upon him; he had served for twelve years, had been quæstor in
Sardinia, and thus already had awakened jealousy: for a young man who
displayed the most perfect disinterestedness, was a reproach and an
object of hatred to every one. When the soldiers were in want of warm
clothing, and the miserly senate would not grant any money, he did not
rest until he had scraped together in the province, and from other
sources, the means of buying warm cloaks; he also got a cargo of corn
from Micipsa, the king of Numidia. All these things gave rise to such
rancour and ill-feeling, that it was intended to keep him in Sardinia,
where, even at that time, the air was so unwholesome, that it was
hoped that he would fall a victim to it. By law he was only obliged
to be there for one year; but he had been three years in the island,
and therefore he now went without leave to Rome, where he publicly
justified himself, showing how he had been thwarted in everything. This
made such an impression, that not only did the tribunes take him under
their protection, but he was himself chosen to be tribune of the people
for the following year, and that under more favourable auspices than
his brother had been: for among the enlargements of the tribunician
power, which the senate had yielded, owing to their evil conscience,
since the death of Tib. Gracchus, there had also been a _plebiscitum_
passed, by which a tribune who wished to carry through his laws,
might be elected twice. In the year 629, C. Gracchus entered upon his
tribuneship. He was upright and pure, like Tiberius, but passionate; he
was superior to his brother in energy, and he knew more clearly what
he was about. With regard to the possession of land, in the outset he
had indeed only to enact Tiberius’ laws: but he aimed also far beyond
these at other reforms: since, as a tribune, he had a power just as
lawful as that of the senate itself, and therefore did not act the part
of a revolutionist. But had he also a chance of success? That was the
question. In his own mind, he was satisfied that his cause could make
its way. It is a pity that we do not get a sight of the whole of his
plan; the most important points are the very ones which have been the
most corrupted: his legislation consisted of a number of detached laws
which affected the most different branches of the state. What we know
of it, is quite enough to show how little he was of a demagogue. There
are seemingly the greatest contradictions in it; but they vanish when
we look at them from the right point of view: for we thus see that he
did not wish to lend himself to any party. Far from it, he made use of
the factions to carry out wholesome reforms, holding out to one side
such and such advantage, and to the other something else, while he
himself stood quite apart. His first step, as tribune of the people,
was, of course, to avenge the death of his brother and his friends.
Nasica had gone off with a commission to Asia, and did not return.

His first law was that no one who had been deprived of his office by
the people, should be invested with any other: this bill, which was
evidently aimed against Octavius, he withdrew at the intercession of
his mother. The second enacted that those men should be punished with
death, who, without any previous trial, had laid hands upon Roman
citizens, and slain them. This was chiefly directed against Lænas, who,
when it passed, went into voluntary exile. Of the speech, in which
Gracchus made these motions, we have a fine fragment still left, which
Gellius pedantically criticises. These were the offerings with which he
made atonement to the dead.

The carrying out of the agrarian law had been decreed, and it went on,
though rather sluggishly. The measure which has been most found fault
with, is his having first brought in the practice of distributing corn
to the common people living at Rome: in the way in which he did it,
the _modius_ of corn was to be given out at three-quarters of an _as_,
one-fourth of what it would cost elsewhere. This surely was not by any
means a bribe, but a charity to the poor who wanted it. Rome had those
great revenues which were paid in grain, and the treasury was so rich
that it was not necessary to convert the corn into money. At the time
of the Social war, there were about seventy-four millions sterling in
the treasury, and these certainly could not be better bestowed than
for the good of the poor: besides which, even from of old, corn had
been distributed in the temple of Ceres; so that this was not even an
innovation. The idea of a certain dignity being inherent in every one
who belongs to a free people, lies at the bottom of everything that is
done in a republic. A commonwealth has the duty of providing for its
members, even for the most humble: this is a principle which England in
some measure follows in her poor’s rates, whereas there is nothing of
the kind in a despotic country, to belong to which gives no privilege.
Now it so happened that part of the true Roman citizens, who also had
their share with the rest in the sovereignty, were as poor as those
paupers among us, who are maintained by the alms of the public: their
numbers must have been immense; some of them were not in the tribes at
all; others, as, for instance, the descendants of freedmen, were in
the _tribus urbanæ_. The Gracchi wished to make peasants of as many of
them as possible; but this could not be done with all, nor perhaps had
the greater part of that _plebes_ even so much as a claim to it, as the
division of the land was to be according to tribes. C. Gracchus did
not want the corn to be given them entirely for nothing; but at such a
rate that they might easily earn their livelihood by their work. From
this time, I believe the difference of the _plebes urbana_ and the
thirty-five tribes to be dated, the free Roman citizens of lower rank
being the main elements of that _plebes_.

