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                                      75 AD
                                  CAIUS MARIUS
                                  155?-86 B.C.
                                  by Plutarch
                           translated by John Dryden

  WE are altogether ignorant of any third name of Caius Marius; as
also of Quintus Sertorius, that possessed himself of Spain or of
Lucius Mummius that destroyed Corinth, though this last was surnamed
Achaicus from his conquests, as Scipio was called Africanus, and
Metellus, Macedonicus. Hence Posidonius draws his chief argument to
confute those that hold the third to be the Roman proper name, as
Camillus, Marcellus, Cato; as in this case, those that had but two
names would have no proper name at all. He did not, however, observe
that by his own reasoning he must rob the women absolutely of their
names; for none of them have the first, which Posidonius imagines
the proper name with the Romans. Of the other two, one was common to
the whole family, Pompeii, Manlii, Cornelii (as with us Greeks, the
Heraclidae, and Pelopidae), the other titular, and personal, taken
either from their natures, or actions, or bodily characteristics, as
Macrinus, Torquatus, Sylla; such as are Mnemon, Grypus, or
Callinicus among the Greeks. On the subject of names, however, the
irregularity of custom, would we insist upon it, might furnish us with
discourse enough.
  There is a likeness of Marius in stone at Ravenna, in Gaul, which
I myself saw quite corresponding with that roughness of character that
is ascribed to him. Being naturally valiant and warlike, and more
acquainted also with the discipline of the camp than of the city, he
could not moderate his passion when in authority. He is said never
to have either studied Greek, or to have use of that language in any
matter of consequence; thinking it ridiculous to bestow time in that
learning, the teachers of which were little better than slaves. So
after his second triumph, when at the dedication of a temple he
presented some shows after the Greek fashion, coming into the theatre,
he only sat down and immediately departed. And, accordingly, as
Plato used to say to Xenocrates the philosopher, who was thought to
show more than ordinary harshness of disposition, "I pray you, good
Xenocrates, sacrifice to the Graces;" so if any could have persuaded
Marius to pay his devotions to the Greek Muses and Graces, he had
never brought his incomparable actions, both in war and peace, to so
unworthy a conclusion, or wrecked himself, so to say, upon an old
age of cruelty and vindictiveness, through passion, ill-timed
ambition, and insatiable cupidity. But this will further appear by and
by from the facts.
  He was born of parents altogether obscure and indigent, who
supported themselves by their daily labour; his father of the same
name with himself, his mother called Fulcinia. He had spent a
considerable part of his life before he saw and tasted the pleasures
of the city; having passed previously in Cirrhaeaton, a village of the
territory of Arpinum, a life, compared with city delicacies, rude
and unrefined, yet temperate, and conformable to the ancient Roman
severity. He first served as a soldier in the war against the
Celtiberians, when Scipio Africanus besieged Numantia; where he
signalized himself to his general by courage far above his comrades,
and particularly by his cheerfully complying with Scipio's reformation
of his army, being almost ruined by pleasures and luxury. It is
stated, too, that he encountered and vanquished an enemy in single
combat, in his general's sight. In consequence of all this he had
several honours conferred upon him; and once when at an
entertainment a question arose about commanders, and one of the
company (whether really desirous to know, or only in complaisance)
asked Scipio where the Romans, after him, should obtain such another
general, Scipio, gently clapping Marius on the shoulder as he sat next
him, replied, "Here, perhaps." So promising was his early youth of his
future greatness, and so discerning was Scipio to detect the distant
future in the present first beginnings. It was this speech of
Scipio, we are told, which, like a divine admonition, chiefly
emboldened Marius to aspire to a political career. He sought, and by
the assistance of Caecilius Metellus, of whose family he as well as
his father were dependents, obtained the office of tribune of the
people. In which place, when he brought forward a bill for the
regulation of voting, which seemed likely to lessen the authority of
the great men in the courts of justice, the consul Cotta opposed
him, and persuaded the senate to declare against the law, and called
Marius to account for it. He, however, when this decree was
prepared, coming into the senate, did not behave like a young man
newly and undeservedly advanced to authority, but, assuming all the
courage that his future actions would have warranted, threatened
Cotta, unless he recalled the decree, to throw him into prison. And on
his turning to Metellus, and asking his vote, and Metellus, rising
up to concur with the consul, Marius, calling for the officer outside,
commanded him to take Metellus into custody. He appealed to the
other tribunes, but not one of them assisted him; so that the
senate, immediately complying, withdrew the decree. Marius came
forth with glory to the people and confirmed his law, and was
henceforth esteemed a man of undaunted courage and assurance, as
well as a vigorous opposer of the senate in favour of the commons. But
he immediately lost their opinion of him by a contrary action; for
when a law for the distribution of corn was proposed, he vigorously
and successfully resisted it, making himself equally honoured by
both parties, in gratifying neither, contrary to the public interest.
  After his tribuneship, he was candidate for the office of chief
aedile; there being two orders of them, one the curules, from the
stool with crooked feet on which they sat when they performed their
duty; the other and inferior, called aediles of the people. As soon as
they have chosen the former, they give their voices again for the
latter. Marius, finding he was likely to be put by for the greater,
immediately changed and stood for the less; but because he seemed
too forward and hot, he was disappointed of that also. And yet
though he was in one day twice frustrated of his desired preferment
(which never happened to any before), yet he was not at all
discouraged, but a little while after sought for the praetorship and
was nearly suffering a repulse, and then, too, though he was
returned last of all, was nevertheless accused of bribery.
  Cassius Sabaco's servant, who was observed within the rails among
those who voted, chiefly occasioned the suspicion, as Sabaco was an
intimate friend of Marius; but on being called to appear before the
judges, he alleged, that being thirsty by reason of the heat, he
called for cold water, and that his servant brought him a cup, and
as soon as he had drunk, departed; he was, however, excluded from
the senate by the succeeding censors, and not undeservedly either,
as was thought, whether it might be for his false evidence, or his
want of temperance. Caius Herennius was also cited to appear as
evidence, but pleaded that it was not customary for a patron (the
Roman word for protector) to witness against his clients, and that the
law excused them from that harsh duty; and both Marius and his parents
had always been clients to the family of Herennii. And when the judges
would have accepted of this plea, Marius himself opposed it, and
told Herennius, that when he was first created magistrate he ceased to
be his client; which was not altogether true. For it is not every
office that frees clients and their posterity from the observance
due to their patrons, but only those to which the law has assigned a
curule chair. Notwithstanding, though at the beginning of the suit
it went somewhat hard with Marius, and he found the judges no way
favourable to him, yet at last, their voices being equal, contrary
to all expectation, he was acquitted.
  In his praetorship he did not get much honour, yet after it he
obtained the further Spain; which province he is said to have
cleared of robbers, with which it was much infested, the old barbarous
habits still prevailing, and the Spaniards, in those days, still
regarding robbery as a piece of valour. In the city he had neither
riches nor eloquence to trust to, with which the leading men of the
time obtained power with the people, but his vehement disposition, his
indefatigable labours, and his plain way of living, of themselves
gained him esteem and influence; so that he made an honourable match
with Julia, of the distinguished family of the Caesars, to whom that
Caesar was nephew who was afterwards so great among the Romans, and,
in some degree, from his relationship, made Marius his example, as
in his life we have observed.
  Marius is praised for both temperance and endurance, of which latter
he gave a decided instance in an operation of surgery. For having,
as it seems, both his legs full of great tumours, and disliking the
deformity, he determined to put himself into the hands of an operator;
when, without being tied, he stretched out one of his legs, and
silently, without changing countenance, endured most excessive
torments in the cutting, never either flinching or complaining; but
when the surgeon went to the other, he declined to have it done,
saying, "I see the cure is not worth the pain."
  The consul Caecilius Metellus, being declared general in the war
against Jugurtha in Africa took with him Marius for lieutenant; where,
eager himself to do great deeds and services that would get him
distinction, he did not, like others, consult Metellus's glory and the
serving his interest, and attributing his honour of lieutenancy not to
Metellus, but to fortune, which had presented him with a proper
opportunity and theatre of great actions, he exerted his utmost
courage. That war, too, affording several difficulties, he neither
declined the greatest, nor disdained undertaking the least of them,
but surpassing his equals in counsel and conduct, and matching the
very common soldiers in labour and abstemiousness, he gained great
popularity with them; as indeed any voluntary partaking with people in
their labour is felt as an easing of that labour, as it seems to
take away the constraint and necessity of it. It is the most
obliging sight in the world to the Roman soldier to see a commander
eat the same bread as himself, or lie upon an ordinary bed, or
assist the work in the drawing a trench and raising a bulwark. For
they do not so much admire those that confer honours and riches upon
them, as those that partake of the same labour and danger with
themselves; but love them better that will vouchsafe to join in
their work, than those that encourage their idleness.
  Marius thus employed, and thus winning the affections of the
soldiers, before long filled both Africa and Rome with his fame, and
some, too, wrote home from the army that the war with Africa would
never be brought to a conclusion unless they chose Caius Marius
consul. All which was evidently unpleasing to Metellus; but what
more especially grieved him was the calamity of Turpillius. This
Turpillius had, from his ancestors, been a friend of Metellus, and
kept up a constant hospitality with him, and was now serving in the
war in command of the smiths and carpenters of the army. Having the
charge of a garrison in Vaga, a considerable city, and trusting too
much to the inhabitants, because he treated them civilly and kindly,
he unawares fell into the enemy's hands. They received Jugurtha into
the city; yet nevertheless, at their request, Turpillius was dismissed
safe and without receiving any injury; whereupon he was accused of
betraying it to the enemy. Marius, being one of the council of war,
was not only violent against him himself, but also incensed most of
the others, so that Metellus was forced, much against his will, to put
him to death. Not long after the accusation proved false, and when
others were comforting Metellus, who took heavily the loss of his
friend, Marius, rather insulting and arrogating it to himself, boasted
in all companies that he had involved Metellus in the guilt of putting
his friend to death.
  Henceforward they were at open variance; and it is reported that
Metellus once, when Marius was present, said insultingly, "You, sir,
design to leave us to go home and stand for the consulship, and will
not be content to wait and be consul with this boy of mine?"
