(M861) This immense disaster was the signal for the revolt of the allies, which Hannibal before in vain had sought to procure. Capua opened her gates to the conqueror. Nearly all the people of Southern Italy rose against Rome. But the Greek cities of the coast were held by Roman garrisons, as well as the fortresses in Apulia, Campania, and Samnium. The news of the battle of Cannae, B.C. 216, induced the Macedonian king to promise aid to Hannibal. The death of Hiero at Syracuse made Sicily an enemy to Rome, while Carthage, now elated, sent considerable re-enforcements.

(M862) Many critics have expressed surprise that Hannibal, after this great victory, did not at once march upon Rome. Had he conquered, as Alexander did, a Persian, Oriental, effeminate people, this might have been his true policy. But Rome was still capable of a strong defense, and would not have succumbed under any pressure of adverse circumstances, and she also was still strong in allies. And more, Hannibal had not perfected his political combinations. He was not ready to strike the final blow. He had to keep his eye on Macedonia, Africa, Sicily, and Spain. Alexander did not march to Babylon, until he had subdued Phoenicia and Egypt. Even the capture of Rome would not prevent a long war with the States of Italy.

(M863) Nor did the Romans lose courage when they learned the greatest calamity which had ever befallen them. They made new and immense preparations. All the reserve forces were called out—all men capable of bearing arms—young or old. Even the slaves were armed, after being purchased by the State, and made soldiers. Spoils were taken down from the temples. The Latin cities sent in contingents, and the Senate refused to receive even the envoy of the conqueror.

(M864) Such courage and fortitude and energy were not without effect, while the enervating influence of Capua, the following winter, demoralized the Carthaginians. The turning point of the war was the winter which followed the defeat at Cannae. The great aim of Hannibal, in his expedition to Italy, had been to break up the Italian confederacy. After three campaigns, that object was only imperfectly accomplished, in spite of his victories, and he had a great frontier to protect. With only forty thousand men, he could not leave it uncovered, and advance to Rome. The Romans, too, learning wisdom, now appointed only generals of experience, and continued them in command.

(M865) The animating soul of the new warfare was Marcus Claudius Marcellus, a man fifty years of age, who had received a severe military training, and performed acts of signal heroism. He was not a general to be a mere spectator of the movements of the enemy from the hills, but to take his position in fortified camps under the walls of fortresses. With the two legions saved from Cannae, and the troops raised from Rome and Ostia, he followed Hannibal to Campania, while other Roman armies were posted in other quarters.

Hannibal now saw that without great re-enforcements from Carthage, Spain, Macedonia, and Syracuse, he would be obliged to fight on the defensive. But the Carthaginians sent only congratulations; the king of Macedonia failed in courage; while the Romans intercepted supplies from Syracuse and Spain. Hannibal was left to his own resources.

(M866) Scipio, meanwhile, in Spain, attacked the real base of Hannibal, overran the country of the Ebro, secured the passes of the Pyrenees, and defeated Hasdrubal while attempting to lead succor to his brother. The capture of Saguntum gave the Romans a strong fortress between the Ebro and Carthagena. Scipio even meditated an attack on Africa, and induced Syphax, king of one of the Numidian nations, to desert Carthage, which caused the recall of Hasdrubal from Spain. His departure left Scipio master of the peninsula; but Hasdrubal, after punishing the disaffected Numidians, returned to Spain, and with overwhelming numbers regained their ascendency, and Scipio was slain, as well as his brother, and their army routed.

(M867) It has been mentioned that on the death of Hiero, who had been the long-tried friend of Rome, Syracuse threw her influence in favor of Carthage, being ruled by factions. Against this revolted city the consul Marcellus now advanced, and invested the city by land and sea. He was foiled by the celebrated mathematician Archimedes, who constructed engines which destroyed the Roman ships. This very great man advanced the science of geometry, and made discoveries which rank him among the lights of the ancient world. His theory of the lever was the foundation of statics till the time of Newton. His discovery of the method of determining specific gravities by immersion in a fluid was equally memorable. He was not only the greatest mathematician of the old world, but he applied science to practical affairs, and compelled Marcellus to convert the siege of Syracuse into a blockade. He is said to have launched a ship by the pressure of the screw, which, reversed in its operation, has revolutionized naval and commercial marines.

(M868) The time gained by this eminent engineer, as well as geometer, enabled the Carthaginians to send an army to relieve Syracuse. The situation of Marcellus was critical, when, by a fortunate escalade of the walls, left unguarded at a festival, the Romans were enabled to take possession of a strong position within the walls. A pestilence carried off most of the African army encamped in the valley of Anapus, with the general Himilco. Bomilcar, the Carthaginian admiral, retreated, rather than fight the Roman fleet. Marcellus obtained, by the treachery of a Sicilian captain, possession of the island of Ortygia, where Dionysius had once intrenched himself, the key to the port and the city, and Syracuse fell. The city was given up to plunder and massacre, and Archimedes was one of the victims. Marcellus honored the illustrious defender with a stately funeral, and he was buried outside the gate of Aeradina. One hundred and fifty years later, the Syracusans had forgotten even where he was buried, and his tomb was discovered by Cicero.

(M869) While these events took place in Spain and Sicily, Hannibal bent his efforts to capture Tarentum, and the Romans were equally resolved to recover Capua. The fall of Tarentum enabled Hannibal to break up the siege of Capua, and foiled in his attempts to bring on a decisive battle before that city, he advanced to Rome, and encamped within five miles of the city, after having led his troops with consummate skill between the armies and fortresses of the enemy. But Rome was well defended by two legions, under Fabius, who refused to fight a pitched battle. Hannibal was, therefore, compelled to retreat in order to save Capua, which, however, in his absence, had surrendered to the Romans, after a two years' siege, and was savagely punished for its defection from the Roman cause. The fall of Capua gave a renewed confidence to the Roman government, which sent re-enforcements to Spain. But it imprudently reduced its other forces, so that Marcellus was left to face Hannibal with an inadequate army. The war was now carried on with alternate successes, in the course of which Tarentum again fell into Roman hands. Thirty thousand Tarentines were sold as slaves, B.C. 209.

(M870) This great war had now lasted ten years, and both parties were sinking from exhaustion. In this posture of affairs the Romans were startled with the intelligence that Hasdrubal had crossed the Pyrenees, and was advancing to join his brother in Italy. The Romans, in this exigency, made prodigious exertions. Twenty-three legions were enrolled; but before preparations were completed, Hasdrubal crossed the Alps, re-enforced by eight thousand Ligurian mercenaries. It was the aim of the two Carthaginian generals to form a juncture of their forces, and of the Romans to prevent it. Gaining intelligence of the intended movements of Hannibal and Hasdrubal by an intercepted dispatch, the Roman consul, Nero, advanced to meet Hasdrubal, and encountered him on the banks of the Metaurus. Here a battle ensued, in which the Carthaginians were defeated and Hasdrubal slain. Hannibal was waiting in suspense for the dispatch of his brother in his Apulian camp, when the victor returned from his march of five hundred miles, and threw the head of Hasdrubal within his outposts, On the sight of his brothers head, he exclaimed; "I recognize the doom of Carthage." Abandoning Apulia and Lucania, he retired to the Bruttian peninsula, and the victor of Cannae retained only a few posts to re-embark for Africa.

And yet this great general was able to keep the field four years longer, nor could the superiority of his opponents compel him to shut himself up in a fortress or re-embark, a proof of his strategic talents.

(M871) In the mean time a brilliant career was opened in Spain to the young Publius Scipio, known as the elder Africanus. He was only twenty-four when selected to lead the armies of Rome in Spain; for it was necessary to subdue that country in order to foil the Carthaginians in Italy. Publius Scipio was an enthusiast, who won the hearts of soldiers and women. He was kingly in his bearing, confident of his greatness, graceful in his manners, and eloquent in his speech—popular with all classes, and inspiring the enthusiasm which he felt.

(M872) He landed in Spain with an army of thirty thousand, and at once marched to New Carthage, before the distant armies of the Carthaginians could come to its relief. In a single day the schemes of Hamilcar and his sons were dissolved, and this great capital fell into the hands of the youthful general, not yet eligible for a single curule magistracy. Ten thousand captives were taken and six hundred talents, with great stores of corn and munitions of war. Spain seemed to be an easy conquest; but the following year the Carthaginians made a desperate effort, and sent to Spain a new army of seventy thousand infantry, four thousand horse, and thirty-two elephants. Yet this great force, united with that which remained under Hasdrubal and Mago, was signally defeated by Scipio. This grand victory, which made Scipio master of Spain, left him free to carry the war into Africa itself, assisted by his ally Masinassa. Gades alone remained to the Carthaginians, the original colony of the Phoenicians, and even this last tie was severed when Mago was recalled to assist Hannibal.