Another of Gracchus’ measures was for the relief of the soldier. Every
soldier had formerly to find his arms, and part of his pay was kept
back to defray the expense of repairing them. But the treasury was so
very full, that the sacrifice was not felt, if those who had to serve,
had at least their arms given them. This point C. Gracchus carried.
He also established between the quay, the Aventine, and the Monte
Testaccio, a corn-magazine (_horrea populi Romani_): this afterwards
expanded into immense buildings, the traces of which were very
distinctly seen even so late as in the sixteenth century. Moreover,
he made highways, and gave a new impulse to paving: it was perhaps
under his management that the great Roman roads were brought to that
perfection which we still admire in them; for he had them paved with
basalt, which until then had been done on a small piece of the Appian
road only. By this means he gave employment to the poor man, who was
thus enabled to get his living.

All these arrangements were administrative ones; he now went on to make
others which affected the constitution itself. The senate was at that
time without control with regard to one of the most important branches
of civil government: Polybius already remarks, that the great power of
the senate in so democratical a republic was owing to two causes. In
the first place, it had quite an unbounded power over the finances;
so that many were dependent on it for their incomes. All the revenues
of the state from customs, mines, tithes, and other sources, were let
to companies of wealthy Romans; and these again in their business
employed the lower classes down to the very lowest, who, therefore,
were all of them under the influence of the senate, which had the
supreme direction: thus indeed, though every one engaged in this way
did not get his maintenance from a government employment, as with us;
the result was practically the same among the Romans, that the state
itself provided for a great part of its subjects. Hence swarms of these
citizens spread themselves as _negotiatores_ over the provinces, and
sucked their life’s blood. This was one of the circumstances which
enabled the small body of the senate to stand its ground so steadily.
The other means which it had, was, that all these people were obliged
to have their patrons in the senate itself, and that the judges in
nearly all the more important causes were senators; at least in all
those which did not directly concern Quiritary property. It is one of
the erroneous notions to be found everywhere, that in ancient Rome a
sort of jury had existed, which was instituted only after the laws of
Gracchus. During the earlier times, no trial was required in any case
of _delictum manifestum_; the identity of the person being proved,
the prætor immediately enforced the law, and that was all. In other
cases, as in criminal causes and those civil suits which were not
brought before the _centum viri_, the decision of one _arbiter_ was
needed, before the prætor could pass a sentence which might be acted
upon. The complaint was laid before the prætor, who after thirty days
named a judge. The latter gave judgment according to certain fixed
rules, from which there was no further appeal; for the appeal which
there had once been to the people had been done away with, whilst for
anything that was not _judicium publicum_, none perhaps had ever been
allowed. Since the seventh century, several pleas for which formerly
special _quæsitores_ had been appointed, from whom they came before
the popular tribunals, were now judged according to the common course
of law; especially the _actiones repetundarum_, the complaints of the
unfortunate provincials against their governors: for these, however,
several judges were granted. But this single judge, or, as the case
might be, these several judges, were always senators; and this was
indeed a strong tie, by which the senate strengthened its authority.
But these courts were detestable: the most scandalous judgments were
given; and the senator who by lot had become _judex_, allowed himself
to be bribed in the most barefaced manner, no one making any secret
of it: nor indeed was any body ashamed of doing thus; those who were
not to be bought formed but a small exception, and that perhaps merely
from calculation. The right of bringing an action made the provinces
yet worse off than if they had been utterly debarred from it; for
the governor had to plunder so much the more, that he might be able
to bribe his judges. This reminds me of the saying of the Neapolitan
minister, the prince of Canosa, an eccentric but witty man: he said,
that no where out of the kingdom of Naples could one get so many false
witnesses for a carlino (about fourpence) each; and that, if one
wanted a quantity of them, they were to be had cheaper still. Thus
the senators in Rome merely asked, “How many thousands will you give
me, that I may acquit you?” One crow does not pick out the eyes of
the other. This was revolting, and it was clear that it would bring
the state to ruin: a change was necessary, and that of Gracchus was
certainly the best as things were, though, on the other hand, it might
also have ill consequences. He cast his eyes upon that body of men
which now in some measure filled the place of a middle class, although
sometimes possessing immense riches: it was composed of those who had
more than a hundred thousand _denarii_ (400,000 sesterces), there
being no longer any other standard but that of wealth. From what is
called the people, Gracchus expected nothing whatever; he knew that
part of it was a rabble which either did not care for anything, or else
was open to the worst bribery; the knights, on the other hand, had
no interest to screen the misdeeds of those who were in power. As in
the senate there were three hundred members, Gracchus transferred the
jurisdiction to a like number of knights in their stead. That the three
hundred knights were alone to be the judges, and that, as the case
might require, each of these was one by one to be chosen by lot from
among them, is placed beyond a doubt by the researches of Manutius. At
first, this did not altogether work badly, as these new judges had none
of the family and other connexions of the leading senators at Rome;
but, on the other hand, they were no fair judges for the provincials.
The Roman companies which farmed the revenue, consisted chiefly of
knights, and they had been guilty of most unrighteous dealings in the
provinces. Hitherto these had been ground down by the magistrates who
had been sent to rule over them; and now that a remedy had been found
for the evil, if the latter chose to make a bargain with the knights,
they could buy them over by letting them go beyond their contracts, and
take, for instance, one-fifth, instead of the tenth which was their
due. In return for this, the knights would guarantee them impunity,
should they be prosecuted for extortion. This was a monstrous abuse,
occasioned by accidental circumstances; but for Rome and Italy the
change was an improvement: and so it was on the whole for all those
places to which the farming companies did not extend.