Metellus's son being a mere boy at the time. Yet for all this Marius
being very importunate to be gone, after several delays, he was
dismissed about twelve days before the election of consuls; and
performed that long journey from the camp to the seaport of Utica in
two days and a night, and there doing sacrifice before he went on
shipboard, it is said the augur told him that heaven promised him some
incredible good fortune, and such as was beyond all expectation.
Marius, not a little elated with his good omen, began his voyage,
and in four days, with a favourable wind, passed the sea; he was
welcomed with great joy by the people, and being brought into the
assembly by one of the tribunes, sued for the consulship, inveighing
in all ways against Metellus, and promising either to slay Jugurtha or
take him alive.
  He was elected triumphantly, and at once proceeded to levy
soldiers contrary both to law and custom, enlisting slaves and poor
people; whereas former commanders never accepted of such, but bestowed
arms, like other favours, as a matter of distinction, on persons who
had the proper qualification, a man's property being thus a sort of
security for his good behaviour. These were not the only occasions
of ill-will against Marius; some haughty speeches, uttered with
great arrogance and contempt, gave great offence to the nobility;
as, for example, his saying that he had carried off the consulship
as a spoil from the effeminacy of the wealthy and high-born
citizens, and telling the people that he gloried in wounds he had
himself received for them, as much as others did in the monuments of
dead men, and images of their ancestors. Often speaking of the
commanders that had been unfortunate in Africa, naming Bestia, for
example, and Albinus, men of very good families, but unfit for war,
and who had miscarried through want of experience, he asked the people
about him if they did not think that the ancestors of these nobles had
much rather have left a descendant like him, since they themselves
grew famous not by nobility, but by their valour and great actions?
This he did not say merely out of vanity and arrogance, or that he
were willing, without any advantage, to offend the nobility; but the
people always delighting in affronts and scurrilous contumelies
against the senate, making boldness of speech their measure of
greatness of spirit, continually encouraged him in it, and
strengthened his inclination not to spare persons of repute, so he
might gratify the multitude.
  As soon as he arrived again in Africa, Metellus, no longer able to
control his feelings of jealousy, and his indignation that now when he
had really finished the war, and nothing was left but to secure the
person of Jugurtha, Marius, grown great merely through his ingratitude
to him, should come to bereave him both of his victory and triumph,
could not bear to have any interview with him; but retired himself,
whilst Rutilius, his lieutenant, surrendered up the army to Marius,
whose conduct, however, in the end of the war, met with some sort of
retribution, as Sylla deprived him of the glory of the action as he
had done Metellus. I shall state the circumstances briefly here as
they are given at large in the life of Sylla. Bocchus was king of
the more distant barbarians, and was father-in-law to Jugurtha, yet
sent him little or no assistance in his war, professing fears of his
unfaithfulness, and really jealous of his growing power; but after
Jugurtha fled, and in his distress came to him as his last hope, he
received him as a suppliant, rather because ashamed to do otherwise
than out of real kindness; and when he had him in his power, he openly
entreated Marius on his behalf, and interceded for him with bold
words, giving out that he would by no means deliver him. Yet privately
designing to betray him, he sent for Lucius Sylla, quaestor to Marius,
and who had on a previous occasion befriended Bocchus in the war. When
Sylla, relying on his word, came to him, the African began to doubt
and repent of his purpose, and for several days was unresolved with
himself, whether he should deliver Jugurtha or retain Sylla; at length
he fixed upon his former treachery, and put Jugurtha alive into
Sylla's possession. Thus was the first occasion given of that fierce
and implacable hostility which so nearly ruined the whole Roman
empire. For many that envied Marius attributed the success wholly to
Sylla, and Sylla himself got a seal made, on which was engraved
Bocchus betraying Jugurtha to him, and constantly used it,
irritating the hot and jealous temper of Marius, who was naturally
greedy of distinction, and quick to resent any claim to share in his
glory, and whose enemies took care to promote the quarrel, ascribing
the beginning and chief business of the war to Metellus and its
conclusion to Sylla; that so the people might give over admiring and
esteeming Marius as the worthiest person.
  But these envyings and calumnies were soon dispersed and cleared
away from Marius by the danger that threatened Italy from the west;
when the city, in great need of a good commander, sought about whom
she might set at the helm to meet the tempest of so great a war, no
one would have anything to say to any members of noble or potent
families who offered themselves for the consulship, and Marius, though
then absent, was elected.
  Jugurtha's apprehension was only just known, when the news of the
invasion of the Teutones and Cimbri began. The accounts at first
exceeded all credit, as to the number and strength of the
approaching army, but in the end report proved much inferior to truth,
as they were three hundred thousand effective fighting men, besides
a far greater number of women and children. They professed to be
seeking new countries to sustain these great multitudes, and cities
where they might settle and inhabit, in the same way as they had heard
the Celti before them had driven out the Tyrrhenians, and possessed
themselves of the best part of Italy. Having had no commerce with
the southern nations, and travelling over a wide extent of country, no
man knew what people they were, or whence they came, that thus like
a cloud burst over Gaul and Italy; yet by their grey eyes and the
largeness of their stature they were conjectured to be some of the
German races dwelling by the northern sea; besides that, the Germans
call plunderers Cimbri.
  There are some that say that the country of the Celti, in its vast
size and extent, reaches from the furthest sea and the arctic
regions to the lake Maeotis eastward, and to that part of Scythia
which is near Pontus, and that there the nations mingle together; that
they did not swarm out of their country all at once, or on a sudden,
but advancing by force of arms, in the summer season, every year, in
the course of time they crossed the whole continent. And thus,
though each party had several appellations, yet the whole army was
called by the common name of Celto-Scythians. Others say that the
Cimmerii, anciently known to the Greeks, were only a small part of the
nation, who were driven out upon some quarrel among the Scythians, and
passed all along from the lake Maeotis to Asia, under the conduct of
one Lygdamis; and that the greater and more warlike part of them still
inhabit the remotest regions lying upon the outer ocean. These, they
say, live in a dark and woody country hardly penetrable by the
sunbeams, the trees are so close and thick, extending into the
interior as far as the Hercynian forest; and their position on the
earth is under that part of heaven where the pole is so elevated that,
by the declination of the parallels, the zenith of the inhabitants
seems to be but little distant from it; and that their days and nights
being almost of an equal length, they divide their year into one of
each. This was Homer's occasion for the story of Ulysses calling up
the dead, and from this region the people, anciently called
Cimmerii, and afterwards, by an easy change, Cimbri, came into
Italy. All this, however, is rather conjecture than an authentic
history.
  Their numbers, most writers agree, were not less, but rather greater
than was reported. They were of invincible strength and fierceness
in their wars, and hurried into battle with the violence of a
devouring flame; none could withstand them: all they assaulted
became their prey. Several of the greatest Roman commanders with their
whole armies, that advanced for the defence of Transalpine Gaul,
were ingloriously overthrown, and, indeed, by their faint
resistance, chiefly gave them the impulse of marching towards Rome.
Having vanquished all they had met, and found abundance of plunder,
they resolved to settle themselves nowhere till they should have razed
the city and wasted all Italy. The Romans, being from all parts
alarmed with this news, sent for Marius to undertake the war, and
nominated him the second time consul, though the law did not permit
any one that was absent, or that had not waited a certain time after
his first consulship, to be again created. But the people rejected all
opposers, for they considered this was not the first time that the law
gave place to the common interest; nor the present occasion less
urgent than that when, contrary to law, they made Scipio consul, not
in fear for the destruction of their own city, but desiring the ruin
of that of the Carthaginians.
  Thus it was decided; and Marius, bringing over his legions out of
Africa on the very first day of January, which the Romans count the
beginning of the year, received the consulship, and then, also,
entered in triumph, showing Jugurtha a prisoner to the people, a sight
they had despaired of ever beholding, nor could any, so long as he
lived, hope to reduce the enemy in Africa; so fertile in expedients
was he to adapt himself to every turn of fortune, and so bold as
well as subtle. When, however, he was led in triumph, it is said
that he fell distracted, and when he was afterwards thrown into
prison, where some tore off his clothes by force, and others, whilst
they struggled for his golden earring, with it pulled off the tip of
his ear, and when he was, after this, cast naked into the dungeon,
in his amazement and confusion, with a ghastly laugh, he cried out, "O
Hercules! how cold your bath is!" Here for six days struggling with
hunger, and to the very last minute desirous of life, he was overtaken
by the just reward of his villainies. In this triumph was brought,
as is stated, of gold three thousand and seven pounds weight, of
silver bullion five thousand seven hundred and seventy-five, of
money in gold and silver coin two hundred and eighty-seven thousand
drachmas. After the solemnity, Marius called together the senate in
the capitol, and entered, whether through inadvertency or unbecoming
exultation with his good fortune, in his triumphal habit; but
presently observing the senate offended at it, went out, and
returned in his ordinary purple-bordered robe.
  On the expedition he carefully disciplined and trained his army
whilst they were on their way, giving them practice in long marches,
and running of every sort, and compelling every man to carry his own
baggage and prepare his own victuals; insomuch that thenceforward
laborious soldiers, who did their work silently without grumbling, had
the name of "Marius's mules." Some, however, think the proverb had a
different occasion; that when Scipio besieged Numantia, and was
careful to inspect not only their horses and arms, but their mules and
carriages too, and see how well equipped and in what readiness each
one's was, Marius brought forth his horse which he had fed extremely
well, and a mule in better case, stronger and gentler than those of
others; that the general was very well pleased, and often afterwards
mentioned Marius's beasts; and that hence the soldiers, when
speaking jestingly in the praise of a drudging laborious fellow,
called him Marius's mule.
  But to proceed; very great fortune seemed to attend Marius, for by
the enemy in a manner changing their course, and falling first upon
Spain, he had time to exercise his soldiers, and confirm their
courage, and, which was most important, to show them what he himself
was. For that fierce manner of his in command, and inexorableness in
punishing, when his men became used not to do amiss or disobey, was
felt to be wholesome and advantageous, as well as just, and his
violent spirit, stern voice, and harsh aspect, which in a little while
grew familiar to them, they esteemed terrible not to themselves, but
only to their enemies. But his uprightness in judging more
especially pleased the soldiers, one remarkable instance of which is
as follows. One Caius Lusius, his own nephew, had a command under
him in the army, a man not in other respects of bad character, but
shamefully licentious with young men. He had one young man under his
command called Trebonius, with whom notwithstanding many solicitations
he could never prevail. At length one night he sent a messenger for
him and Trebonius came, as it was not lawful for him to refuse when he
was sent for, and being brought into his tent, when Lusius began to
use violence with him, he drew his sword and ran him through. This was
done whilst Marius was absent. When he returned, he appointed
Trebonius a time for his trial, where, whilst many accused him, and
not any one appeared in his defence, he himself boldly related the
whole matter, and brought witness of his previous conduct to Lusius,
who had frequently offered him considerable presents. Marius, admiring
his conduct and much pleased, commanded the garland, the usual Roman
reward of valour, to be brought, and himself crowned Trebonius with
it, as having performed an excellent action, at a time that very
much wanted such good examples.