(M873) Scipio, ambitious to finish the war, and seeking to employ the whole resources of the empire, returned to Italy and offered himself for the consulship, B.C. 205, and was unanimously chosen by the centuries, though not of legal age. His colleague was the chief pontiff P. Licinius Crassus, whose office prevented him from leaving Italy, and he was thus left unobstructed in the sole conduct of the war. Sicily was assigned to him as his province, where he was to build a fleet and make preparations for passing over to Africa, although a party, headed by old Fabius Maximus, wished him to remain in Italy to drive away Hannibal. The Senate withheld the usual power of the consul to make a new levy, but permitted Scipio to enroll volunteers throughout Italy. In the state of disorganization and demoralization which ever attend a long war, this enrollment was easily effected, and money was raised by contributions on disaffected States.

(M874) Hannibal was still pent up among the Bruttii, unwilling to let go his last hold on Italy. Mago, in cisalpine Gaul, was too far off to render aid. The defense of Africa depended on him alone, and he was recalled. He would probably have anticipated the order. Rome breathed more freely when the "Libyan Lion" had departed. For fifteen years he had been an incubus or a terror, and the Romans, in various conflicts, had lost three hundred thousand men. Two of the Scipios, Paulus Gracchus and Marcellus, had yielded up their lives in battle. Only Fabius, among the experienced generals at the beginning of the war, was alive, and he, at the age of ninety, was now crowned with a chaplet of the grass of Italy, as the most honorable reward which could be given him.

(M875) Hannibal now sought a conference with Scipio, for both parties were anxious for peace, but was unable to obtain any better terms than the cession of Spain, as well as the Mediterranean islands, the surrender of the Carthaginian fleet, the payment of four thousand talents, and the confirmation of Masinissa in the kingdom of Syphax. Such terms could not be accepted, and both parties prepared for one more decisive conflict.

(M876) The battle was fought at Zama. "Hannibal arranged his infantry in three lines. The first division contained the Carthaginian mercenaries; the second, the African allies, and the militia of Carriage; the third, the veterans who followed him from Italy. In the front of the lines were stationed eighty elephants; the cavalry was placed on the wings. Scipio likewise disposed the legions in three divisions. The infantry fought hand to hand in the first division, and both parties falling into confusion, sought aid in the second division. The Romans were supported, but the Carthaginian militia was wavering. Upon seeing this, Hannibal hastily withdrew what remained of the two first lines to the flanks, and pushed forward his choice Italian troops along the whole line. Scipio gathered together in the centre all that were able to fight of the first line, and made the second and third divisions close up on the right and left of the first. Once again the conflict was renewed with more desperate fighting, till the cavalry of the Romans and of Masinassa, returning from pursuit of the beaten cavalry of the enemy, surrounded them on all sides. This movement annihilated the Punic army. All was lost, and Hannibal was only able to escape with a handful of men."

(M877) It was now in the power of Scipio to march upon Carthage and lay siege to the city, neither protected nor provisioned. But he made no extravagant use of his victory. He granted peace on the terms previously rejected, with the addition of an annual tribute of two hundred talents for fifty years. He had no object to destroy a city after its political power was annihilated, and wickedly overthrow the primitive seat of commerce, which was still one of the main pillars of civilization. He was too great and wise a statesman to take such a revenge as the Romans sought fifty years afterward. He was contented to end the war gloriously, and see Carthage, the old rival, a tributary and broken power, with no possibility of reviving its former schemes, B.C. 201.

(M878) This ended the Hannibalic war, which had lasted seventeen years, and which gave to Rome the undisputed sovereignty of Italy, the conversion of Spain into two Roman provinces, the union of Syracuse with the Roman province of Sicily, the establishment of a Roman protectorate over the Numidian chiefs, and the reduction of Carthage to a defenseless mercantile city. The hegemony of Rome was established over the western region of the Mediterranean. These results were great, but were obtained by the loss of one quarter of the burgesses of Rome, the ruin of four hundred towns, the waste of the accumulated capital of years, and the general demoralization of the people. It might seem that the Romans could have lived side by side with other nations in amity, as modern nations do. But, in ancient times, "it was necessary to be either anvil or hammer." Either Rome or Carthage was to become the great power of the world.



CHAPTER XXXI.

THE MACEDONIAN AND ASIATIC WARS.

Scarcely was Rome left to recover from the exhaustion of the long and desperate war with Hannibal, before she was involved in a new war with Macedonia, which led to very important consequences.

The Greeks had retained the sovereignty which Alexander had won, and their civilization extended rapidly into the East. There were three great monarchies which arose, however, from the dismemberment of the empire which Alexander had founded—Macedonia, Asia, and Egypt—and each of them, in turn, was destined to become provinces of Rome.

(M879) Macedonia was then ruled by Philip V., and was much such a monarchy as the first Philip had consolidated. The Macedonian rule embraced Greece and Thessaly, and strong garrisons were maintained at Demetrias in Maguesia, Calchis in the island of Euboea, and in Corinth, "the three fetters of the Hellenes." But the strength of the kingdom lay in Macedonia. In Greece proper all moral and political energy had fled, and the degenerate, but still intellectual inhabitants spent their time in bacchanalian pleasures, in fencing, and in study of the midnight lamp. The Greeks, diffused over the East, disseminated their culture, but were only in sufficient numbers to supply officers, statesmen, and schoolmasters. All the real warlike vigor remained among the nations of the North, where Philip reigned, a genuine king, proud of his purple, and proud of his accomplishments, lawless and ungodly, indifferent to the lives and sufferings of others, stubborn and tyrannical. He saw with regret the subjugation of Carthage, but did not come to her relief when his aid might have turned the scale, ten years before. His eyes were turned to another quarter, to possess himself of part of the territories of Egypt, assisted by Antiochus of Asia. In this attempt he arrayed against himself all the Greek mercantile cities whose interests were identified with Alexandria, now, on the fall of Carthage, the greatest commercial city of the world. He was opposed by Pergamus and the Rhodian league, while the Romans gave serious attention to their Eastern complications, not so much with a view of conquering the East, as to protect their newly-acquired possessions. A Macedonian war, then, became inevitable, but was entered into reluctantly, and was one of the most righteous, according to Mommsen, which Rome ever waged.

(M880) The pretext for war—the casus belli—was furnished by an attack on Athens by the Macedonian general, to avenge the murder of two Arcanians for intruding upon the Eleusinan Mysteries, B.C. 201. Athens was an ally of Rome. Two legions, under Publius Sulpicius Galba, embarked at Brundusium for Macedonia, with one thousand Numidian cavalry and a number of elephants. Nothing was accomplished this year of any historical importance. The next spring Galba led his troops into Macedonia, and encountered the enemy, under Philip, on a marshy plain on the northwest frontier. But the Macedonians avoided battle, and after repeated skirmishes and marches the Romans returned to Apollonia. Philip did not disturb the army in its retreat, but turned against the AEtolians, who had joined the league against him. At the end of the campaign the Romans stood as they were in the spring, but would have been routed had not the AEtolians interposed. The successes of Philip filled him with arrogance and self-confidence, and the following spring he assumed the offensive. The Romans, meantime, had been re-enforced by new troops, under the command of Flaminius, who attacked Philip in his intrenched camp. The Macedonian king lost his camp and two thousand men, and retreated to the Pass of Tempe, the gate of Macedonia proper, deserted by many of his allies. The Achaeans entered into alliance with Rome. The winter came on, and Philip sought terms of peace. All he could obtain from Flaminius was an armistice of two months. The Roman Senate refused all terms unless Philip would renounce all Greece, especially Corinth, Chalcis, and Demetrias. These were rejected, and Philip strained all his energies to meet his enemy in a pitched battle. He brought into the field twenty-six thousand men, an equal force to the Romans, and encountered them at Cynocephalae. The Romans were victorious, and a great number of prisoners fell into their hands. Philip escaped to Larissa, burned his papers, evacuated Thessaly, and returned home. He was completely vanquished, and was obliged to accept such a peace as the Romans were disposed to grant. But the Romans did not abuse their power, but treated Philip with respect, and granted to him such terms as had been given to Carthage. He lost all his foreign possessions in Asia Minor, Thrace, Greece, and the islands of the AEgean, but retained Macedonia. He was also bound not to conclude foreign alliances without the consent of the Romans, nor send garrisons abroad, nor maintain an army of over five thousand men, nor possess a navy beyond five ships of war. He was also required to pay a contribution of one thousand talents. He was thus left in possession only of as much power as was necessary to guard the frontiers of Hellas against the barbarians. All the States of Greece were declared free, and most of them were incorporated with the Achaean League, a confederation of the old cities, which were famous before the Dorian migration, to resist the Macedonian domination. This famous league was the last struggle of Greece for federation to resist overpowering foes. As the Achaean cities were the dominant States of Greece at the Trojan war, so the expiring fires of Grecian liberty went out the last among that ancient race.