This fell upon the senators like a thunderbolt. And when an independent
body of judges had now been formed, Gracchus went still farther: he
substituted their jurisdiction for those popular tribunals which were
not worth anything, and which henceforth are only met with as an
exception. This was setting bounds to democracy, where democracy was no
longer in its right place.

In order to put better blood into the veins of the thirty-five tribes,
he wished to extend the full right of citizenship to the Latins, among
whom there were some forty colonial towns besides the old Latin cities:
they had existed for three hundred years, and had for two centuries
been entirely amalgamated by language and manners with the Romans; and
in all likelihood he meant to form them into new tribes. The Italian
allies, on the other hand, from Lucania to the March of Ancona, nay
all the Italian districts as far as to the Alps, he wished to raise to
that position which the Latins then held; that is to say, to give them
a vote in the assembly of the people, and prepare them to become full
citizens after thirty or forty years. It may even be that something
was really done to carry this out. This law again was most wise and
judicious, and those who were for a reasonable aristocracy must have
rejoiced at it. In the Latin towns, there were many good families of
local celebrity, which were now to be ranked among the Roman citizens.
In Augustus’ times, the most distinguished families came from the
allied towns: the Asinii were Marrucinians; thus also, the Munatii and
others; according to Cicero, literature was more cultivated among them
than at Rome. Thus, an aristocracy of wealth and refinement was to
be brought in; a wiser and more praise-worthy scheme than that of C.
Gracchus, there could not possibly have been.

Many of his laws are either not known to us at all, or only from
occasional notices. Though he wished to make the plebeians good
husbandmen, if he could, and therefore assigned land to them, he did
not make them a present of it. The state, the interests of which
Gracchus did not lose sight of, had hitherto always had the tithes from
the occupants; and this burthen he allowed to continue, as we learn
from a passage in Plutarch which can have no other meaning. To him it
seemed evident, that Rome could only hold her own by returning to her
first principles: he therefore gave the Italians hopes of the right
of citizenship, and also moved for a reform of the manner of voting;
so that the republic would no longer have comprised one city, but the
whole of Italy.