  This being told at Rome, proved no small help to Marius towards
his third consulship; to which also conduced the expectation of the
barbarians at the summer season, the people being unwilling to trust
their fortunes with any other general but him. However, their
arrival was not so early as was imagined, and the time of Marius's
consulship was again expired. The election coming on, and his
colleague being dead, he left the command of the army to Manius
Aquilius, and hastened to Rome, where, several eminent persons being
candidates for the consulship, Lucius Saturninus, who more than any of
the other tribunes swayed the populace, and of whom Marius himself was
very observant, exerted his eloquence with the people, advising them
to choose Marius consul. He playing the modest part, and professing to
decline the office, Saturninus called him traitor to his country if,
in such apparent danger, he would avoid command. And though it was not
difficult to discover that he was merely helping Marius in putting
this pretence upon the people, yet, considering that the present
juncture much required his skill, and his good fortunes too, they
voted him the fourth time consul, and made Catulus Lutatius his
colleague, a man very much esteemed by the nobility and not
unagreeable to the commons.
  Marius, having notice of the enemy's approach, with all expedition
passed the Alps, and pitching his camp by the river Rhone, took care
first for plentiful supplies of victuals: lest at any time he should
be forced to fight at a disadvantage for want of necessaries. The
carriage of provision for the army from the sea, which was formerly
long and expensive, he made speedy and easy. For the mouth, of the
Rhone, by the influx of the sea, being barred and almost filled up
with sand and mud mixed with clay, the passage there became narrow,
difficult, and dangerous for the ships that brought their
provisions. Hither, therefore, bringing his army, then at leisure,
he drew a great trench: and by turning the course of a great part of
the river, brought it to a convenient point on the shore where the
water was deep enough to receive ships of considerable burden, and
where there was a calm and easy opening to the sea. And this still
retains the name it took from him.
  The enemy dividing themselves into two parts, the Cimbri arranged to
go against Catulus higher up through the country of the Norici, and to
force that passage; the Teutones and Ambrones to march against
Marius by the seaside through Liguria. The Cimbri were a
considerable time in doing their part. But the Teutones and Ambrones
with all expedition passing over the interjacent country, soon came in
sight, in numbers beyond belief, of a terrible aspect, and uttering
strange cries and shouts. Taking up a great part of the plain with
their camp, they challenged Marius to battle; he seemed to take no
notice of them, but kept his soldiers within their fortification,
and sharply reprehended those that were too forward and eager to
show their courage, and who, out of passion, would needs be
fighting, calling them traitors to their country, and telling them
they were not now to think of the glory of triumphs and trophies,
but rather how they might repel such an impetuous tempest of war and
save Italy.
  Thus he discoursed privately with his officers and equals, but
placed the soldiers by turns upon the bulwarks to survey the enemy,
and so made them familiar with their shape and voice, which were
indeed altogether extravagant and barbarous, and he caused them to
observe their arms, and the way of using them, so that in a little
time what at first appeared terrible to their apprehensions, by
often viewing became familiar. For he very rationally supposed that
the strangeness of things often makes them seem formidable when they
are not so; and that by our better acquaintance, even things which are
really terrible lose much of their frightfulness. This daily
converse not only diminished some of the soldiers' fears, but their
indignation warmed and inflamed their courage when they heard the
threats and insupportable insolence of their enemies; who not only
plundered and depopulated all the country round, but would even
contemptuously and confidently attack the ramparts.
  Complaints of the soldiers now began to come to Marius's ears. "What
effeminacy does Marius see in us, that he should thus like women
lock us up from encountering our enemies? Come on, let us show
ourselves men, and ask him if he expects others to fight for Italy;
and means merely to employ us in servile offices, when he would dig
trenches, cleanse places of mud and dirt, and turn the course of the
rivers? It was to do such works as these, it seems, that he gave us
all our long training; he will return home, and boast of these great
performances of his consulships to the people. Does the defeat of
Carbo and Caepio, who were vanquished by the enemy, affright him?
Surely they were much inferior to Marius both in glory and valour, and
commanded a much weaker army: at the worst, it is better to be in
action, though we suffer for it like them, than to sit idle spectators
of the destruction of our allies and companions." Marius, not a little
pleased to hear this, gently appeased them, pretending that he did not
distrust their valour, but that he took his measures as to the time
and place of victory from some certain oracles.
  And, in fact, he used solemnly to carry about in a litter a Syrian
woman, called Martha, a supposed prophetess, and to do sacrifice by
her directions. She had formerly been driven away by the senate, to
whom she addressed herself, offering to inform them about these
affairs, and to foretell future events; and after this betook
herself to the women, and gave them proofs of her skill, especially
Marius's wife, at whose feet she sat when she was viewing a contest of
gladiators, and correctly foretold which of them should overcome.
She was for this and the like predictings sent by her to Marius and
the army, where she was very much looked up to, and, for the most
part, carried about in a litter. When she went to sacrifice, she
wore a purple robe lined and buckled up, and had in her hand a
little spear trimmed with ribbons and garlands. This theatrical show
made many question whether Marius really gave any credit to her
himself, or only played the counterfeit, when he showed her
publicly, to impose upon the soldiers.
  What, however, Alexander the Myndian relates about the vultures does
really deserve admiration; that always before Marius's victories there
appeared two of them, and accompanied the army, which were known by
their brazen collars (the soldiers having caught them and put these
about their necks, and so let them go, from which time they in a
manner knew and saluted the soldiers), and whenever these appeared
in their marches, they used to rejoice at it, and thought themselves
sure of some success. Of the many other prodigies that then were taken
notice of, the greater part were but of the ordinary stamp; it was,
however, reported that at Ameria and Tuder, two cities in Italy, there
were seen at nights in the sky flaming darts and shields, now waved
about, and then again clashing against one another, all in
accordance with the postures and motions soldiers use in fighting;
that at length one party retreating, and the other pursuing, they
all disappeared westward. Much about the same time came Bataces, one
of Cybele's priests, from Pessinus, and reported how the goddess had
declared to him out of her oracle that the Romans should obtain the
victory. The senate giving credit to him, and voting the goddess a
temple to be built in hopes of the victory, Aulus Pompeius, a tribune,
prevented Bataces, when he would have gone and told the people this
same story, calling him impostor, and ignominiously pulling him off
the hustings; which action in the end was the main thing that gained
credit for the man's story, for Aulus had scarce dissolved the
assembly, and returned home, when a violent fever seized him, and it
was matter of universal remark, and in everybody's mouth, that he died
within a week after.
  Now the Teutones, whilst Marius lay quiet, ventured to attack his
camp; from whence, however, being encountered with showers of darts,
and losing several of their men, they determined to march forward,
hoping to reach the other side of the Alps without opposition, and,
packing up their baggage, passed securely by the Roman camp, where the
greatness of their number was especially made evident by the long time
they took in their march, for they were said to be six days
continually going on in passing Marius's fortifications; they
marched pretty near, and revilingly asked the Romans if they would
send any commands by them to their wives, for they would shortly be
with them. As soon as they were passed and had gone on a little
distance ahead, Marius began to move, and follow them at his
leisure, always encamping at some small distance from them; choosing
also strong positions, and carefully fortifying them, that he might
quarter with safety. Thus they marched till they came to the place
called Sextilius's Waters, from whence it was but a short way before
being amidst the Alps, and here Marius put himself in readiness for
the encounter.
  He chose a place for his camp of considerable strength, but where
there was a scarcity of water; designing, it is said, by this means,
also, to put an edge on his soldiers' courage; and when several were
not a little distressed, and complained of thirst, pointing to a river
that ran near the enemy's camp; "There," said he, "you may have drink,
if you will buy it with your blood." "Why, then," replied they, "do
you not lead us to them, before our blood is dried up in us?" He
answered, in a softer tone, "Let us first fortify our camp," and the
soldiers, though not without repining, proceeded to obey. Now a
great company of their boys and camp followers, having neither drink
for themselves nor for their horses, went down to that river; some
taking axes and hatchets, and some, too, swords and darts with their
pitchers, resolving to have water though they fought for it. These
were first encountered by a small party of the enemies; for most of
them had just finished bathing, and were eating and drinking, and
several were still bathing, the country thereabouts abounding in hot
springs; so that the Romans partly fell upon them whilst they were
enjoying themselves and occupied with the novel sights and
pleasantness of the place. Upon hearing the shouts, great numbers
still joining in the fight, it was not a little difficult for Marius
to contain his soldiers, who were afraid of losing the camp
servants; and the more warlike part of the enemies, who had overthrown
Manlius and Caepio (they were called Ambrones, and were in number, one
with another, above thirty thousand), taking the alarm, leaped up
and hurried to arms.
  These, though they had just been gorging themselves with food, and
were excited and disordered with drink, nevertheless did not advance
with an unruly step, or in mere senseless fury, nor were their
shouts mere inarticulate cries; but clashing their arms in concert and
keeping time as they leapt and bounded onward, they continually
repeated their own name, "Ambrones!" either to encourage one
another, or to strike the greater terror into their enemies. Of all
the Italians in Marius's army, the Ligurians were the first that
charged; and when they caught the word of the enemy's confused
shout, they, too, returned the same, as it was an ancient name also in
their country, the Ligurians always using it when speaking of their
descent. This acclamation, bandied from one army to the other before
they joined, served to rouse and heighten their fury, while the men on
either side strove, with all possible vehemence, the one to
overshout the other.