(M881) The liberator of Greece, as Flaminius may be called, assembled the deputies of all the Greek communities at Corinth, exhorted them to use the freedom which he had conferred upon them with moderation, and requested, as the sole return for the kindness which the Romans had shown, that they would send back all the Italian captives sold in Greece during the war with Hannibal, and then he evacuated the last fortresses which he held, and returned to Rome with his troops and liberated captives. Rome really desired the liberation and independence of Greece, now that all fears of her political power were removed, and that glorious liberty which is associated with the struggles of the Greeks with the Persians might have been secured, had not the Hellenic nations been completely demoralized. There was left among them no foundation and no material for liberty, and nothing but the magic charm of the Hellenic name could have prevented Flaminius from establishing a Roman government in that degenerate land. It was an injudicious generosity which animated the Romans, but for which the war with Antiochus might not have arisen.

(M882) Antiochus III., the great-great-grandson of the general of Alexander who founded the dynasty of the Seleucidae, then reigned in Asia. On the fall of Philip, who was his ally, he took possession of those districts in Asia Minor that formerly belonged to Egypt, but had fallen to Philip. He also sought to recover the Greek cities of Asia Minor as a part of his empire. This enterprise embroiled him with the Romans, who claimed a protectorate over all the Hellenic cities. And he was further complicated by the arrival at Ephesus, his capital, of Hannibal, to whom he gave an honorable reception. A rupture with Rome could not be avoided.

(M883) To strengthen himself in Asia for the approaching conflict, Antiochus married one of his daughters to Ptolemy, king of Egypt, another to the king of Cappadocia, a third to the king of Pergamus, while the Grecian cities were amused by promises and presents. He was also assured of the aid of the AEtolians, who intrigued against the Romans as soon as Flaminius had left. Then was seen the error of that general for withdrawing garrisons from Greece, which was to be the theatre of the war.

(M884) Antiochus collected an army and started for Greece, hoping to be joined by Philip, who, however, placed all his forces at the disposal of the Romans. The Achaean League also was firm to the Roman cause. The Roman armies sent against him, commanded by Maninius Acilius Glabrio, numbered forty thousand men. Instead of retiring before this superior force, Antiochus intrenched himself in Thermopylae, but his army was dispersed, and he fled to Chalcis, and there embarked for Ephesus. The war was now to be carried to Asia.

(M885) Both parties, during the winter, vigorously prepared for the next campaign, and the conqueror of Zama was selected by Rome to conduct her armies in Asia. It was a long and weary march for the Roman armies to the Hellespont, which was crossed, however, without serious obstacles, from the mismanagement of Antiochus, who offered terms of peace when the army had safely landed in Asia. He offered to pay half the expenses of the war and the cession of his European possessions, as well as of the Greek cities of Asia Minor that had gone over to the Romans. But Scipio demanded the whole cost of the war and the cession of Asia Minor. These terms were rejected, and the Syrian king hastened to decide the fate of Asia by a pitched battle.

(M886) This fight was fought at Magnesia, B.C. 190, not far from Smyrna, in the valley of the Hermus. The forces of Antiochus were eighty thousand, including twelve thousand cavalry, but were undisciplined and unwieldy. Those of Scipio were about half as numerous. The Romans were completely successful, losing only twenty-four horsemen and three hundred infantry, whereas the loss of Antiochus was fifty thousand—a victory as brilliant as that of Alexander at Issus. Asia Minor was surrendered to the Romans, and Antiochus was compelled to pay three thousand talents (little more than three million dollars) at once, and the same contribution for twelve years, so that he retained nothing but Cilicia. His power was broken utterly, and he was prohibited from making aggressive war against the States of the West, or from navigating the sea west of the mouth of the Calycadnus, in Cilicia, with armed ships, or from taming elephants, or even receiving political fugitives. The province of Syria never again made a second appeal to the decision of arms—a proof of the feeble organization of the kingdom of the Seleucidae.

(M887) The king of Cappadocia escaped with a fine of six hundred talents. All the Greek cities which had joined the Romans had their liberties confirmed. The AEtolians lost all cities and territories which were in the hands of their adversaries. But Philip and the Achaeans were disgusted with the small share of the spoil granted to them.

(M888) Thus the protectorate of Rome now embraced all the States from the eastern to the western end of the Mediterranean. And Rome, about this time, was delivered of the last enemy whom she feared—the homeless and fugitive Carthaginian, who lived long enough to see the West subdued, as well as the armies of the East overpowered. At the age of seventy six he took poison, on seeing his house beset with assassins. For fifty years he kept the oath he had sworn as a boy. About the same time that he killed himself in Bithynia, Scipio, on whom fortune had lavished all her honors and successes—who had added Spain, Africa, and Asia to the empire, died in voluntary banishment, little over fifty years of age, leaving orders not to bury his remains in the city for which he had lived, and where his ancestors reposed. He died in bitter vexation from the false charges made against him of corruption and embezzlement, with hardly any other fault than that overweening arrogance which usually attends unprecedented success, and which corrodes the heart when the eclat of prosperity is dimmed by time. The career and death of both these great men—the greatest of their age—shows impressively the vanity of all worldly greatness, and is an additional confirmation of the fact that the latter years of illustrious men are generally sad and gloomy, and certain to be so when their lives are not animated by a greater sentiment than that of ambition.

(M889) Philip of Macedon died, B.C. 179, in the fifty-ninth year of his age and the forty-second of his reign, and his son Perseus succeeded to his throne at the age of thirty-one. Macedonia had been humbled rather than weakened by the Romans, and after eighteen years of peace, had renewed her resources. This kingdom chafed against the foreign power of Rome, as did the whole Hellenic world. A profound sentiment of discontent existed in both Asia and Europe. Perseus made alliances with the discontented cities—with the Byzantines, the AEtolians, and the Boeotians. But so prudently did he conduct his intrigues, that it was not till the seventh year of his reign that Rome declared war against him.

(M890) The resources of Macedonia were still considerable. The army consisted of thirty thousand men, without considering mercenaries or contingents, and great quantities of military stores had been collected in the magazines. And Perseus himself was a monarch of great ability, trained and disciplined to war. He collected an army of forty-three thousand men, while the whole Roman force in Greece was scarcely more. Crassus conducted the Roman army, and in the first engagement at Ossa, was decidedly beaten. Perseus then sought peace, but the Romans never made peace after a defeat. The war continued, but the military result of two campaigns was null, while the political result was a disgrace to the Romans. The third campaign, conducted by Quintus Marcius Philippus, was equally undecisive, and had Perseus been willing to part with his money, he could have obtained the aid of twenty thousand Celts who would have given much trouble. At last, in the fourth year of the war, the Romans sent to Macedonia Lucius AEmilius Paulus, son of the consul that fell at Cannae—an excellent general and incorruptible; a man sixty years of age, cultivated in Hellenic literature and art. Soon after his arrival at the camp at Heracleum, he brought about the battle of Pydna, which settled the fate of Macedonia. The overthrow of the Macedonians was fearful. Twenty thousand were killed and eleven thousand made prisoners. All Macedonia submitted in two days, and the king fled with his gold, some six thousand talents he had hoarded, to Samothrace, accompanied with only a few followers. The Persian monarch might have presented a more effectual resistance to Alexander had he scattered his treasures among the mercenary Greeks. So Perseus could have prolonged his contest had he employed the Celts. When a man is struggling desperately for his life or his crown, his treasures are of secondary importance. Perseus was soon after taken prisoner by the Romans, with all his treasures, and died a few years later at Alba.

(M891) "Thus perished the empire of Alexander, which had subdued and Hellenized the East, one hundred and forty-four years from his death." The kingdom of Macedonia was stricken out of the list of States, and the whole land was disarmed, and the fortress of Demetrias was razed. Illyria was treated in a similar way, and became a Roman province. All the Hellenic States were reduced to dependence upon Rome. Pergamus was humiliated. Rhodes was deprived of all possessions on the main land, although the Rhodians had not offended. Egypt voluntarily submitted to the Roman protectorate, and the whole empire of Alexander the Great fell to the Roman commonwealth. The universal empire of the Romans dates from the battle of Pydna—"the last battle in which a civilized State confronted Rome in the field on the footing of equality as a great power." All subsequent struggles were with barbarians. Mithridates, of Pontus, made subsequently a desperate effort to rid the Oriental world of the dominion of Rome, but the battle of Pydna marks the real supremacy of the Romans in the civilized world. Mommsen asserts that it is a superficial view which sees in the wars of the Romans with tribes, cities, and kings, an insatiable longing after dominion and riches, and that it was only a desire to secure the complete sovereignty of Italy, unmolested by enemies, which prompted, to this period, the Roman wars—that the Romans earnestly opposed the introduction of Africa, Greece, and Asia into the pale of protectorship, till circumstances compelled the extension of that pale—that, in fact, they were driven to all their great wars, with the exception of that concerning Sicily, even those with Hannibal and Antiochus, either by direct aggression or disturbance of settled political relations. "The policy of Rome was that of a narrow-minded but very able deliberate assembly, which had far too little power of grand combination, and far too much instinctive desire for the preservation of its own commonwealth, to devise projects in the spirit of a Caesar or a Napoleon." Nor did the ancient world know of a balance of power among nations, and hence every nation strove to subdue its neighbors, or render them powerless, like the Grecian States. Had the Greeks combined for a great political unity, they might have defied even the Roman power, or had they been willing to see the growth of equal States without envy, like the modern nations of Europe, without destructive conflicts, the States of Sparta, Corinth, and Athens might have grown simultaneously, and united, would have been too powerful to be subdued. But they did not understand the balance of power, and they were inflamed with rival animosities, and thus destroyed each other.