The distribution of the provinces had until now given rise to the
greatest intrigues in the senate. Sometimes the tribunes even
interfered. When the new consuls and prætors had come in, and the
reference was made _de provinciis_, every one would apply for himself,
and try to get what seemed to him most favourable to his purpose of
enriching himself; and the senate decided from personal considerations.
At that time already, the elections took place long before the end of
the year. C. Gracchus now made the wise rule, that the senate should
settle before the elections, to what provinces a consul or a prætor
was to be sent, and then assign them afterwards to the persons who
were to have them: this was wont to be done by lot, and thus anything
like favouritism was put an end to. This rid the republic of a great
many evils. He, no doubt, was also the one who brought in the rule of
having the _comitia_ held so early, that the year might not come to an
end without the curule chair being filled. This is one of the real and
lasting improvements of Gracchus, and it was still in force seventy
years after his death.

These laws of his, Gracchus made in 629 and 630, having been tribune
for two years running. His tribunate was less stormy than that of his
brother, as he had much greater power, and was less thwarted. He got
himself, and his friend M. Fulvius Flaccus, and very likely Q. Rubrius
also, to be appointed triumvirs for the establishing of colonies; for
his activity was unwearied, and it was felt in all the branches of the
state to which his influence as tribune could reach. Among others, he
had founded a colony by the side of old Carthage, and against this
settlement a hypocritical outcry was raised, as if it might one day
become dangerous to Rome; a most senseless notion, which some folks
even held in good earnest. The jealousy and spite against him had now
risen to the highest pitch, and the present opportunity was seized
to harass him. The senate, with fiendish cunning, egged on another
tribune, M. Livius Drusus, to outbid him in liberality to the people,
and that in the name of the senate, so as to undermine his popularity.
The great mass did not care, who it was that offered a boon to them;
they thought, “Gracchus wants to buy and cheat us, Livius bids more:
let us take what we can get, and not let ourselves be cheated.” Such,
the Italians are even to this day. I myself have seen a striking
example of this in the citizen of a small town, who had some coins
which I valued for him. He fancied that I wanted to overreach him; and
immediately after, he asked me, for a piece which I wished to buy,
three times as much as I had told him, whereas before that, I might
have had all of them for the third part of what they were worth. When
one gives the modern Romans any advice from real kindness, and with
perfect disinterestness, they will at once suspect you of having some
secret end in view; for indeed they will not trust anybody. Thus it
was also in those times. Livius did away with the tithes with which
the lands were still burthened; and instead of the two colonies which
Gracchus had proposed, he founded twelve, each of which was to consist
of three thousand citizens. This the rich could easily grant, the
only losers by it being the old inhabitants, unhappy men who hitherto
had dwelt by sufferance on the soil where their ancestors had been
conquered; for the estates of the rich were only in those places where
the old towns had been destroyed. With regard to these colonies of
Livius, we may ask, have they really been founded? There seems to
be no doubt of it, as those of Gracchus were certainly established;
indeed they were in all likelihood those _duodecim coloniæ_ in
Cicero’s oration _pro Cæcina_, about which there has been so much
controversy. These cannot have had any reference to what happened in
the war with Hannibal, when the number of those which had remained
faithful was eighteen; so that eighteen and not twelve must have had
the _commercium_ given them as a boon. The MSS. have XII.: it has been
proposed to write XIIX. instead; but this kind of notation is not met
with in any of the old manuscripts. If, as I take it for granted, they
were not twelve new colonies, but twelve Latin towns which, as they had
a great deal of unoccupied ground, were increased by three thousand
citizens, it is quite easy to understand why they had better rights
than the other colonies.