  The river disordered the Ambrones; before they could draw up all
their army on the other side of it, the Ligurians presently fell
upon the van, and began to charge them hand to hand. The Romans,
too, coming to their assistance, and from the higher ground pouring
upon the enemy, forcibly repelled them, and the most of them (one
thrusting another into the river) were there slain, and filled it with
their blood and dead bodies. Those that got safe over, not daring to
make head, were slain by the Romans, as they fled to their camp and
wagons; where the women meeting them with swords and hatchets, and
making a hideous outcry, set upon those that fled as well as those
that pursued, the one as traitors, the other as enemies, and mixing
themselves with the combatants, with their bare arms pulling away
the Romans' shields, and laying hold on their swords, endured the
wounds and slashing of their bodies to the very last with undaunted
resolution. Thus the battle seems to have happened at that river
rather by accident than by the design of the general.
  After the Romans were retired from the great slaughter of the
Ambrones, night came on; but the army was not indulged, as was the
usual custom, with songs of victory, drinking in their tents, and
mutual entertainments and (what is most welcome to soldiers after
successful fighting) quiet sleep, but they passed that night, above
all others, in fears and alarm. For their camp was without either
rampart or palisade, and there remained thousands upon thousands of
their enemies yet unconquered; to whom were joined as many of the
Ambrones as escaped. There were heard from these all through the night
wild bewailings, nothing like the sighs and groans of men, but a
sort of wild-beast-like howling and cursing joined with threats and
lamentations rising from the vast multitude, and echoed among the
neighbouring hills and hollow banks of the river. The whole plain
was filled with hideous noise, insomuch that the Romans were not a
little afraid and Marius himself was apprehensive of a confused
tumultuous night engagement. But the enemy did not stir either this
night or the next day, but were employed in disposing and drawing
themselves up to the greatest advantage.
  Of this occasion Marius made good use; for there were beyond the
enemies some wooded ascents and deep valleys thickly set with trees,
whither he sent Claudius Marcellus, secretly, with three thousand
regular soldiers, giving him orders to post them in ambush there,
and show themselves at the rear of the enemies when the fight was
begun. The others, refreshed with victuals and sleep, as soon as it
was day he drew up before the camp, and commanded the horse to sally
out into the plain, at the sight of which the Teutones could not
contain themselves till the Romans should come down and fight them
on equal terms, but hastily arming themselves, charged in their fury
up the hillside. Marius, sending officers to all parts, commanded
his men to stand still and keep their ground; when they came within
reach, to throw their javelins, then use their swords, and joining
their shields, force them back; pointing out to them that the
steepness of the ground would render the enemy's blows inefficient,
nor could their shields be kept close together, the inequality of
the ground hindering the stability of their footing.
  This counsel he gave them, and was the first that followed it; for
he was inferior to none in the use of his body, and far excelled all
in resolution. The Romans accordingly stood for their approach, and,
checking them in their advance upwards, forced them little by little
to give way and yield down the hill, and here, on the level ground, no
sooner had the Ambrones begun to restore their van into a posture of
resistance, but they found their rear disordered. For Marcellus had
not let slip the opportunity; but as soon as the shout was raised
among the Romans on the hills, he, setting his men in motion, fell
in upon the enemy behind, at full speed, and with loud cries, and
routed those nearest him, and they, breaking the ranks of those that
were before them, filled the whole army with confusion. They made no
long resistance after they were thus broke in upon, but having lost
all order, fled.
  The Romans, pursuing them, slew and took prisoners above one hundred
thousand, and possessing themselves of their spoil, tents, and
carriages, voted all that was not purloined to Marius's share,
which, though so magnificent a present, yet was generally thought less
than his conduct deserved in so great a danger. Other authors give a
different account, both about the division of the plunder and the
number of the slain. They say, however, that the inhabitants of
Massilia made fences round their vineyards with the bones, and that
the ground, enriched by the moisture of the putrefied bodies (soaked
with the rain of the following winter), yielded at the season a
prodigious crop, and fully justified Archilochus, who said, that the
fallows thus are fattened. It is an observation, also, that
extraordinary rains pretty generally fall after great battles; whether
it be that some divine power thus washes and cleanses the polluted
earth with showers from above, or that moist and heavy evaporations,
steaming forth from the blood and corruption, thicken the air, which
naturally is subject to alteration from the smallest causes.
  After the battle, Marius chose out from amongst the barbarians'
spoils and arms those that were whole and handsome, and that would
make the greatest show in his triumph; the rest he heaped upon a large
pile, and offered a very splendid sacrifice. Whilst the army stood
round about with their arms and garlands, himself attired (as the
fashion is on such occasions) in the purple-bordered robe, and
taking a lighted torch, and with both hands lifting it up towards
heaven, he was then going to put it to the pile, when some friends
were espied with all haste coming towards him on horseback. Upon which
every one remained in silence and expectation. They, upon their coming
up, leapt off and saluted Marius, bringing him the news of his fifth
consulship, and delivered him letters to that effect. This gave the
addition of no small joy to the solemnity; and while the soldiers
clashed their arms and shouted, the officers again crowned Marius with
a laurel wreath, and he thus set fire to the pile, and finished his
sacrifice.
  But whatever it be which interferes to prevent the enjoyment of
prosperity ever being pure and sincere, and still diversifies human
affairs with the mixture of good and bad, whether fortune or divine
displeasure, or the necessity of the nature of things, within a few
days Marius received an account of his colleague, Catulus, which, as a
cloud in serenity and calm, terrified Rome with the apprehension of
another imminent storm. Catulus, who marched against the Cimbri,
despairing of being able to defend the passes of the Alps, lest, being
compelled to divide his forces into several parties, he should
weaken himself, descended again into Italy, and posted his army behind
the river Adige; where he occupied the passages with strong
fortifications on both sides the river, and made a bridge, that so
he might cross to the assistance of his men on the other side, if so
be the enemy, having forced their way through the mountain passes,
should storm the fortresses. The barbarians, however, came on with
such insolence and contempt of their enemies, that to show their
strength and courage, rather than out of any necessity, they went
naked in the showers of snow, and through the ice and deep snow
climbed up to the tops of the hills, and from thence, placing their
broad shields under their bodies, let themselves slide from the
precipices along their vast slippery descents.
  When they had pitched their camp at a little distance from the
river, and surveyed the passage, they began to pile it up, giant-like,
tearing down the neighbouring hills; and brought trees pulled up by
the roots, and heaps of earth to the river, damming up its course; and
with great heavy materials which they rolled down the stream and
dashed against the bridge, they forced away the beams which
supported it; in consequence of which the greatest part of the Roman
soldiers, much affrighted, left the camp and fled. Here Catulus showed
himself a generous and noble general, in preferring the glory of his
people before his own; for when he could not prevail with his soldiers
to stand to their colours, but saw how they all deserted them, he
commanded his own standard to be taken up, and running to the foremost
of those that fled, he led them forward, choosing rather that the
disgrace should fall upon himself than upon his country, and that they
should not seem to fly, but, following their captain, to make a
retreat. The barbarians assaulted and took the fortress on the other
side the Adige; where much admiring the few Romans there left, who had
shown extreme courage, and had fought worthily of their country,
they dismissed them upon terms, swearing them upon their brazen
bull, which was afterwards taken in the battle, and carried, they say,
to Catulus's house, as the chief trophy of victory.
  Thus falling in upon the country destitute of defence, they wasted
it on all sides. Marius was presently sent for to the city; where,
when he arrived, every one supposing he would triumph, the senate,
too, unanimously voting it, he himself did not think it convenient:
whether that he were not willing to deprive his soldiers and
officers of their share of the glory, or that, to encourage the people
in this juncture, he would leave the honour due to his past victory on
trust, as it were, in the hands of the city and its future fortune;
deferring it now to receive it afterwards with the greater
splendour. Having left such orders as the occasion required, he
hastened to Catulus, whose drooping spirits he much raised, and sent
for his own army from Gaul; and as soon as it came, passing the
river Po, he endeavoured to keep the barbarians out of that part of
Italy which lies south of it.
  They professed they were in expectation of the Teutones, and
saying they wondered they were so long in coming deferred the
battle; either that they were really ignorant of their defeat or
were willing to seem so. For they certainly much maltreated those that
brought them such news, and, sending to Marius, required some part
of the country for themselves and their brethren, and cities fit for
them to inhabit. When Marius inquired of the ambassadors who their
brethren were, upon their saying the Teutones, all that were present
began to laugh; and Marius scoffingly answered them, "Do not trouble
yourself for your brethren, for we have already provided lands for
them, which they shall possess for ever." The ambassadors,
understanding the mockery, broke into insults, and threatened that the
Cimbri would make him pay for this and the Teutones, too, when they
came. "They are not far off," replied Marius, "and it will be unkindly
done of you to go away before greeting your brethren." Saying so, he
commanded the kings of the Teutones to be brought out, as they were,
in chains; for they were taken by the Sequani among the Alps, before
they could make their escape. This was no sooner made known to the
Cimbri, but they with all expedition came against Marius, who then lay
still and guarded his camp.
  It is said that, against this battle Marius first altered the
construction of the Roman javelins. For before at the place where
the wood was joined to the iron it was made fast with two iron pins;
but now Marius let one of them alone as it was, and pulling out the
other, put a weak wooden peg in its place, thus contriving that when
it was driven into the enemy's shield, it should not stand right
out, but the wooden peg breaking, the iron should bend, and so the
javelin should hold fast by its crooked point and drag. Boeorix,
King of the Cimbri, came with a small party of horse to the Roman
camp, and challenged Marius to appoint the time and place where they
might meet and fight for the country. Marius answered that the
Romans never consulted their enemies when to fight, however, he
would gratify the Cimbri so far; and so they fixed upon the third
day after and for the place, the plain near Vercellae, which was
convenient enough for the Roman horse, and afforded room for the enemy
to display their numbers.
  They observed the time appointed, and drew out their forces
against each other. Catulus commanded twenty thousand three hundred,
and Marius thirty-two thousand, who were placed in the two wings,
leaving Catulus the centre. Sylla, who was present at the fight, gives
this account; saying, also, that Marius drew up his army in this
order, because he expected that the armies would meet on the wings
since it generally happens that in such extensive fronts the centre
falls back, and thus he would have the whole victory to himself and
his soldiers, and Catulus would not be even engaged. They tell us,
also, that Catulus himself alleged this in vindication of his
honour, accusing, in various ways, the enviousness of Marius. The
infantry of the Cimbri marched quietly out of their fortifications,
having their flanks equal to their front; every side of the army
taking up thirty furlongs. Their horse, that were in number fifteen
thousand, made a very splendid appearance. They wore helmets, made
to resemble the head and jaws of wild beasts, and other strange
shapes, and heightening these with plumes of feathers, they made
themselves appear taller than they were. They had breastplates of iron
and white glittering shields; and for their offensive arms every one
had two darts, and when they came hand to hand, they used large and
heavy swords.