CHAPTER XXXII.

THE THIRD PUNIC WAR.

The peace between Carthage and Rome, after the second Punic war, lasted fifty years, during which the Carthaginians gave the Romans no cause of complaint. Carthage, in the enjoyment of peace, devoted itself to commerce and industrial arts, and grew very rich and populous. The government alone was weak, from the anarchical ascendency of the people, who were lawless and extravagant.

(M892) Their renewed miseries can be traced to Masinissa, who was in close alliance with the Romans. The Carthaginians endured everything rather than provoke the hostility of Rome, which watched the first opportunity to effect their ruin. Having resigned themselves to political degradation, general cowardice and demoralization were the result.

(M893) Masinissa, king of Numidia, made insolent claims on those Phoenician settlements on the coast of Byzacene, which the Carthaginians possessed from the earliest times. Scipio was sent to Carthage, to arrange the difficulty, as arbitrator, and the circumstances were so aggravated that he could not, with any justice, decide in favor of the king, but declined to pronounce a verdict, so that Masinissa and Carthage should remain on terms of hostility. And as Masinissa reigned for fifty years after the peace, Carthage was subjected to continual vexations. At last a war broke out between them. Masinissa was stronger than Carthage, but the city raised a considerable army, and placed it under the conduct of Hasdrubal, who marched against the perfidious enemy with fifty thousand mercenaries. The battle was not decisive, but Hasdrubal retreated without securing his communication with Carthage. His army was cut off, and he sought terms of peace, which were haughtily rejected, and he then gave hostages for keeping the peace, and agreed to pay five thousand talents within fifty years, and acknowledge Masinissa's usurpation. The Romans, instead of settling the difficulties, instigated secretly Masinissa. And the Roman commissioners sent to the Senate exaggerated accounts of the resources of Carthage. The Romans compelled the Carthaginians to destroy their timber and the materials they had in abundance for building a new fleet. Still the Senate, having the control of the foreign relations, and having become a mere assembly of kings, with the great power which the government of provinces gave to it, was filled with renewed jealousy. Cato never made a speech without closing with these words: "Carthago est delenda." A blind hatred animated that vindictive and narrow old patrician, who headed a party with the avowed object of the destruction of Carthage. And it was finally determined to destroy the city.

(M894) The Romans took the Carthaginians to account for the war with Masinissa, and not contented with the humiliation of their old rival, aimed at her absolute ruin, though she had broken no treaties. The Carthaginians, broken-hearted, sent embassy after embassy, imploring the Senate to preserve peace, to whom the senators gave equivocal answers. The situation of Carthage was hopeless and miserable—stripped by Masinissa of the rich towns of Emporia, and on the eve of another conflict with the mistress of the world.

(M895) Had the city been animated by the spirit which Hannibal had sought to infuse, she was still capable of a noble defense. She ruled over three hundred Libyan cities, and had a population of seven hundred thousand. She had accumulated two hundred thousand stand of arms, and two thousand catapults. And she had the means to manufacture a still greater amount. But she had, unfortunately, on the first demand of the Romans, surrendered these means of defense.

(M896) At last Rome declared war, B.C. 149—the wickedest war in which she ever engaged—and Cato had the satisfaction of seeing, at the age of eighty-five, his policy indorsed against every principle of justice and honor. A Roman army landed in Africa unopposed, and the Carthaginians were weak enough to surrender, not only three hundred hostages from the noblest families, but the arms already enumerated. Nothing but infatuation can account for this miserable concession of weakness to strength, all from a blind confidence in the tender mercies of an unpitying and unscrupulous foe. Then, when the city was defenseless, the hostages in the hands of the Romans, and they almost at the gates, it was coolly announced that it was the will of the Senate that the city should be destroyed.

(M897) Too late, the doomed city prepared to make a last stand against an inexorable enemy. The most violent feelings of hatred and rage, added to those of despair, at last animated the people of Carthage. It was the same passion which arrayed Tyre against Alexander, and Jerusalem against Titus. It was a wild patriotic frenzy which knew no bounds, inspired by the instinct of self-preservation, and aside from all calculation of success or failure. As the fall of the city was inevitable, wisdom might have counseled an unreserved submission. Resistance should have been thought of before. In fact, Carthage should not have yielded to the first Africanus. And when she had again become rich and populous, she should have defied the Romans when their spirit was perceived—should have made a more gallant defense against Masinissa, and concentrated all her energies for a last stand upon her own territories. But why should we thus speculate? The doom of Carthage had been pronounced by the decrees of fate. The fall has all the mystery and solemnity of a providential event, like the fall of all empires, like the defeat of Darius by Alexander, like the ruin of Jerusalem, like the melting away of North American Indians, like the final overthrow of the "Eternal City" itself.

(M898) The desperation of the city in her last conflict proves, however, that, with proper foresight and patriotism, her fall might have been delayed, for it took the Romans three years to subdue her. The disarmed city withstood the attack of the Romans for a period five times as long as it required Vespasian and Titus to capture Jerusalem. The city resounded day and night with the labors of men and women on arms and catapults. One hundred and forty shields, three hundred swords, five hundred spears, and one thousand missiles were manufactured daily, and even a fleet of one hundred and fifty ships was built during the siege. The land side of the city was protected by a triple wall, and the rocks of Cape Camast and Cape Carthage sheltered it from all attacks by sea, except one side protected by fortified harbors and quays. Hasdrubal, with the remnant of his army, was still in the field, and took up his station at Nephesis, on the opposite side of the lake of Tunis, to harass the besiegers. Masinissa died at the age of ninety, soon after hostilities began.

(M899) The first attack on Carthage was a failure, and the army of the Consuls Censorinus and Manius Manilius would have been cut to pieces, had it not been for the the reserve led by Scipio AEmilianus, a grandson of Africanus, who was then serving as military tribune. He also performed many gallant actions when Censorinus retired to Rome, leaving the army in the hands of his incompetent colleague.

(M900) The second campaign was equally unsuccessful, under L. Calpurnius Fiso and L. Mancinus. The slow progress of the war excited astonishment throughout the world. The suspense of the campaign was intolerable to the proud spirit of the Romans, who had never dreamed of such resistance. The eyes of the Romans were then turned to the young hero who alone had thus far distinguished himself. Although he had not reached the proper age, he was chosen consul, and the province of Africa was assigned to him. He sailed with his friends Polybius and Laelius. He was by no means equal to the elder Scipio, although he was an able general and an accomplished man. He was ostentatious, envious, and proud, and had cultivation rather than genius.

(M901) When he arrived at Utica, he found the campaign of B.C. 147 opened in such a way that his arrival saved a great disaster. The admiral Mancinus had attempted an attack on an undefended quarter, but a desperate sally of the besieged had exposed him to imminent danger, and he was only relieved by the timely arrival of Scipio.

(M902) The new general then continued the siege with new vigor. His headquarters were fixed on an isthmus uniting the peninsula of Carthage with the main-land, from which he attacked the suburb called Megara, and took it, and shut up the Carthaginians in the old town and ports. The garrison of the suburb and the army of Hasdrubal retreated within the fortifications of the city. The Carthaginian leader, to cut off all retreat, inflicted inhuman barbarities and tortures on all the Roman prisoners they took. Scipio, meanwhile, intrenched and fortified in the suburb, cut off all communication between the city and main-land by parallel trenches, three miles in length, drawn across the whole isthmus. The communication with the sea being still open, from which the besieged received supplies, the port was blocked up by a mole of stone ninety-six feet wide. The besieged worked night and day, and cut a new channel to the sea, and, had they known how to improve their opportunity, might, with the new fleet they had constructed, have destroyed that of their enemies, unprepared for action.

(M903) Scipio now resolved to make himself master of the ports, which were separated from the sea by quays and a weak wall. His battering-rams were at once destroyed by the Carthaginians. He then built a wall or rampart upon the quay, to the height of the city wall, and placed upon it four thousand men to harass the besieged. As the winter rains then set in, making his camp unhealthy, and the city was now closely invested by sea and land, he turned his attention to the fortified camp of the enemy at Nephesis, which was taken by storm, and seventy thousand persons put to the sword. The Carthaginian army was annihilated.