Gracchus saw that the thoughtless people turned away from him to the
senate, and to the tools of the senate who deceived them. There are
many men, frank and kindly souls, who heartily love the Beautiful, and
are delighted at seeing distinguished men play their part, and look
upon them as the ornaments of their age; others think of nothing but
themselves: driven on by envy and jealousy, and grieved at hearing
any name praised be it ever so slightly, even when it does not harm
them in the least, they are glad if they can discover any weaknesses
in great men. All this tribe now raised an outcry against Gracchus,
laughing at him as a _doctrinaire_, a man of crotchets and theories.
He had now for so long a time enjoyed great consideration, and he
stood forth in too full a blaze of light not to become an eyesore
to many people; just as the Athenian citizen gave his vote against
Aristides, because he was called the Just. Thus it came to pass, that
when he again offered himself as a candidate for the tribuneship, he
was rejected; nor is there any reason to believe that his colleagues
had been guilty of foul play. Among the independent educated middle
classes only, Gracchus seems to have had many partisans; but these
had not much political weight, and his friends of high rank were
hot-headed people. In the year 631, his enemy L. Opimius, the destroyer
of Fregellæ, whom, the year before, he had kept out of the consulship,
was chosen consul. For when he was in the heyday of his popularity, he
once asked the people to promise him a favour; this they granted, and
while it was thought that he would demand great things, he begged the
consulship for C. Fannius. The latter was a _homo novus_, at least for
the consulship, and it would have been hard for him to get it without
the help of Gracchus: he, however, soon left him, and went over to his
foes. Opimius also was a plebeian; but, like Popillius Lænas, he sided
with the aristocracy against Gracchus. The oligarchical party was
bent upon getting up a quarrel. Gracchus, now that he was no longer
_sacrosanctus_, did not feel sure of his life, and was therefore always
surrounded by many of his friends. The measures of the senate became
more and more hostile: the colonies granted to him were to be broken up
by a decree of that body, and there was a deliberation on the subject;
one of the tribunes moreover, who had been nominated by the oligarchs,
spoke to the people then assembled before the Capitol, against
Gracchus, and when the latter came forward to defend himself, he was
charged in a tumultuous manner with having interrupted the tribune.
The consul, who just then was offering a sacrifice on the Capitol,
sent one of his lictors, as if to fetch something for the sacrifice,
but in reality for another purpose; and the man while forcing his way
across the friends of Gracchus, cried out, “Ye evil-minded fellows!
make room for the good citizens!” One of them was rash enough to strike
him; a tumult arose, and the lictor was murdered. His dead body was
displayed in the forum, and a scene was got up, as if he had been
a martyr to the good cause. For the first time,[78] the senate now
passed the decree, _viderent Consules, ne quid detrimenti res publica
caperet_. Opimius was invested with dictatorial power; for the custom
of making dictators had fallen into disuse, as it could no longer be
managed in the old forms, the curies having ceased to exist. Gracchus
now took leave of his wife and children; after which, he and Fulvius
went to the Aventine, the ancient refuge for persecuted innocence.
He had had no foreboding of the misfortune which had come upon him:
his whole party was all in confusion, and he could not make up his
mind to let things go on to extremity. His friend and colleague, the
consular M. Fulvius Flaccus, who was more resolute, armed some of the
common people, and slaves; in short, any one whom he could get. The mob
itself--from henceforth we meet with nothing better--for which Gracchus
had no sympathies, left him to his fate, taking him for a knave or
a fool, and being quite content, so long as they kept the benefits
which he had gained for them. Thus it cost the consuls no trouble to
attack the Aventine, though they had only a small force, the city
being either paralyzed or indifferent. The knights, whom Gracchus had
nearly remodelled as an order, were likewise idle lookers on, owing to
that fear which is inherent in rich men whose wealth is not in landed
property, but merely in money. This class shows itself lukewarm in
every commotion, and lets itself be trampled on in every possible way,
as we see, for instance, in the history of Florence.