  The cavalry did not fall directly upon the front of the Romans, but,
turning to the right, they endeavoured to draw them on in that
direction by little and little, so as to get them between themselves
and their infantry, who were placed in the left wing. The Roman
commanders soon perceived the design, but could not contain the
soldiers; for one happening to shout out that the enemy fled, they all
rushed to pursue them, while the whole barbarian foot came on,
moving like a great ocean. Here Marius, having washed his hands, and
lifting them up towards heaven, vowed an hecatomb to the gods; and
Catulus, too, in the same posture, solemnly promised to consecrate a
temple to the "Fortune of that day." They say, too, that Marius,
having the victim shown to him as he was sacrificing, cried out with a
loud voice, "The victory is mine."
  However, in the engagement, according to the accounts of Sylla and
his friends, Marius met with what might be called a mark of divine
displeasure. For a great dust being raised, which (as it might very
probably happen) almost covered both the armies, he, leading on his
forces to the pursuit, missed the enemy, and having passed by their
array, moved for a good space, up and down the field; meanwhile the
enemy, by chance, engaged with Catulus, and the heat of the battle was
chiefly with him and his men, among whom Sylla says he was; adding,
that the Romans had great advantage of the heat and sun that shone
in the faces of the Cimbri. For they, well able to endure cold, and
having been bred up (as we observed before) in cold and shady
countries, were overcome with the excessive heat; they sweated
extremely, and were much out of breath, being forced to hold their
shields before their faces; for the battle was fought not long after
the summer solstice, or, as the Romans reckon, upon the third day
before the new moon of the month now called August and then
Sextilis. The dust, too, gave the Romans no small addition to their
courage, inasmuch as it hid the enemy. For afar off they could not
discover their number; but every one advancing to encounter those that
were nearest to them, came to fight hand to hand before the sight of
so vast a multitude had struck terror into them. They were so much
used to labour, and so well exercised, that in all the heat and toil
of the encounter, not one of them was observed either to sweat or to
be out of breath; so much so, that Catulus himself, they say, recorded
it in commendation of his soldiers.
  Here the greatest part and most valiant of the enemies were cut in
pieces; for those that fought in the front, that they might not
break their ranks, were fast tied to one another, with long chains put
through their belts. But as they pursued those that fled to their camp
they witnessed a most fearful tragedy; the women, standing in black
clothes on their wagons, slew all that fled, some their husbands, some
their brethren, others their fathers; and strangling their little
children with their own hands, threw them under the wheels and the
feet of the cattle, and then killed themselves. They tell of one who
hung herself from the end of the pole of a wagon, with her children
tied dangling at her heels. The men, for want of trees, tied
themselves, some to the horns of the oxen, others by the neck to their
legs, that so pricking them on, by the starting and springing of the
beasts, they might be torn and trodden to pieces. Yet for all they
thus massacred themselves, above sixty thousand were taken
prisoners, and those that were slain were said to be twice as many.
  The ordinary plunder was taken by Marius's soldiers, but the other
spoils, as ensigns, trumpets, and the like, they say, were brought
to Catulus's camp; which he used for the best argument that the
victory was obtained by himself and his army. Some dissensions
arising, as was natural, among the soldiers, the deputies from
Parma, being then present, were made judges of the controversy; whom
Catulus's men carried about among their slain enemies and manifestly
showed them that they were slain by their javelins, which were known
by the inscriptions, having Catulus's name cut in the wood.
Nevertheless the whole glory of the action was ascribed to Marius,
on account of his former victory, and under colour of his present
authority; the populace more especially styling him the third
founder of their city, as having diverted a danger no less threatening
than was that when the Gauls sacked Rome; and every one, in their
feasts and rejoicings at home with their wives and children, made
offerings and libations in honour of "The Gods and Marius;" and
would have had him solely have the honour of both the triumphs.
However, he did not do so, but triumphed together with Catulus,
being desirous to show his moderation even in such great circumstances
of good fortune; besides he was not a little afraid of the soldiers in
Catulus's army, lest, if he should wholly bereave their general of the
honour, they should endeavour to hinder him of his triumph.
  Marius was now in his fifth consulship, and he sued for his sixth in
such a manner as never any man before him had done, even for his
first; he courted the people's favour and ingratiated himself with the
multitude by every sort of complaisance; not only derogating from
the state and dignity of his office, but also belying his own
character, by attempting to seem popular and obliging, for which
nature had never designed him. His passion for distinction did,
indeed, they say, make him exceedingly timorous in any political
matters, or in confronting public assemblies; and that undaunted
presence of mind he always showed in battle against the enemy
forsook him when he was to address the people; he was easily upset
by the most ordinary commendation or dispraise. It is told of him,
that having at one time given the freedom of the city to one
thousand men of Camerinum who had behaved valiantly in this war, and
this seeming to be illegally done, upon some one or other calling
him to an account for it, he answered, that the law spoke too softly
to be heard in such a noise of war; yet he himself appeared to be more
disconcerted and overcome by the clamour made in the assemblies. The
need they had of him in time of war procured him power and dignity;
but in civil affairs, when he despaired of getting the first place, he
was forced to betake himself to the favour of the people, never caring
to be a good man so that he were but a great one.
  He thus became very odious to all the nobility; and above all, he
feared Metellus, who had been so ungratefully used by him, and whose
true virtue made him naturally an enemy to those that sought influence
with the people, not by the honourable course, but by subservience and
complaisance. Marius, therefore, endeavoured to banish him from the
city, and for this purpose he contracted a close alliance with Glaucia
and Saturninus a couple of daring fellows, who had the great mass of
the indigent and seditious multitude at their control; and by their
assistance he enacted various laws, and bringing the soldiers, also,
to attend the assembly, he was enabled to overpower Metellus. And as
Rutilius relates (in all other respects a fair and faithful authority,
but, indeed, privately an enemy to Marius), he obtained his sixth
consulship by distributing vast sums of money among the tribes, and by
this bribery kept out Metellus, and had Valerius Flaccus given him
as his instrument, rather than his colleague, in the consulship. The
people had never before bestowed so many consulships on any one man,
except on Valerius Corvinus only, and he, too, they say, was
forty-five years between his first and last; but Marius, from his
first, ran through five more, with one current of good fortune.
  In the last, especially, he contracted a great deal of hatred, by
committing several gross misdemeanours in compliance with the
desires of Saturninus; among which was the murder of Nonius whom
Saturninus slew because he stood in competition with him for the
tribuneship. And when, afterwards, Saturninus, on becoming tribune,
brought forward his law for the division of lands, with a clause
enacting that the senate publicly swear to confirm whatever the people
should vote, and not to oppose them in anything, Marius, in the
senate, cunningly feigned to be against this provision, and said
that he would not take any such oath, nor would any man, he thought,
who was wise; for if there were no ill design in the law, still it
would be an affront to the senate to be compelled to give their
approbation, and not to do it willingly and upon persuasion. This he
said, not that it was agreeable to his own sentiments, but that he
might entrap Metellus beyond any possibility of escape. For Marius, in
whose ideas virtue and capacity consisted largely in deceit, made very
little account of what he had openly professed to the senate; and
knowing that Metellus was one of a fixed resolution, and, as Pindar
has it, esteemed "truth the first principle of heroic virtue," he
hoped to ensnare him into a declaration before the senate, and on
his refusing, as he was sure to do, afterwards to take the oath, he
expected to bring him into such odium with the people as should
never be wiped off. The design succeeded to his wish. As soon as
Metellus had declared that he would not swear to it, the senate
adjourned. A few days after on Saturninus citing the senators to
make their appearance, and take the oath before the people, Marius
stepped forth amidst a profound silence, every one being intent to
hear him, and bidding farewell to those fine speeches he had before
made in the senate, said, that his back was not so broad that he
should think himself bound, once for all, by any opinion once given on
so important a matter; he would willingly swear and submit to the law,
if so be it were one, a proviso which he added as a mere cover for his
effrontery. The people, in great joy at his taking the oath, loudly
clapped and applauded him, while the nobility stood by ashamed and
vexed at his inconstancy; but they submitted out of fear of the
people, and all in order took the oath, till it came to Metellus's
turn. But he, though his friends begged and entreated him to take
it, and not to plunge himself irrecoverably into the penalties which
Saturninus had provided for those that should refuse it, would not
flinch from his resolution, nor swear; but, according to his fixed
custom, being ready to suffer anything rather than do a base, unworthy
action, he left the forum, telling those that were with him that to do
wrong things is base, and to do well where there is no danger, common;
the good man's characteristic is to do so where there is danger.
  Hereupon Saturninus put it to the vote, that the consuls should
place Metellus under their interdict, and forbid him fire, water,
and lodging. There were enough, too, of the basest of people ready
to kill him. Nevertheless, when many of the better sort were extremely
concerned, and gathered about Metellus, he would not suffer them to
raise a sedition upon his account, but with this calm reflection
left the city, "Either when the posture of affairs is mended and the
people repent, I shall be recalled, or if things remain in their
present condition, it will be best to be absent." But what great
favour and honour Metellus received in his banishment, and in what
manner he spent his time at Rhodes, in philosophy, will be more
fitly our subject when we write his life.
  Marius, in return for this piece of service, was forced to connive
at Saturninus now proceeding to the very height of insolence and
violence, and was, without knowing it, the instrument of mischief
beyond endurance, the only course of which was through outrages and
massacres to tyranny and the subversion of the government. Standing in
some awe of the nobility, and, at the same time, eager to court the
commonalty, he was guilty of a most mean and dishonest action. When
some of the great men came to him at night to stir him up against
Saturninus, at the other door, unknown to them, he let him in; then
making the same pretence of some disorder of body to both, he ran from
one party to the other, and staying at one time with them and
another with him, he instigated and exasperated them one against
another. At length when the senate and equestrian order concerted
measures together, and openly manifested their resentment, he did
bring his soldiers into the forum, and driving the insurgents into the
capitol, and then cutting off the conduits, forced them to surrender
by want of water. They, in this distress, addressing themselves to
him, surrendered, at it is termed, on the public faith. He did his
utmost to save their lives, but so wholly in vain, that when they came
down into the forum they were all basely murdered. Thus he had made
himself equally odious both to the nobility and commons, and when
the time was come to create censors, though he was the most obvious
man, yet he did not petition for it; but fearing the disgrace of being
repulsed, permitted others, his inferiors, to be elected, though he
pleased himself by giving out that he was not willing to disoblige too
many by undertaking a severe inspection into their lives and conduct.