(M904) Meanwhile famine pressed within the besieged city, and Hasdrubal would not surrender. An attack, led by Laelius, on the market-place, gave the Romans a foothold within the city, and a great quantity of spoil. One thousand talents were taken from the temple of Apollo. Preparations were then made for the attack of the citadel, and for six days there was a hand-to-hand fight between the combatants amid the narrow streets which led to the Byrsa. The tall Oriental houses were only taken one by one and burned, and the streets were cumbered with the dead. The miserable people, crowded within the citadel, certain now of destruction, then sent a deputation to Scipio to beg the lives of those who had sought a retreat in the Byrsa. The request was granted to all but Roman deserters. But out of the great population of seven hundred thousand, only thirty thousand men and twenty-five thousand women marched from the burning ruins. Hasdrubal and the three hundred Roman deserters, certain of no mercy, retired to the temple of AEsculapius, the heart of the citadel. But the Carthaginian, uniting pusillanimity with cruelty, no sooner found the temple on fire, than he rushed out in Scipio's presence, with an olive-branch in his hands, and abjectly begged for his life, which Scipio granted, after he had prostrated himself at his feet in sight of his followers, who loaded him with the bitterest execrations. The wife of Hasdrubal, deserted by the abject wretch, called down the curses of the gods on the man who had betrayed his country and deserted at last his family. She then cut the throats of her children and threw them into the flames, and then leaped into them herself. The Roman deserters in the same manner perished. The city was given up to plunder, the inhabitants whose lives were spared were sold as slaves, and the gold and works of art were carried to Rome and deposited in the temples.

(M905) Such was the fate of Carthage—a doom so awful, that we can not but feel that it was sent as a chastisement for crimes which had long cried to Heaven for vengeance. Carthage always was supremely a wicked city. All the luxurious and wealthy capitals of ancient times were wicked, especially Oriental cities, as Carthage properly, though not technically, was—founded by Phoenicians, and a worshiper of the gods of Tyre and Sidon. The Roman Senate decreed that not only the city, but even the villas of the nobles in the suburb of Megara, should be leveled with the ground, and the plowshare driven over the soil devoted to perpetual desolation, and a curse to the man who should dare to cultivate it or build upon it. For fourteen days, the fires raged in this once populous and wealthy city, and the destruction was complete, B.C. 146. So deep-seated was the Roman hatred of rivals, or States that had been rivals; so dreadful was the punishment of a wicked city, of which Scipio was made the instrument, not merely of the Romans, but of Divine providence.

(M906) All the great cities of antiquity, which had been seats of luxury and pride, had now been utterly destroyed—Nineveh, Babylon, Tyre, and Carthage. Corinth was already sacked by Mummius, and Jerusalem was to be by Titus, and Rome herself was finally to receive a still direr chastisement at the hands of Goths and Vandals. So Providence moves on in his mysterious power to bring to naught the grandeur and power of rebellious nations—rebellious to those mighty moral laws which are as inexorable as the laws of nature.

The territory on the coast of Zeugitana and Byzantium, which formed the last possession of Carthage, was erected into the province of Africa, and the rich plain of that fertile province became more important to Rome for supplies of corn than even Sicily, which had been the granary of Rome.

(M907) Scipio returned to Rome, and enjoyed a triumph more gorgeous than the great Africanus. He also lived to enjoy another triumph for brilliant successes in Spain, yet to be enumerated, but was also doomed to lose his popularity, and to perish by the dagger of assassins.

(M908) Rome had now acquired the undisputed dominion of the civilized world, and with it, the vices of the nations she subdued. A great decline in Roman morals succeeded these brilliant conquests. Great internal changes took place. The old distinction of patricians and plebeians had vanished, and a new nobility had arisen, composed of rich men and of those whose ancestors had enjoyed curule magistracies. They possessed the Senate, and had control of the Comitia Centuriata, by the prerogative vote of the equestrian centuries. A base rabble had grown up, fed with corn and oil, by the government, and amused by games and spectacles. The old republican aristocracy was supplanted by a family oligarchy. The vast wealth which poured into Rome from the conquered countries created disproportionate fortunes. The votes of the people were bought by the rich candidates for popular favor. The superstitions of the East were transferred to the capitol of the world, and the decay in faith was as marked as the decay in virtue. Chaldaean astrologers were scattered over Italy, and the gods of all the conquered peoples of the earth were worshiped at Rome. The bonds of society were loosed, and a state was prepared for the civil wars which proved even more destructive than the foreign.



CHAPTER XXXIII.

ROMAN CONQUESTS FROM THE FALL OF CARTHAGE TO THE TIMES OF THE GRACCHI.

Although the Roman domination now extended in some form or other over most of the countries around the Mediterranean, still several States remained to be subdued, in the East and in the West.

The subjugation of Spain first deserves attention, commenced before the close of the third Punic war, and which I have omitted to notice for the sake of clearness of connection.

After the Hannibalic war, we have seen how Rome planted her armies in Spain, and added two provinces to her empire. But the various tribes were far from being subdued, and Spain was inhabited by different races.

(M909) This great peninsula, bounded on the north by the ocean Cantabricus, now called the Bay of Biscay, and the Pyrenees, on the east and south by the Mediterranean, and on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, was called Iberia, by the Greeks, from the river Iberus, or Ebro. The term Hispania was derived from the Phoenicians, who planted colonies on the southern shores. The Carthaginians invaded it next, and founded several cities, the chief of which was New Carthage. At the end of the second Punic war, it was wrested from them by the Romans, who divided it into two provinces, Citerior and Ulterior. In the time of Augustus, Ulterior Spain was divided into two provinces, called Lusitania and Baetica, while the Citerior province, by far the larger, occupying the whole northern country from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean, was called Tanagona. It included three-fifths of the peninsula, or about one hundred and seven thousand three hundred square miles. It embraced the modern provinces of Catalonia, Aragon, Navarre, Biscay, Asturias, Galicia, Northern Leon, old and new Castile, Murcia, and Valentia, and a part of Portugal. Baetica nearly corresponded with Andalusia, and embraced Granada, Jaen, Cordova, Seville, and half of Spanish Estremadura. Lusitania corresponds nearly with Portugal.

(M910) The Tanaconneusis was inhabited by numerous tribes, and the chief ancient cities were Barcelona, Tanagona the metropolis, Pampeluna, Oporto, Numantia, Saguntum, Saragossa, and Cartagena. In Baetica were Cordova, Castile, Gades, and Seville. In Lusitania were Olisipo (Lisbon), and Salamanca.

(M911) Among the inhabitants of these various provinces were Iberians, Celts, Phoenicians, and Hellenes. In the year 154 B.C., the Lusitanians, under a chieftain called Punicus, invaded the Roman territory which the elder Scipio had conquered, and defeated two Roman governors. The Romans then sent a consular army, under Q. Fulvius Nobilior, which was ultimately defeated by the Lusitanians under Caesarus. This success kindled the flames of war far and near, and the Celtiberians joined in the warfare against the Roman invaders. Again the Romans were defeated with heavy loss. The Senate then sent considerable re-enforcements, under Claudius Marcellus, who soon changed the aspect of affairs. The nation of the Arevacae surrendered to the Romans—a people living on the branches of the Darius, near Numantia—and their western neighbors, the Vaccaei, were also subdued, and barbarously dealt with. On the outbreak of the third Punic war the affairs of Spain were left to the ordinary governors, and a new insurrection of the Lusitanians took place. Viriathus, a Spanish chieftain, signally defeated the Romans, and was recognized as king of all the Lusitanians. He was distinguished, not only for bravery, but for temperance and art, and was a sort of Homeric hero, whose name and exploits were sounded throughout the peninsula. He gained great victories over the Roman generals, and destroyed their armies. General after general was successively defeated. For five years this gallant Spaniard kept the whole Roman power at bay, and he was only destroyed by treachery.

(M912) While the Lusitanians at the South were thus prevailing over the Roman armies on the bunks of the Tagus, another war broke out in the North among the Celtiberian natives. Against these people Quintus Caecilius Metellus, the consul, was sent. He showed great ability, and in two years reduced the whole northern province, except the two cities of Termantia and Numantia. These cities, wearied at last with war, agreed to submit to the Romans, and delivered up hostages and deserters, with a sum of money. But the Senate, with its usual policy, refused to confirm the treaty of its general, which perfectly aroused the Numantines to resentment and despair. These brave people obtained successes against the Roman general Laenas and his successors, Mancinus and M. AEmilius Lepides, as well as Philus and Piso.

(M913) The Romans, aroused at last to this inglorious war, which had lasted nearly ten years, resolved to take the city of the Numantines at any cost, and intrusted the work to Scipio AEmilianus, their best general. He spent the summer (B.C. 134) in extensive preparations, and it was not till winter that he drew his army round the walls of Numantia, defended by only eight thousand citizens. Scipio even declined a battle, and fought with mattock and spade. A double wall of circumvallation, surmounted with towers, was built around the city, and closed the access to it by the Douro, by which the besieged relied upon for provisions. The city sustained a memorable siege of nearly a year, and was only reduced by famine. The inhabitants were sold as slaves, and the city was leveled with the ground. The fall of this fortress struck at the root of opposition to Rome, and a senatorial commission was sent to Spain, in order to organize with Scipio the newly-won territories, and became henceforth the best-regulated country of all the provinces of Rome.