Gracchus sent to the senate to effect a compromise; but unconditional
surrender was demanded. The Aventine being feebly defended, the _clivus
Publicius_, by which one ascended from the Circus, was taken by storm;
and now Fulvius sent his son, a fine, handsome youth, to the senate,
to ask for a truce. He was sent back the first time; and when he came
again, Opimius had him arrested, thrown into a dungeon, and afterwards
put to death. When the Aventine was taken, Fulvius, who had hidden
himself, was found and slain; Gracchus leaped from the temple of Diana
down the sharp steep of the Aventine, and sprained his ankle; not
being able to find a horse, he, leaning on his friends, could hardly
reach the _Pons sublicius_. The two friends, Pomponius and Lætorius,
who were knights, and formed an honourable exception to the majority
of the higher classes, fought like Horatius Cocles on the bridge, to
keep the pursuers at bay, and allowed themselves to be cut down. In the
meanwhile, Gracchus fled across the Tiber into a sacred grove (_lucus
Furiarum_), which, however, did not shelter him. Opimius had promised
for his head its weight in gold. According to the most likely account,
a faithful slave did him the friendly service of killing him. An
Anagnian, Septimuleius, got the head, and filled it with molten lead.
Upwards of three thousand men were denounced as partisans of Gracchus,
and nearly all of them were put to death by Opimius; a few only may
have made their escape. This war of extermination was waged against all
who were in any way distinguished: it was a downright butchery, like
that of the year 1799 at Naples. For two years the bloodshed lasted,
and these murderers called themselves _boni homines, boni cives_. There
were many renegades, and there is no doubt but that C. Carbo was very
early one of them. He became consul, and then defended Opimius against
the charges brought against him by the tribune Q. Decius. Carbo,
after he had saved Opimius, became the darling of the oligarchs; but
now there arose against him P. Licinius Crassus, a near kinsman of
his, perhaps a brother of the wife of C. Gracchus, and the very one
of whom Cicero so often speaks, especially in the masterly dialogue
_de Oratore_, and in his “Brutus.” Crassus was a man of uncommon mind
and powers; but like all the orators of that age (with the exception
of C. Gracchus), wanting in cultivation. He too began on the side of
the people, and then he went over to the senate, and became one of
the foremost champions of the oligarchy; yet he is a very respectable
oligarch, and quite free from the reproach which clings to so many
others. He now spoke against Carbo, and attacked him in such a manner,
that he took away his own life by means of poison (a solution of
vitriol, _atramentum sutorium_).[79] This was a satisfaction to men’s
feelings, and it gave a hope of the possibility that things would still
change for the better. But for all that, they remained as they were:
the knights were intimidated; the courts of justice were no better,
nor were any fruits whatever of their independence yet to be seen. The
utter worthlessness of those who were in power is strikingly shown in
the war of Jugurtha, which Sallust, with his fine tact, has therefore
made the subject of his historical work. But we must first speak of the
conquests of the empire.

FOREIGN CONQUESTS DOWN TO THE WAR WITH JUGURTHA.

In Spain, few events of any importance happened between the time of
Tib. Gracchus and the war with Jugurtha. The Balearic isles were
subdued by one of the four sons of Metellus Macedonicus, all of whom
were consuls. The Metelli were plebeians, but one of the most powerful
families which formed the aristocracy; and they were truly great
characters: Metellus Numidicus also, notwithstanding the reproaches
which have been brought against him, is one of the most spotless
of men. Another son of Metellus conquered the Dalmatians, who from
henceforth remained subject to the Romans; so that one might now go by
land to Greece round the Adriatic.

Soon after the death of Tib. Gracchus, the Romans made their first
expedition into Transalpine Gaul. They were masters of nearly the whole
of Spain, and of Italy almost as far as the Alps (Aosta did not yet
belong to them); but in Gaul itself, between the Alps and the Pyrenees,
they had not yet even tried to gain a firm footing: all that they did,
was to secure for the Massilians, their old allies, in the beginning
of the seventh century, a strip of country along the coast against the
Ligurians. The first occasion for their establishing themselves there,
was a war of the Salluvians or Salyans against the Ligurians: the
Salluvians, who dwelt from Aix to Marseilles, were conquered by them.
This tribe had been supported by the Allobroges, one of the greatest
peoples of Gaul, who had their abodes in Dauphiné and Savoy, as far as
Lyons; and when these had likewise been defeated, the Romans turned
their arms against the Arvernians, a race governed by rich and powerful
kings, which as far back as the second Punic War, held the supremacy
in Gaul. These last were utterly routed on the banks of the Rhone
near Vienne, in the days of C. Gracchus. Bituitus, of whose wealth
various accounts have been preserved, was at that time their king: he
tried to make his peace with the Romans, and the generals, Q. Fabius
Maximus (who was afterwards surnamed Allobrogicus), and Cn. Domitius,
sent him to Rome to beg the mercy of the senate. Without having come
_in deditionem_, he went thither, trusting to the good faith of those
who were in power; but they arrested him, and kept him a prisoner to
the day of his death at Alba on the lake Fucinus, where Syphax and
Perseus had died. The Roman province now reached as far as Dauphiné.
The Allobroges in that country, though they acknowledged the _majestas
populi Romani_, did not become subjects; but Provence and Lower
Languedoc, were real provinces, although there was not always a prætor
there. The time when the Roman provincial institutions were introduced,
cannot be exactly made out, owing to the loss of the books of Livy.
Aquæ Sextiæ was the first Roman colony beyond the Alps.