  There was now an edict preferred to recall Metellus from banishment;
this he vigorously, but in vain, opposed both by word and deed, and
was at length obliged to desist. The people unanimously voted for
it; and he, not able to endure the sight of Metellus's return, made
a voyage to Cappadocia and Galatia; giving out that he had to
perform the sacrifices which he had vowed to Cybele; but actuated
really by other less apparent reasons. For, in fact, being a man
altogether ignorant of civil life and ordinary politics, he received
all his advancement from war; and supposing his power and glory
would by little and little decrease by his lying quietly out of
action, he was eager by every means to excite some new commotions, and
hoped that by setting at variance some of the kings, and by
exasperating Mithridates, especially, who was then apparently making
preparations for war, he himself should be chosen general against him,
and so furnish the city with new matter of triumph, and his own
house with the plunder of Pontus and the riches of its king.
Therefore, though Mithridates entertained him with all imaginable
attention and respect, yet he was not at all wrought upon or
softened by it; but said, "O king, either endeavour to be stronger
than the Romans, or else quietly submit to their commands." With which
he left Mithridates as he indeed had often heard the fame of the
bold speaking of the Romans, but now for the first time experienced
it.
  When Marius returned again to Rome, he built a house close by the
forum, either, as he himself gave out, that he was not willing his
clients should be tried with going far, or that he imagined distance
was the reason why more did not come. This, however, was not so; the
real reason was, that, being inferior to others in agreeableness of
conversation and the arts of political life, like a mere tool and
implement of war, he was thrown aside in time of peace. Amongst all
those whose brightness eclipsed his glory, he was most incensed
against Sylla, who had owed his rise to the hatred which the
nobility bore Marius; and had made his disagreement with him the one
principle of his political life. When Bocchus, King of Numidia, who
was styled the associate of the Romans, dedicated some figures of
Victory in the capitol, and with them a representation in gold of
himself delivering Jugurtha to Sylla, Marius upon this was almost
distracted with rage and ambition, as though Sylla had arrogated
this honour to himself, and endeavoured forcibly to pull down these
presents; Sylla, on the other side, as vigorously resisted him; but
the Social War, then on a sudden threatening the city, put a stop to
this sedition when just ready to break out. For the most warlike and
best-peopled countries of all Italy formed a confederacy together
against Rome, and were within a little of subverting the empire; as
they were indeed strong, not only in their weapons and the valour of
their soldiers, but stood nearly upon equal terms with the Romans as
to the skill and daring of their commanders.
  As much glory and power as this war, so various in its events and so
uncertain as to its success, conferred upon Sylla, so much it took
away from Marius, who was thought tardy, unenterprising, and timid,
whether it were that his age was now quenching his former heat and
vigour (for he was above sixty-five years old), or that having, as
he himself said, some distemper that affected his muscles, and his
body being unfit for action, he did service above his strength. Yet,
for all this, he came off victor in a considerable battle, wherein
he slew six thousand of the enemies, and never once gave them any
advantage over him; and when he was surrounded by the works of the
enemy, he contained himself, and though insulted over, and challenged,
did not yield to the provocation. The story is told that when
Publius Silo, a man of the greatest repute and authority among the
enemies, said to him, "If you are indeed a great general, Marius,
leave your camp and fight a battle," he replied, "If you are one, make
me do so." And another time, when the enemy gave them a good
opportunity of a battle, and the Romans through fear durst not charge,
so that both parties retreated, he called an assembly of his soldiers,
and said, "It is no small question whether I should call the enemies
or you the greater cowards, for neither did they dare to face your
backs, nor you to confront theirs." At length, professing to be worn
out with the infirmity of his body, he laid down his command.
  Afterwards when the Italians were worsted, there were several
candidates suing with the aid of the popular leaders for the chief
command in the war with Mithridates. Sulpicius, tribune of the people,
a bold and confident man, contrary to everybody's expectation, brought
forward Marius, and proposed him as proconsul and general in that war.
The people were divided; some were on Marius's side, others voted
for Sylla, and jeeringly bade Marius go to the baths at Baiae, to cure
his body, worn out, as himself confessed, with age and catarrhs.
Marius had indeed, there, about Misenum, a villa more effeminately and
luxuriously furnished than seemed to become one that had seen
service in so many and great wars and expeditions. This same house
Cornelia bought for seventy-five thousand drachmas, and not long after
Lucius Lucullus, for two million five hundred thousand; so rapid and
so great was the growth of Roman sumptuosity. Yet, in spite of all
this, out of a mere boyish passion for distinction, affecting to shake
off his age and weakness, he went down daily to the Campus Martius,
and exercising himself with the youth, showed himself still nimble
in his armour, and expert in riding; though he was undoubtedly grown
bulky in his old age, and inclining to excessive faintness and
corpulency.
  Some people were pleased with this, and went continually to see
him competing and displaying himself in these exercises; but the
better sort that saw him pitied the cupidity and ambition that made
one who had risen from utter poverty to extreme wealth, and out of
nothing into greatness, unwilling to admit any limit to his high
fortune, or to be content with being admired, and quietly enjoying
what he had already got; why, as if he still were indigent, should
he at so great an age leave his glory and his triumphs to go into
Cappadocia and the Euxine Sea, to fight Archelaus and Neoptolemus,
Mithridates's generals? Marius's pretences for this action of his
seemed very ridiculous; for he said he wanted to go and teach his
son to be a general.
  The condition of the city, which had long been unsound and
diseased became hopeless now that Marius found so opportune an
instrument for the public destruction as Sulpicius's insolence. This
man professed, in all other respects, to admire and imitate
Saturninus; only he found fault with him for backwardness and want
of spirit in his designs. He, therefore, to avoid this fault, got
six hundred of the equestrian order about him as his guard, whom he
named anti-senators; and with these confederates he set upon the
consuls, whilst they were at the assembly, and took the son of one
of them who fled from the forum and slew him. Sylla, being hotly
pursued, took refuge in Marius's house, which none could suspect, by
that means escaping those that sought him, who hastily passed by
there, and, it is said, was safely conveyed by Marius himself out at
the other door, and came to the camp. Yet Sylla, in his memoirs,
positively denies that he fled to Marius, saying he was carried
thither to consult upon the matters to which Sulpicius would have
forced him, against his will, to consent; that he, surrounding him
with drawn swords, hurried him to Marius, and constrained him thus,
till he went thence to the forum and removed, as they required him
to do, the interdict on business.
  Sulpicius, having thus obtained the mastery, decreed the command
of the army to Marius, who proceeded to make preparations for his
march, and sent two tribunes to receive the charge of the army from
Sylla. Sylla hereupon exasperating his soldiers, who were about
thirty-five thousand full-armed men, led them towards Rome. First
falling upon the tribunes Marius had sent, they slew them; Marius
having done as much for several of Sylla's friends in Rome, and now
offering their freedom to the slaves on condition of their
assistance in the war; of whom, however, they say, there were but
three who accepted his proposal. For some small time he made head
against Sylla's assault, but was soon overpowered and fled; those that
were with him, as soon as he had escaped out of the city, were
dispersed, and night coming on, he hastened to a country-house of his,
called Solonium. Hence he sent his son to some neighbouring farms of
his father-in-law, Mucius, to provide necessaries; he went himself
to Ostia, where his friend Numerius had prepared him a ship, and
hence, not staying for his son, he took with him his son-in-law
Granius, and weighed anchor.
  Young Marius, coming to Mucius's farms, made his preparations; and
the day breaking, was almost discovered by the enemy. For there came
thither a party of horse that suspected some such matter; but the farm
steward, foreseeing their approach, hid Marius in a cart full of
beans, then yoking in his team and driving toward the city, met
those that were in search of him. Marius, thus conveyed home to his
wife, took with him some necessaries, and came at night to the
seaside; where, going on board a ship that was bound for Africa, he
went away thither. Marius, the father, when he had put to sea, with
a strong gale passing along the coast of Italy, was in no small
apprehension of one Geminius, a great man at Terracina, and his enemy;
and therefore bade the seamen hold off from that place. They were
indeed willing to gratify him, but the wind now blowing in from the
sea and making the waves swell to a great height, they were afraid the
ship would not be able to weather out the storm, and Marius, too,
being indisposed and sea-sick, they made for land, and not without
some difficulty reached the shore near Circeium.
  The storm now increasing and their victuals failing, they left their
ship, and wandered up and down without any certain purpose, simply
as in great distresses people shun the present as the greatest evil,
and rely upon the hopes of uncertainties. For the land and sea were
both equally unsafe for them; it was dangerous to meet with people,
and it was no less so to meet with none, on account of their want of
necessaries. At length, though late, they lighted upon a few poor
shepherds, that had not anything to relieve them; but knowing
Marius, advised him to depart as soon as might he, for they had seen a
little beyond that place a party of horse that were gone in search
of him. Finding himself in a great strait, especially because those
that attended him were not able to go further, being spent with
their long fasting, for the present he turned aside out of the road,
and hid himself in a thick wood, where he passed the night in great
wretchedness. The next day, pinched with hunger, and willing to make
use of the little strength he had, before it were all exhausted, he
travelled by the seaside, encouraging his companions not to fall
away from him before the fulfillment of his final hopes, for which, in
reliance on some old predictions, he professed to be sustaining
himself. For when he was yet but very young, and lived in the country,
he caught in the skirt of his garment an eagle's nest, as it was
falling, in which were seven young ones, which his parents seeing
and much admiring, consulted the augurs about it, who told them he
should become the greatest man in the world, and that the fates had
decreed he should seven times be possessed of the supreme power and
authority. Some are of opinion that this really happened to Marius, as
we have related it; others say, that those who then and through the
rest of his exile heard him tell these stories, and believed him, have
merely repeated a story that is altogether fabulous; for an eagle
never hatches more than two; and even Musaeus was deceived, who,
speaking of the eagle, says that-

        "She lays three eggs, hatches two, and rears one."