(M914) But a graver difficulty existed with the African, Greek, and Asiatic States that had been brought under the influence of the Roman hegemony, which was neither formal sovereignty nor actual subjection. The client States had neither independence nor peace. The Senate, nevertheless, perpetually interfered with the course of African, Hellenic, Asiatic, and Egyptian affairs. Commissioners were constantly going to Alexandria, to the Achaean diet, and to the courts of the Asiatic princes, and the government of Rome deprived the nations of the blessings of freedom and the blessings of order.

(M915) It was time to put a stop to this state of things, and the only way to do so was to convert the client States into Roman provinces. After the destruction of Carthage, the children of Masinissa retained in substance their former territories, but were not allowed to make Carthage their capital. Her territories became a Roman province, whose capital was Utica.

(M916) Macedonia also disappeared, like Carthage, from the ranks of nations. But the four small States into which the kingdom was parceled could not live in peace. Neither Roman commissioners nor foreign arbiters could restore order. At this crisis a young man appeared in Thrace, who called himself the son of Perseus. This pseudo-Philip, for such was his name, strikingly resembled the son of Perseus. Unable to obtain recognition in his native country, he went to Demetrius Sotor, king of Syria. By him he was sent to Rome. The Senate attached so little importance to the man, that he was left, imperfectly guarded, in an Italian town, and fled to Miletus. Again arrested, and again contriving to escape, he went to Thrace, and obtained a recognition from Teres, the chief of the Thracian barbarians. With his support he invaded Macedonia, and obtained several successes over the Macedonian militia. The Roman commissioner Nasica, without troops, was obliged to call to his aid the Achaean and Pergamene soldiers, until defended by a Roman legion under the praetor Juventius. Juventius was slain by the pretender, and his army cut to pieces. And it was not until a stronger Roman array, under Quintus Caecilius Metellus, appeared, that he was subdued. The four States into which Macedonia had been divided were now converted into a Roman province, B.C. 148, and Macedonia became, not a united kingdom, but a united province, with nearly the former limits.

The defense of the Hellenic civilization now devolved on the Romans, but was not conducted with adequate forces or befitting energy, and the petty States were therefore exposed to social disorganization, and the Greeks evidently sought to pick a quarrel with Rome.

(M917) Hence the Achaean war, B.C. 149. It is not of much historical importance. It was commenced under Metellus, and continued under Mummius, who reduced the noisy belligerents to terms, and entered Corinth, the seat of rebellion, and the first commercial city of Greece. By order of the Senate, the Corinthian citizens were sold into slavery, the fortifications of the city leveled with the ground, and the city itself was sacked. The mock sovereignty of leagues was abolished, and all remains of Grecian liberty fled.

(M918) In Asia Minor, after the Seleucidae were driven away, Pergamus became the first power. But even this State did not escape the jealousy of the Romans, and with Attalus III. the house of Attalids became extinct.

(M919) He, however, had bequeathed his kingdom to the Romans, and his testament kindled a civil war. Aristonicus, a natural son of Eumenes II., made his appearance at Lecuae, a small sea-port near Smyrna, as a pretender to the crown. He was defeated by the Ephesians, who saw the necessity of the protection and friendship of the Roman government. But he again appeared with new troops, and the struggle was serious, since there were no Roman troops in Asia. But, B.C. 131, a Roman army was sent under the consul Publius Licinius Crassus Mucianus, one of the wealthiest men of Rome, distinguished as an orator and jurist. This distinguished general was about to lay siege to Leucae, when he was surprised and taken captive, and put to death. His successor, Marcus Perpenua, was fortunate in his warfare, and the pretender was taken prisoner, and executed at Rome. The remaining cities yielded to the conqueror, and Asia Minor became a Roman province.

(M920) In other States the Romans set up kings as they chose. In Syria, Antiochus Eupater was recognized over the claims of Demetrius Sotor, then a hostage in Rome. But he contrived to escape, and seized the government of his ancestral kingdom. But it would seem that the Romans, at this period, did not take a very lively interest in the affairs of remote Asiatic States, and the decrees of the Senate were often disregarded with impunity. A great reaction of the East took place against the West, and, under Mithridates, a renewed struggle again gave dignity to the Eastern kingdoms, which had not raised their heads since the conquests of Alexander. That memorable struggle will be alluded to in the proper place. It was a difficult problem which Rome undertook when she undertook to govern the Asiatic world. It was easy to conquer; it was difficult to rule, when degeneracy and luxury became the vices of the Romans themselves. We are now to trace those domestic dissensions and civil wars which indicate the decline of the Roman republic. But before we describe those wars, we will take a brief survey of the social and political changes in Rome at this period.



CHAPTER XXXIV.

ROMAN CIVILIZATION AT THE CLOSE OF THE THIRD PUNIC WAR, AND THE FALL OF GREECE.

(M921) Rome was now the unrivaled mistress of the world. She had conquered all the civilized States around the Mediterranean, or had established a protectorate over them. She had no fears of foreign enemies. Her empire was established.

Before we proceed to present subsequent conquests or domestic revolutions, it would be well to glance at the political and social structure of the State, as it was two hundred years before the Christian era, and also at the progress which had been made in literature and art.

(M922) One of the most noticeable features of the Roman State at this period was the rise of a new nobility. The patricians, when they lost the exclusive control of the government, did not cease to be a powerful aristocracy. But another class of nobles arose in the fifth century of the city, and shared their power—those who had held curule offices and were members of the Senate. Their descendants, plebeian as well as patrician, had the privilege of placing the wax images of their ancestors in the family hall, and to have them carried in funeral processions. They also wore a stripe of purple on the tunic, and a gold ring on the finger. These were trifling insignia of rank, still they were emblems and signs by which the nobility were distinguished. The plebeian families, ennobled by their curule ancestors, were united into one body with the patrician families, and became a sort of hereditary nobility. This body of exclusive families really possessed the political power of the State. The Senate was made up from their members, and was the mainstay of Roman nobility. The equites, or equestrian order, was also composed of the patricians and wealthy plebeians. Noble youths gradually withdrew from serving in the infantry, and the legionary cavalry became a closed aristocratic corps. Not only were the nobles the possessors of senatorial privileges, and enrolled among the equites, but they had separate seats from the people at the games and at the theatres. The censorship also became a prop to the stability of the aristocratic class.

(M923) We have some idea of the influence of the aristocracy from the families which furnished the higher offices of the State. For three centuries the consuls were chiefly chosen from powerful families. The Cornelii gentes furnished fifteen consuls in one hundred and twelve years, and the Valerii, ten. And, what is more remarkable, for the following one hundred and fifty years these two families furnished nearly the same number. In one hundred and twelve years fifteen families gave seventy consuls to the State: the Cornelii, fifteen; the Valerii, ten; the Claudii, four; the AEmilii, nine; the Fabii, six; the Manilii, four; the Postumii, two; the Servilii, three; the Sulpicii, six; and also about the same number the following one hundred and fifty years, thereby showing that old families, whether patrician or plebeian, were long kept in sight, and monopolized political power. This was also seen in the elevation of young men of these ranks to high office before they had reached the lawful age. M. Valerius Corvus was consul at twenty-three, Scipio at thirty, and Flaminius at twenty-nine.

(M924) The control of Rome over conquered provinces introduced a new class of magistrates, selected by the Senate, and chosen from the aristocratic circles. These were the provincial governors or praetors, who had great power, and who sometimes appeared in all the pomp of kings. They resided in the ancient palaces of the kings, and had great opportunities for accumulating fortunes. Nor could the governors be called to account, until after their term of office expired, which rarely happened. The governors were, virtually, sovereigns while they continued in office—were satraps, who conducted a legalized tyranny abroad, and returned home arrogant and accustomed to adulation—a class of men who proved dangerous to the old institutions, those which recognized equality within the aristocracy and the subordination of power to the senatorial college.

(M925) The burgesses, or citizens, before this period, were a very respectable body, patriotic and sagacious. They occupied chiefly Latium, a part of Campania, and the maritime colonies. But gradually, a rabble of clients grew up on footing equality with these independent burgesses. These clients, as the aristocracy increased in wealth and power, became parasites and beggars, and undermined the burgess class, and controlled the Comitia. This class rapidly increased, and were clamorous for games, festivals, and cheap bread, for corn was distributed to them by those who wished to gain their favor at elections, at less than cost. Hence, festivals and popular amusements became rapidly a great feature of the times. For five hundred years the people had been contented with one festival in a year, and one circus. Flaminius added another festival, and another circus. In the year 550 of the city, there were five festivals. The candidates for the consulship spent large sums on these games, the splendor of which became the standard by which the electoral body measured the fitness of candidates. A gladiatorial show cost seven hundred and twenty thousand sesterces, or thirty-six thousand dollars.