In 638 the Cimbri make their first appearance. After the reduction
of Dalmatia, the Romans had attacked Carniola, which is said to have
roused the anger of the Scordiscans. It is, however, more likely
that the immigration of the Sarmatians from the east stirred up the
Scordiscans, who now fell upon Macedon and Greece. This was one of the
greatest calamities of the unfortunate sixth and seventh centuries
of the city, which were some of the most awful for the world itself;
just as the sixteenth and seventeenth of our era in modern history:
it destroyed most of the beautiful works of ancient art. In Italy,
that havoc went on until the times of Augustus, which were the first
beginning of a kind of material prosperity. The consul C. Porcius Cato
was routed in Thrace by the Scordiscans, and Macedon, Thessaly, and
part of Greece, were overrun by the barbarians.

THE WAR AGAINST JUGURTHA. Q. CÆCILIUS METELLUS NUMIDICUS. C. MARIUS.

Sallust’s description of the war against Jugurtha, is one of the best
specimens which we have in either language of the ancient literature,
and I would even rate it above that of Catiline’s conspiracy. They are
monographies, almost the only ones which the Romans had, except perhaps
the history of the war with Hannibal by Cœlius Antipater, of which,
however, we know nothing: the memoirs of Fannius were something quite
different. Sallust takes indeed the utmost care to avoid anything that
has an annalistic look; he leaves out every mention of dates, to give
his work the greatest possible finish. It is a book which, the more one
reads it, the more worthy of admiration it seems: it is a real study
for every one who wants to know what excellent historical writing is.
To him I refer you.

When Masinissa died, he had put his kingdom in order, and made Scipio
executor of his will. He left his dominions to his three sons, Gulussa,
Micipsa, and Mastanabal, whom we are by no means to look upon as
having been somewhat like the chieftains of the tribes which now
dwell in those countries; for Livy says of Mastanabal, that he had
been _litteris Græcis apprime eruditus_. He knew Greek so well, that
he wrote it; a fact which shows us how wrongly we deem the Numidians
and all such races to have been mere barbarians. Even among the rude
Thracians, there can be no doubt that at that time Greek learning was
not unknown; we meet with it afterwards even among the Parthians. The
civilization of the Greeks had spread very widely, more especially
since the fall of the nation. The Numidians, as well as the Libyans,
had an alphabet of their own, as one sees from remains which are found
in several towns in those parts. Colonel Humbert has discovered over
the gate of a city an _inscriptio bilinguis_, Punic and Libyan; in
Cyrene, there are inscriptions in three languages, Punic, Greek, and
one which is unknown; in the desert of Sahara, among the Tuariks,
the travellers Clapperton and Denham have met with an alphabet which
is quite distinct from the Arabic. I am convinced that it belongs to
the Libyan language, which is spoken in the Canary isles, throughout
the whole of the desert and the oases, as far as the Nile and the
Barabras in Upper Egypt. Denham[80] is too shallow, to see his way
through it; we shall be able to read the Libyan inscriptions when we
fully know the alphabet, of which Denham gives one letter. The whole
of this matter will one day be cleared up. The Numidian kings likewise
had the Carthaginian library given them as a present by the Romans.
Gulussa died early, as also did Mastanabal, who left behind him only a
son by a concubine, Jugurtha. The Numidian empire, which reached from
the borders of Morocco to the Syrtes as far as Leptis and Tripolis,
was now in the hands of Micipsa alone. He had two sons, Adherbal and
Hiempsal. Jugurtha, who had excellent abilities, at first won the
heart of the old king; but when the latter discovered in him talents
superior to those of his own sons, he became jealous of him, and sent
him to Spain, where Scipio was gathering troops together from all
parts for the siege of Numantia: there he hoped that he would perish.
But Jugurtha was befriended by fortune; and he gained great favour
with Scipio, under whose protection he desired to be placed, lest
Micipsa should murder him. Many Romans of rank even encouraged him to
revolt, and provided him with money, as he had no prospect of coming
to the throne lawfully; for after Micipsa’s death, the whole of the
kingdom was to be kept together. He now got letters of recommendation
to Micipsa, who, taking fright, adopted him, and in his will divided
the sovereignty among the three princes, who were to reign together
as colleagues. The proud and fierce Hiempsal, who looked upon his
cousin as an intruder, would insult him without any provocation: it
was then agreed upon to share the inheritance, and in the meanwhile
Jugurtha had him murdered. Jugurtha, who was no common man, being
shrewd and versatile, but without any notion of truth and honesty, like
an Albanian chief, now took up arms and attacked Adherbal also. The
latter betook himself to the Romans, and owing to their predilection
for him obtained a favourable decision: a commission was sent from Rome
to divide the country between himself and Jugurtha. The commissioners,
however, were so well plied with gold, that, when the division was
made, Jugurtha got the most powerful and warlike part of the country.
But he longed for the whole, and thus a war was soon brought on again.
Adherbal imploringly besought the help of Rome against this criminal
and restless man, and in the senate, at first, his cause was found to
be a just one; but the ruling oligarchs, headed by Opimius, and bought
over with bribes, declared for Jugurtha, and hindered every decision.
In the meantime, Adherbal was beset in Cirta, and driven to the last
distress: his representations to the Roman senate were all baffled
by the influence of L. Opimius, as the envoys of Jugurtha, who were
at Rome with a large sum of money, purchased the votes of every one.
But when Cirta had been brought to extremity, some of the friends of
Adherbal stole out of the town, and carried to the senate most dismal
letters: a new commission was now sent, which was likewise bribed,
and returned without having raised the siege. Jugurtha, however, was
impelled by Nemesis not to keep his promise to Adherbal, when he
yielded himself up and stipulated for his life only; nor to the Roman
and Italian _negotiatores_, who alone had upheld that prince, and who
now also surrendered. He had them slaughtered to sate his vengeance.
This was too bad, and even those who had hitherto spoken most loudly
for him, had no longer a word to say. A Roman embassy arrived at Utica,
to call Jugurtha to account; but he gave evasive answers and completely
took them in.