However this be, it is certain Marius, in his exile and greatest
extremities, would often say that he should attain a seventh
consulship.
  When Marius and his company were now about twenty furlongs distant
from Minturnae, a city in Italy, they espied a troop of horse making
up toward them with all speed, and by chance, also, at the same
time, two ships under sail. Accordingly, they ran every one with
what speed and, strength they could to the sea, and plunging into it
swam to the ships, Those that were with Granius, reaching one of them,
passed over to an island opposite, called Aenaria; Marius himself,
whose body was heavy and unwieldy, was with great pains and difficulty
kept above the water by two servants, and put into the other ship. The
soldiers were by this time come to the seaside, and from thence called
out to the seamen to put to shore, or else to throw out Marius, and
then they might go whither they would. Marius besought them with tears
to the contrary, and the masters of the ship, after frequent
changes, in a short space of time, of their purpose, inclining first
to one, then to the other side, resolved at length to answer the
soldiers that they would not give up Marius. As soon as they had
ridden off in a rage, the seamen, again changing their resolution,
came to land, and casting anchor at the mouth of the river Liris,
where it overflows and makes a marsh, they advised him to land,
refresh himself on shore, and take some care of his discomposed
body, till the wind came fairer; which, said they, will happen at such
an hour, when the wind from the sea will calm, and that from the
marshes rise. Marius, following their advice, did so, and when the
seamen had set him on shore, he laid him down in an adjacent field,
suspecting nothing less than what was to befall him. They, as soon
as they had got into the ship, weighed anchor and departed, as
thinking it neither honourable to deliver Marius into the hands of
those that sought him, nor safe to protect him.
  He thus, deserted by all, lay a good while silently on the shore; at
length collecting himself, he advanced with pain and difficulty,
without any path, till, wading through deep bogs and ditches full of
water and mud, he came upon the hut of an old man that worked in the
fens, and falling at his feet besought him to assist and preserve
one who, if he escaped the present danger, would make him returns
beyond his expectation. The poor man, whether he had formerly known
him, or were then moved with his superior aspect, told him that if
he wanted only rest his cottage would be convenient; but if he were
flying from anybody's search, he would hide him in a more retired
place. Marius desiring him to do so, he carried him into the fens
and bade him hide himself in an hollow place by the river-side,
where he laid upon him a great many reeds, and other things that
were light, and would cover, but not oppress him. But within a very
short time he was disturbed with a noise and tumult from the
cottage, for Geminius had sent several from Terracina in pursuit of
him; some of whom happening to come that way, frightened and
threatened the old man for having entertained and hid an enemy of
the Romans. Whereupon Marius, arising and stripping himself, plunged
into a puddle full of thick muddy water; and even there he could not
escape their search, but was pulled out covered with mire, and carried
away naked to Minturnae and delivered to the magistrates. For there
had been orders sent through all the towns to make public search for
Marius, and if they found him to kill him; however, the magistrates
thought convenient to consider a little better of it first, and sent
him prisoner to the house of one Fannia.
  This woman was supposed not very well affected towards him upon an
old account. One Tinnius had formerly married this Fannia; from whom
she afterwards, being divorced, demanded her portion, which was
considerable, but her husband accused her of adultery; so the
controversy was brought before Marius in his sixth consulship. When
the case was examined thoroughly, it appeared both that Fannia had
been incontinent, and that her husband, knowing her to be so, had
married and lived a considerable time with her. So that Marius was
severe enough with both, commanding him to restore her portion, and
laying a fine of four copper coins upon her by way of disgrace. But
Fannia did not then behave like a woman that had been injured, but
as soon as she saw Marius, remembered nothing less than old
affronts; took care of him according to her ability, and comforted
him. He made her his returns and told her he did not despair, for he
had met with a lucky omen, which was thus. When he was brought to
Fannia's house, as soon as the gate was opened, an ass came running
out to drink at a spring hard by, and giving a bold and encouraging
look, first stood still before him, then brayed aloud and pranced by
him. From which Marius drew his conclusion, and said, that the fates
designed his safety, rather by sea than land, because the ass
neglected his dry fodder, and turned from it to the water. Having told
Fannia this story, he bade the chamber door to be shut and went to
rest.
  Meanwhile the magistrates and councillors of Minturnae consulted
together, and determined not to delay any longer, but immediately to
kill Marius; and when none of their citizens durst undertake the
business, a certain soldier, a Gaulish or Cimbrian horseman (the story
is told both ways), went in with his sword drawn to him. The room
itself was not very light, that part of it especially where he then
lay was dark, from whence Marius's eyes, they say, seemed to the
fellow to dart out flames at him, and a loud voice to say, out of
the dark, "Fellow, darest thou kill Caius Marius?" The barbarian
hereupon immediately fled, and leaving his sword in the place,
rushed out of doors, crying only this, "I cannot kill Caius Marius."
At which they were all at first astonished, and presently began to
feel pity, and remorse, and anger at themselves for making so unjust
and ungrateful a decree against one who had preserved Italy, and
whom it was bad enough not to assist. "Let him go," said they,
"where he please to banishment, and find his fate somewhere else; we
only entreat pardon of the gods for thrusting Marius distressed and
deserted out of our city."
  Impelled by thoughts of this kind, they went in a body into the
room, and taking him amongst them, conducted him towards the
seaside; on his way to which, though every one was very officious to
him, and all made what haste they could, yet a considerable time was
likely to be lost. For the grove of Marica (as she is called), which
the people hold sacred and make it a point of religion not to let
anything that is once carried into it be taken out, lay just in
their road to the sea, and if they should go round about, they must
needs come very late thither. At length one of the old men cried out
and said, there was no place so sacred but they might pass through
it for Marius's preservation; and thereupon, first of all, he himself,
taking up some of the baggage that was carried for his accommodation
to the ship, passed through the grove, all the rest immediately,
with the same readiness, accompanying him. And one Belaeus (who
afterwards had a picture of these things drawn, and put it in a temple
at the place of embarkation), having by this time provided him a ship,
Marius went on board, and hoisting sail, was by fortune thrown upon
the island Aenaria, where meeting with Granius, and his other friends,
he sailed with them for Africa. But their water failing them in the
way, they were forced to put in near Eryx, in Sicily, where was a
Roman quaestor on the watch, who all but captured Marius himself on
his landing, and did kill sixteen of his retinue that went to fetch
water. Marius, with all expedition loosing thence, crossed the sea
to the isle of Meninx, where he first heard the news of his son's
escape with Cethegus, and of his going to implore the assistance of
Hiempsal, King of Numidia.
  With this news, being somewhat comforted, he ventured to pass from
that isle towards Carthage. Sextilius, a Roman, was then governor in
Africa; one that had never received either any injury or any
kindness from Marius; but who from compassion, it was hoped, might
lend him some help. But he was scarce got ashore with a small
retinue when an officer met him, and said, "Sextilius, the governor,
forbids you, Marius, to set foot in Africa; if you do, he says he will
put the decree of the senate in execution, and treat you as an enemy
to the Romans." When Marius heard this, he wanted words to express his
grief and resentment, and for a good while held his peace, looking
sternly upon the messenger, who asked him what he should say, or
what answer he should return to the governor? Marius answered him with
a deep sigh: "Go tell him that you have seen Caius Marius sitting in
exile among the ruins of Carthage;" appositely applying the example of
the fortune of that city to the change of his own condition.
  In the interim, Hiempsal, King of Numidia, dubious of what he should
determine to do, treated young Marius and those that were with him
very honourably; but when they had a mind to depart, he still had some
pretence or other to detain them, and it was manifest he made these
delays upon no good design. However, there happened an accident that
made well for their preservation. The hard fortune which attended
young Marius, who was of a comely aspect, touched one of the king's
concubines, and this pity of hers was the beginning and occasion of
love for him. At first he declined the woman's solicitations, but when
he perceived that there was no other way of escaping, and that her
offers were more serious than for the gratification of intemperate
passion, he accepted her kindness, and she finding means to convey
them away, he escaped with his friends and fled to his father. As soon
as they had saluted each other, and were going by the seaside, they
saw some scorpions fighting, which Marius took for an ill omen,
whereupon they immediately went on board a little fisher-boat, and
made towards Cercinas, an island not far distant from the continent.
They had scarce put off from shore when they espied some horse, sent
after them by the king, with all speed making towards that very
place from which they were just retired. And Marius thus escaped a
danger, it might be said, as great as any he ever incurred.
  At Rome news came that Sylla was engaged with Mithridates's generals
in Boeotia; the consuls, from factious opposition, were fallen to
downright fighting, wherein Octavius prevailing, drove Cinna out of
the city for attempting despotic government, and made Cornelius Merula
consul in his stead; while Cinna, raising forces in other parts of
Italy, carried the war against them. As soon as Marius heard of this
he resolved, with all expedition, to put to sea again, and taking with
him from Africa some Mauritanian horse, and a few of the refugees
out of Italy, all together not above one thousand, he, with this
handful, began his voyage. Arriving at Telamon, in Etruria, and coming
ashore, he proclaimed freedom for the slaves; and many of the
countrymen, also, and shepherds thereabouts, who were already freemen,
at the hearing his name, flocked to him to the seaside. He persuaded
the youngest and strongest to join him, and in a small time got
together a competent force with which he filled forty ships. Knowing
Octavius to be a good man and willing to execute his office with the
greatest justice imaginable, and Cinna to be suspected by Sylla, and
in actual warfare against the established government, he determined to
join himself and his forces with the latter. He therefore sent a
message to him, to let him know that he was ready to obey him as
consul.
  When Cinna had joyfully received his offer, naming him proconsul,
and sending him the fasces and other ensigns of authority, he said
that grandeur did not become his present fortune; but wearing an
ordinary habit, and still letting his hair grow as it had done, from
that very day he first went into banishment, and being now above
threescore and ten years old, he came slowly on foot, designing to
move people's compassion; which did not prevent, however, his
natural fierceness of expression from still predominating, and his
humiliation still let it appear that he was not so much dejected as
exasperated by the change of his condition. Having saluted Cinna and
the soldiers, he immediately prepared for action, and soon made a
considerable alteration in the posture of affairs. He first cut off
the provision ships, and plundering all the merchants, made himself
master of the supplies of corn; then bringing his navy to the
seaport towns, he took them, and at last, becoming master of Ostia
by treachery, he pillaged that town, and slew a multitude of the
inhabitants, and, blocking up the river, took from the enemy all hopes
of supply by the sea; then marched with his army toward the city,
and posted himself upon the hill called Janiculum.