(M926) And corruption extended to the army. The old burgess militia were contented to return home with some trifling gift as a memorial of victory, but the troops of Scipio, and the veterans of the Macedonian and Asiatic wars, came back enriched with spoils. A decay of a warlike spirit was observable from the time the burgesses converted war into a traffic in plunder. A great passion also arose for titles and insignia, which appeared under different forms, especially for the honors of a triumph, originally granted only to the supreme magistrate who had signally augmented the power of the State. Statues and monuments were often erected at the expense of the person whom they purported to honor. And finally, the ring, the robe, and the amulet case distinguished not only the burgesses from the foreigners and slaves, but also the person who was born free from one who had been a slave, the son of the free-born from the son of the manumitted, the son of a knight from a common burgess, the descendant of a curule house from the common senators. These distinctions in rank kept pace with the extension of conquests, until, at last, there was as complete a net work of aristocratic distinctions as in England at the present day.

(M927) All these distinctions and changes were bitterly deplored by Marcus Portius Cato—the last great statesman of the older school—a genuine Roman of the antique stamp. He was also averse to schemes of universal empire. He was a patrician, brought up at the plow, and in love with his Sabine farm. Yet he rose to the consulship, and even the censorship. He served in war under Marcellus, Fabius, and Scipio, and showed great ability as a soldier. He was as distinguished in the forum as in the camp and battle-field, having a bold address, pungent wit, and great knowledge of the Roman laws. He was the most influential political orator of his day. He was narrow in his political ideas, conservative, austere, and upright; an enemy to all corruption and villainy, also to genius, and culture, and innovation. He was the protector of the Roman farmer, plain, homely in person, disdained by the ruling nobles, but fearless in exposing corruption from any quarter, and irreconcilably at war with aristocratic coteries, like the Scipios and Flaminii. He was publicly accused twenty-four times, but he was always backed by the farmers, notwithstanding the opposition of the nobles. He erased, while censor, the name of the brother of Flaminius from the roll of senators, and the brother of Scipio from that of the equites. He attempted a vigorous reform, but the current of corruption could only be stemmed for awhile. The effect of the sumptuary laws, which were passed through his influence, was temporary and unsatisfactory. No legislation has proved of avail against a deep-seated corruption of morals, for the laws will be avoided, even if they are not defied. In vain was the eloquence of the hard, arbitrary, narrow, worldly wise, but patriotic and stern old censor. The age of Grecian culture, of wealth, of banquets, of palaces, of games, of effeminate manners, had set in with the conquest of Greece and Asia. The divisions of society widened, and the seeds of luxury and pride were to produce violence and decay.

(M928) Still some political changes were effected at this time. The Comitia Centuriata was remodeled. The equites no longer voted first. The five classes obtained an equal number of votes, and the freedmen were placed on an equal footing with free-born. Thus terminated the long conflict between patricians and plebeians. But although the right of precedence in voting was withdrawn from the equites, still the patrician order was powerful enough to fill, frequently, the second consulship and the second censorship, which were open to patricians and plebeians alike, with men of their own order. At this time the office of dictator went into abeyance, and was practically abolished; the priests were elected by the whole community; the public assemblies interfered with the administration of the public property—the exclusive prerogative of the Senate in former times—and thus transferred the public domains to their own pockets. These were changes which showed the disorganization of the government rather than healthy reform. To this period we date the rise of demagogues, for a minority in the Senate had the right to appeal to the Comitia, which opened the way for wealthy or popular men to thwart the wisest actions and select incompetent magistrates and generals. Even Publius Scipio was not more distinguished for his arrogance and title-hunting than for the army of clients he supported, and for the favor which he courted, of both legions and people, by his largesses of grain.

(M929) At this period, agriculture had reached considerable perfection, but Cato declared that his fancy farm was not profitable. Figs, apples, pears were cultivated, as well as olives and grapes—also shade-trees. The rearing of cattle was not of much account, as the people lived chiefly on vegetables, and fruits and corn. Large cattle were kept only for tillage. Considerable use was made of poultry and pigeons—kept in the farm-yard. Fish-ponds and hare-preserves were also common. The labor of the fields was performed by oxen, and asses for carriage and the turning of mills. The human labor on farms was done by slaves. Vineyards required more expenditure of labor than ordinary tillage. An estate of one hundred jugera, with vine plantations, required one plowman, eleven slaves, and two herdsmen. The slaves were not bred on the estate, but were purchased. They lived in the farm-buildings, among cattle and produce. A separate house was erected for the master. A steward had the care of the slaves. The stewardess attended to the baking and cooking, and all had the same fare, delivered from the produce of the farm on which they lived. Great unscrupulousness pervaded the management of these estates. Slaves and cattle were placed on the same level, and both were fed as long as they could work, and sold when they were incapacitated by age or sickness. A slave had no recreations or holidays. His time was spent between working and sleeping. And when we remember that these slaves were white as well as black, and had once been free, their condition was hard and inhuman. No negro slavery ever was so cruel as slavery among the Romans. Great labors and responsibilities were imposed upon the steward. He was the first to rise in the morning, and the last to go to bed at night; but he was not doomed to constant labor, like the slaves whom he superintended. He also had few pleasures, and was obsequious to the landlord, who performed no work, except in the earlier ages. The small farmer worked himself with the slaves and his children. He more frequently cultivated flowers and vegetables for the market of Rome. Pastoral husbandry was practiced on a great scale, and at least eight hundred jugera were required. On such estates, horses, oxen, mules, and asses were raised, also herds of swine and goats. The breeding of sheep was an object of great attention and interest, since all clothing was made of wool. The shepherd-slaves lived in the open air, remote from human habitations, under sheds and sheep-folds.

(M930) The prices of all produce were very small in comparison with present rates, and this was owing, in part, to the immense quantities of corn and other produce delivered by provincials to the Roman government, sometimes gratuitously. The armies were supported by transmarine corn. The government regulated prices. In the time of Scipio, African wheat was sold as low as twelve ases for six modii—(one and a half bushel)—about sixpence. At one time two hundred and forty thousand bushels of Sicilian grain were distributed at this price. The rise of demagogism promoted these distributions, which kept prices down, so that the farmers received but a small reward for labors, which made, of course, the condition of laborers but little above that of brutes: when the people of the capital paid but sixpence sterling for a bushel and a half of wheat, or one hundred and eighty pounds of dried figs, or sixty pounds of oil, or seventy-two pounds of meat, or four and a half gallons of wine sold only for fivepence, or three-fifths of a denarius. In the time of Polybius, the traveler was charged for victuals and lodgings at an inn only about two farthings a day, and a bushel of wheat sold for fourpence. At such prices there was very little market for the farmer. Sicily and Sardinia were the real granaries of Rome. Thus were all the best interests of the country sacrificed to the unproductive population of the city. Such was the golden age of the republic—a state of utter misery and hardship among the productive classes, and idleness among the Roman people—a state of society which could but lead to ruin. The farmers, without substantial returns, lost energy and spirit, and dwindled away. Their estates fell into the hands of great proprietors, who owned great numbers of slaves. They themselves were ruined, and sunk into an ignoble class. The cultivation of grain in Italy was gradually neglected, and attention was given chiefly to vines, and olives, and wool. The rearing of cattle became more profitable than tillage, and small farms were absorbed in great estates.

(M931) The monetary transactions of the Romans were preeminently conspicuous. No branch of commercial industry was prosecuted with more zeal than money-lending. The bankers of Rome were a great class, and were generally rich. They speculated in corn and all articles of produce. Usury was not disdained even by the nobles. Money-lending became a great system, and all the laws operated in favor of capitalists.

Industrial art did not keep pace with usurious calculations, and trades were concentrated in the capital. Mechanical skill was neglected in all the rural districts.

(M932) Business operations were usually conducted by slaves. Even money-lenders and bankers made use of them. Every one who took contracts for building, bought architect slaves. Every one who provided spectacles purchased a band of serfs expert in the art of fighting. The merchants imported wares in vessels managed by slaves. Mines were worked by slaves. Manufactories were conducted by slaves. Everywhere were slaves.