This embassy was headed by M. Æmilius Scaurus, a man who has a great
name in history, but of whom one is at a loss what to think. Horace
says,

    _Regulum et Scauros_
    _Gratus insigni referam Camena,_
    _Fabriciumque._

As for Horace, it is remarkable that no one could be more ignorant
of the history of his own people than he was; thus, for instance, he
confounds the two Scipios, and he had so little read Ennius whom he
laughs at, as to believe that he had sung of Scipio, the destroyer of
Carthage.[81] When he names Scaurus, he says _Scauri_, not knowing that
Scaurus the son was a most worthless fellow, the Verres of Sardinia,
whom Cicero defended merely out of regard for his family. It is owing
to this un-Roman spirit, that he is utterly unable to appreciate
the great minds of the earlier literature; he is a man of elegant,
superficial learning, and, even in his knowledge of the Greek writers,
not to be compared with Virgil. Hence then so many strange things in
his Odes, where he misunderstood the Greek. The stock-in-trade which
he had for his odes, was taken from a few Greek lyrics. When he says
that Homer was wont to slumber, he merely shows his ignorance; he
writes to Lollius that he had again read Homer, which may perhaps have
been for the first time since he left school. Still he is a noble
genius, much more versatile and prolific than Virgil, who, indeed,
was far more industrious and painstaking. Horace was lazy, ever bent
on refined enjoyments. The contrast between the two poets is very
striking; it would be an excellent subject, if worked out.--What speaks
well for Scaurus, is the great respect in which he was held by Cicero,
who mentions, as one of the finest remembrances of his earlier days,
that as a youth of seventeen he was introduced by his father into
the presence of the great statesmen of the age, among whom Scaurus
then shone as a venerable old man: the youth met with a distinguished
reception from them, as they recognised in him the future great man;
and he, on his side, had come to them with that longing which is felt
by all generous minds, to attach himself to those who are more matured,
and to purify himself after their example. Thus he idealized these