  The public interest did not receive so great damage from
Octavius's unskillfulness in his management of affairs as from his
omitting needful measures through too strict observance of the law. As
when several advised him to make the slaves free, he said that he
would not give slaves the privilege of the country from which he then,
in defence of the laws, was driving away Marius. When Metellus, son to
that Metellus who was general in the war in Africa, and afterwards
banished through Marius's means, came to Rome, being thought a much
better commander than Octavius, the soldiers, deserting the consul,
came to him and desired him to take the command of them and preserve
the city; that they, when they had got an experienced valiant
commander, should fight courageously, and come off conquerors. But
when Metellus, offended at it, commanded them angrily to return to the
consul, they revolted to the enemy. Metellus, too, seeing the city
in desperate condition, left it; but a company of Chaldaeans,
sacrificers, and interpreters of the Sibyl's books persuaded
Octavius that things could turn out happily, and kept him at Rome.
He was, indeed, of all the Romans the most upright and just, and
maintained the honour of the consulate, without cringing or
compliance, as strictly in accordance with ancient laws and usages
as though they had been immutable mathematical truths; and yet fell, I
know not how, into some weaknesses, giving more observance to
fortune-tellers and diviners, than to men skilled in civil and
military affairs. He therefore, before Marius entered the city, was
pulled down from the rostra and murdered by those that were sent
before by Marius; and it is reported there was a Chaldaean writing
found in his gown when he was slain. And it seemed a thing very
unaccountable, that of two famous generals, Marius should be often
successful by the observing divinations, and Octavius ruined by the
same means.
  When affairs were in this posture, the senate assembled, and sent
a deputation to Cinna and Marius, desiring them to come into the
city peaceably and spare the citizens. Cinna, as consul, received
the embassy, sitting in the curule chair, and returned a kind answer
to the messengers; Marius stood by him and said nothing, but gave
sufficient testimony, by the gloominess of his countenance and the
sternness of his looks, that he would in a short time fill the city
with blood. As soon as the council arose, they went toward the city,
where Cinna entered with his guards, but Marius stayed at the gates,
and, dissembling his rage, professed that he was then an exile and
banished his country by course of law; that if his presence were
necessary, they must, by a new decree, repeal the former act by
which he was banished; as though he were, indeed, a religious observer
of the laws, and as if he were returning to a city free from fear or
oppression. Hereupon the people were assembled, but before three or
four tribes had given their votes, throwing up his pretences and his
legal scruples about his banishment, he carried into the city with a
select guard of the slaves who had joined him, whom he called
Bardyaei. These proceeded to murder a number of citizens, as he gave
command, partly by word of mouth, partly by the signal of his nod.
At length Ancharius, a senator, and one that had been praetor,
coming to Marius, and not being re-saluted by him, they with their
drawn swords slew him before Marius's face; and henceforth this was
their token, immediately to kill all those who met Marius and saluting
him were taken no notice of, nor answered with the like courtesy; so
that his very friends were not without dreadful apprehensions and
horror, whensoever they came to speak with him.
  When they had now butchered a great number, Cinna grew more remiss
and cloyed with murders; but Marius's rage continued still fresh and
unsatisfied, and he daily sought for all that were any way suspected
by him. Now was every road and every town filled with those that
pursued and hunted them that fled and hid themselves; and it was
remarkable that there was no more confidence to be placed, as things
stood, either in hospitality or friendship; for there were found but a
very few that did not betray those that fled to them for shelter.
And thus the servants of Cornutus deserve the greater praise and
admiration, who, having concealed their master in the house, took
the body of one of the slain, cut off the head, put a gold ring on the
finger, and showed it to Marius's guards, and buried it with the
same solemnity as if it had been their own master. This trick was
perceived by nobody, and so Cornutus escaped, and was conveyed by
his domestics into Gaul.
  Marcus Antonius, the orator, though he, too, found a true friend,
had ill-fortune. The man was but poor and a plebeian, and as he was
entertaining a man of the greatest rank in Rome, trying to provide for
him with the best he could, he sent his servant to get some wine of
a neighbouring vintner. The servant carefully tasting it and bidding
him draw better, the fellow asked him what was the matter, that he did
not buy new and ordinary wine as he used to do, but richer and of a
greater price; he without any designs told him, as his old friend
and acquaintance, that his master entertained Marcus Antonius, who was
concealed with him. The villainous vintner, as soon as the servant was
gone, went himself to Marius, then at supper, and being brought into
his presence, told him he would deliver Antonius into his hands. As
soon as he heard it, it is said he gave a great shout, and clapped his
hands for joy, and had very nearly risen up and gone to the place
himself; but being detained by his friends, he sent Annius, and some
soldiers with him, and commanded him to bring Antonius's head to him
with all speed. When they came to the house, Annius stayed at the
door, and the soldiers went upstairs into the chamber; where, seeing
Antonius, they endeavoured to shuffle off the murder from one another;
for so great it seems were the graces and charms of his oratory,
that as soon as he began to speak and beg his life, none of them durst
touch or so much as look upon him; but hanging down their heads, every
one fell a-weeping. When their stay seemed something tedious, Annius
came up himself and found Antonius discoursing, and the soldiers
astonished and quite softened by it, and calling them cowards, went
himself and cut off his head.
  Catulus Lutatius, who was colleague with Marius, and his partner
in the triumph over the Cimbri, when Marius replied to those that
interceded for him and begged his life, merely with the words, "He
must die," shut himself up in a room, and making a great fire,
smothered himself. When maimed and headless carcasses were now
frequently thrown about and trampled upon the streets, people were not
so much moved with compassion at the sight, as struck into a kind of
horror and consternation. The outrages of those that were called
Bardyaei was the greatest grievance. These murdered the masters of
families in their own houses, abused their children, and ravished
their wives, and were uncontrollable in their rapine and murders, till
those of Cinna's and Sertorius's party, taking counsel together,
fell upon them in the camp and killed them every man.
  In the interim, as if a change of wind was coming on, there came
news from all parts that Sylla, having put an end to the war with
Mithridates, and taken possession of the provinces, was returning into
Italy with a great army. This gave some small respite and intermission
to these unspeakable calamities. Marius and his friends believing
war to be close at hand, Marius was chosen consul the seventh time,
and appearing on the very calends of January, the beginning of the
year, threw one Sextus Lucinus from the Tarpeian precipice; an omen,
as it seemed, portending the renewed misfortunes both of their party
and of the city. Marius, himself now worn out with labour and
sinking under the burden of anxieties, could not sustain his
spirits, which shook within him with the apprehension of a new war and
fresh encounters and dangers, the formidable character of which he
knew by his own experience. He was not now to hazard the war with
Octavius or Merula, commanding an inexperienced multitude or seditious
rabble; but Sylla himself was approaching, the same who had formerly
banished him, and since that, had driven Mithridates as far as the
Euxine Sea.
  Perplexed with such thoughts as these, and calling to mind his
banishment, and the tedious wanderings and dangers he underwent,
both by sea and land, he fell into despondency, nocturnal frights, and
unquiet sleep, still fancying that he heard some one telling him,
that-

                    " -the lion's lair
         Is dangerous, though the lion be not there."

Above all things fearing to lie awake, he gave himself up to
drinking deep and besotting himself at night in a way most
unsuitable to his age; by all means provoking sleep, as a diversion of
his thoughts. At length, on the arrival of a messenger from the sea,
he was seized with new alarms, and so what with his fear for the
future, and what with the burden and satiety of the present, on some
slight predisposing cause, he fell into a pleurisy, as Posidonius
the philosopher relates, who says he visited and conversed with him
when he was sick, about some business relating to his embassy. Caius
Piso, an historian, tells us that Marius, walking after supper with
his friends, fell into a conversation with them about his past life,
and after reckoning up the several changes of his condition that
from the beginning had happened to him, said, that it did not become a
prudent man to trust himself any longer with fortune; and, thereupon
taking leave of those that were with him, he kept his bed seven
days, and then died.
  Some say his ambition betrayed itself openly in his sickness, and
that he ran into an extravagant frenzy fancying himself to be
general in the war against Mithridates, throwing himself into such
postures and motions of his body as he had formerly used when he was
in battle, with frequent shouts and loud cries. With so strong and
invincible a desire of being employed in that business had he been
possessed through his pride and emulation. Though he had now lived
seventy years, and was the first man that ever was chosen seven
times consul, and had an establishment and riches sufficient for
many kings he yet complained of his ill-fortune, that he must now
die before he had attained what he desired. Plato, when he saw his
death approaching, thanked the guiding providence and fortune of his
life first, that he was born a man and a Grecian, not a barbarian or a
brute, and next, that he happened to live in Socrates's age. And so,
indeed, they say Antipater of Tarsus, in like manner, at his death,
calling to mind the happiness that he had enjoyed, did not so much
as omit his prosperous voyage to Athens; thus recognizing every favour
of his indulgent fortune with the greatest acknowledgments, and
carefully saving all to the last in that safest of human
treasure-chambers, the memory. Unmindful and thoughtless persons, on
the contrary, let all that occurs to them slip away from them as
time passes on. Retaining and preserving nothing, they lose the
enjoyment of their present prosperity by fancying something better
to come; whereas by fortune we may be prevented to this, but that
cannot be taken from us. Yet they reject their present success, as
though it did not concern them, and do nothing but dream of future
uncertainties; not indeed unnaturally; as till men have by reason
and education laid a good foundation for external superstructures,
in the seeking after and gathering them they can never satisfy the
unlimited desires of their mind.
  Thus died Marius on the seventeenth day of his seventh consulship,
to the great joy and content of Rome, which thereby was in good
hopes to be delivered from the calamity of a cruel tyranny; but in a
small time they found that they had only changed their old and
worn-out master for another, young and vigorous; so much cruelty and
savageness did his son Marius show in murdering the noblest and most
approved citizens. At first, being esteemed resolute and daring
against his enemies, he was named the son of Mars, but afterwards, his
actions betraying his contrary disposition, he was called the son of
Venus. At last, besieged by Sylla in Praeneste, where he endeavoured
in many ways, but in vain, to save his life, when on the capture of
the city there was no hope of escape, he killed himself with his own
hand.


                             THE END