(M933) While the farmer obtained only fourpence a bushel for his wheat, a penny a gallon for his wine, and fivepence for sixty pounds of oil, the capitalists, centered in Rome, possessed fortunes which were vastly disproportionate to those which are seen in modern capitals. Paulus was not reckoned wealthy for a senator, but his estate was valued at sixty talents, nearly L15,000, or $75,000. In other words, the daily interest of his capital was fifteen dollars, enough to purchase one hundred and eighty bushels of wheat—as much as a farmer could raise in a year on eight jugera—a farm as large as that of Cincinnatus. Each of the daughters of Scipio received as a dowry fifty talents, or $60,000. The value of this sum, in our money, when measured by the scale of wheat, or oil, or wine—allowing wheat now to be worth five shillings sterling a bushel—against fivepence in those times, would make gold twelve times more valuable then than now. And hence, Scipio left each of his daughters a sum equal to $720,000 of our money. In estimating the fortune of a Roman, by the prices charged at an inn per day, a penny would go further then than a dollar would now. But I think that gold and silver, in the time of Scipio, were about the same value as in England at the time of Henry VII., about twenty times our present standard.

(M934) Every law at Rome tended in its operation to the benefit of the creditor, and to vast accumulations of property; for the government being in the hands of the rich, as in England a century since, and in France before the Revolution, favored the rich at the expense of the poor. It became disgraceful at Rome to perform manual labor, and a wall separated the laboring classes from the capitalists, which could not be passed. Industrial art took the lowest place in the scale of labor, and was in the hands of slaves. The traffic in money, and the farming of the revenue formed the mainstay and stronghold of the Roman economy. The free population of Italy declined, while the city of Rome increased. The loss was supplied by slaves. In the year 502 of the city, the Roman burgesses in Italy numbered two hundred and ninety-eight thousand men capable of bearing arms. Fifty years later, the number was only two hundred and fourteen thousand. The nation visibly diminished, and the community was resolved into masters and slaves. And this decline of citizens and increase of slaves were beheld with indifference, for pride, and cruelty, and heartlessness were the characteristics of the higher classes.

(M935) With the progress of luxury, and the decline of the rural population, and the growth of disproportionate fortunes, residence in the capital became more and more coveted, and more and more costly. Rents rose to an unexampled height. Extravagant prices were paid for luxuries. When a bushel of corn sold for fivepence, a barrel of anchovies from the Black Sea cost L14, and a beautiful boy twenty-four thousand sesterces (L246), more than a farmer's homestead. Money came to be prized as the end of life, and all kinds of shifts and devices were made to secure it. Marriage, on both sides, became an object of mercantile speculation.

(M936) In regard to education, there was a higher development than is usually supposed, and literature and art were cultivated, even while the nation declined in real virtue and strength. By means of the Greek slaves, the Greek language and literature reached even the lower ranks, to a certain extent. "The comedies indicate that the humblest classes were familiar with a sort of Latin, which could no more be understood without a knowledge of Greek, than Wieland's German without a knowledge of French." Greek was undoubtedly spoken by the higher classes, as French is spoken in all the courts of Europe. In the rudiments of education, the lowest people were instructed, and even slaves were schoolmasters. At the close of the Punic wars, both comedy and tragedy were among the great amusements of the Romans, and great writers arose, who wrote, however, from the Greek models. Livius translated Homer, and Naevius popularized the Greek drama. Plautus, it is said, wrote one hundred and thirty plays. The tragedies of Ennius were recited to the latter days of the empire. The Romans did not, indeed, make such advance in literature as the Greeks, at a comparatively early period of their history, but their attainments were respectable when Carthage was destroyed.



CHAPTER XXXV.

THE REFORM MOVEMENT OF THE GRACCHI.

A new era in the history of Rome now commences, a period of glory and shame, when a great change took place in the internal structure of the State, now corrupted by the introduction of Greek and Asiatic refinements, and the vast wealth which rolled into the capital of the world.

(M937) "For a whole generation after the battle of Pydna, the Roman State enjoyed a profound calm, scarcely varied by a ripple here and there upon the surface. Its dominion extended over three continents; all eyes rested on Italy; all talents and all riches flowed thither; it seemed as if a golden age of peaceful prosperity and intellectual enjoyment of life had begun. The Orientals of this period told each other with astonishment of the mighty republic of the West. And such was the glory of the Romans, that no one usurped the crown, and no one glittered in purple dress; but they obeyed whomsoever from year to year they made their master, and there was among them neither envy nor discord."

(M938) So things seemed at a distance. But this splendid external was deceptive. The government of the aristocracy was hastening to its ruin. There was a profound meaning, says Mommsen, in the question of Cato: "What was to become of Rome when she should no longer have any State to fear?" All her neighbors were now politically annihilated, and the single thought of the aristocracy was how they should perpetuate their privileges. A government of aristocratic nobodies was now inaugurated, which kept new men of merit from doing any thing, for fear they should belong to their exclusive ranks. Even an aristocratic conqueror was inconvenient.

(M939) Still opposition existed to this aristocratic regime, and some reforms had been carried out. The administration of justice was improved. The senatorial commissions to the provinces were found inadequate. An effort was made to emancipate the Comitia from the prepondering influence of the aristocracy. The senators were compelled to renounce their public horse on admission to the Senate, and also the privilege of voting in the eighteen equestrian centimes. But there was the semblance of increased democratic power rather than the reality. All the great questions of the day turned upon the election of the curule magistracies, and there was sufficient influence among the nobles to secure these offices. Young men from noble families crowded into the political arena, and claimed what once was the reward of distinguished merit. Powerful connections were indispensable for the enjoyment of political power, as in England at the time of Burke. A large body of clients waited on their patron early every morning, and the candidates for office used all those arts which are customary when votes were to be bought. The government no longer disposed of the property of burgesses for the public good, nor favored the idea among them that they were exempted from taxes. Political corruption reached through all grades and classes. Capitalists absorbed the small farms, and great fortunes were the scandal of the times. Capital was more valued than labor. Italian farms depreciated from the conversion of tillage into pasture lands and parks, as in England in the present day. Slavery inordinately increased from the captives taken in war. Western Asia furnished the greatest number of this miserable population, and Cretan and Cilician slave-hunters were found on all the coasts of Syria and Greece. Delos was the great slave-market of the world, where the slave-dealers of Asia Minor disposed of their wares to Italian speculators. In one day as many as ten thousand slaves were disembarked and sold. Farms, and trades, and mines were alike carried on by these slaves from Asia, and their sufferings and hardships were vastly greater than ever endured by negroes on the South Carolinian and Cuban plantations. But they were of a different race—men who had seen better days, and accustomed to civilization—and hence they often rose upon their masters. Servile wars were of common occurrence, Sicily at one time had seventy thousand slaves in arms, and when consular armies were sent to suppress the revolt, the most outrageous cruelties were inflicted. Twenty thousand men, at one time, were crucified in Sicily by Publius Rupilius.

(M940) At this crisis, when disproportionate wealth and slavery were the great social evils, Tiberius Gracchus arose—a young man of high rank, chivalrous, noble, and eloquent. His mother, Cornelia, was the daughter of Scipio Africanus, and therefore belonged to the most exclusive of the aristocratic circles. Tiberius Gracchus was therefore the cousin of Scipio AEmilianus, under whom he served with distinction in Africa. He was seconded in his views of reform by some stern old patriots and aristocrats, who had not utterly forgotten the interests of the State, now being undermined. Appius Claudius, his father-in-law, who had been both consul and censor; Publius Mucius Scaevola, the great lawyer and founder of scientific jurisprudence; his brother, Publius Crassus Mucianus; the Pontifex Maximus; Quintus Metellus, the conqueror of Macedonia—all men of the highest rank and universally respected, entered into his schemes of reform.

(M941) This patriotic patrician was elected tribune B.C. 134, at a time when political mismanagement, moral decay, the decline of burgesses, and the increase of slaves, were most apparent. So Gracchus, after entering upon his office, proposed the enaction of an agrarian law, by which all State lands, occupied by the possessors, without remuneration, should revert to the State, except five hundred jugera for himself, and two hundred and fifty for each son. The domain land thus resumed was to be divided into lots of thirty jugera, and these distributed to burgesses and Italian allies, not as free property, but inalienable leaseholds, for which they paid rent to the State. This was a declaration of war upon the great landholders. The proposal of Gracchus was paralyzed by the vote of his colleague, Marcus Octavius. Gracchus then, in his turn, suspended the business of the State and the administration of justice, and placed his seal on the public chest. The government was obliged to acquiesce. Gracchus, also, as the year was drawing to a close, brought his law to the vote a second time. Again it was vetoed by Octavius. Gracchus then, at the invitation of the consuls, discussed the matter in the Senate; but the Senate, composed of great proprietors, would not yield. All constitutional means were now exhausted, and Gracchus must renounce his reform or begin a revolution.

(M942) He chose the latter. Before the assembled people he demanded that his colleague should be deposed, which was against all the customs, and laws, and precedents of the past. The assembly, composed chiefly of the proletarians who had come from the country—the Comitia Tributa—voted according to his proposal, and Octavius was removed by the lictors from the tribune bench, and then the agrarian law was passed by acclamation. The Commissioners chosen to confiscate and redistribute the lands were Tiberius Gracchus, his brother Gaius, and his father-in-law Appius Claudius, which family selection vastly increased the indignation of the Senate, who threw every obstacle in the way.