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$Title{Plutarch's Lives
Part I}
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$Author{Plutarch}
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$Subject{caesar
upon
himself
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$Date{c75}
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Title:       Plutarch's Lives
Book:        Caesar
Author:      Plutarch
Date:        c75
Translation: Dryden, Arthur Hugh Clough

Part I

     After Sylla became master of Rome, he wished to make Caesar put away his
wife Cornelia, daughter of Cinna, the late sole ruler of the commonwealth, but
was unable to effect it either by promises or intimidation, and so contented
himself with confiscating her dowry. The ground of Sylla's hostility to
Caesar, was the relationship between him and Marius; for Marius, the elder,
married Julia, the sister of Caesar's father, and had by her the younger
Marius, who consequently was Caesar's first cousin. And though at the
beginning, while so many were to be put to death and there was so much to do,
Caesar was overlooked by Sylla, yet he would not keep quiet, but presented
himself to the people as a candidate for the priesthood, though he was yet a
mere boy. Sylla, without any open opposition, took measures to have him
rejected, and in consultation whether he should be put to death, when it was
urged by some that it was not worth his while to contrive the death of a boy,
he answered, that they knew little who did not see more than one Marius in
that boy. Caesar, on being informed of this saying, concealed himself, and for
a considerable time kept out of the way in the country of the Sabines, often
changing his quarters, till one night, as he was removing from one house to
another on account of his health, he fell into the hands of Sylla's soldiers,
who were searching those parts in order to apprehend any who had absconded.
Caesar, by a bribe of two talents, prevailed with Cornelius, their captain, to
let him go, and was no sooner dismissed but he put to sea, and made for
Bithynia. After a short stay there with Nicomedes, the king, in his passage
back he was taken near the island Pharmacusa by some of the pirates, who, at
that time, with large fleets of ships and innumerable smaller vessels infested
the seas everywhere.

     When these men at first demanded of him twenty talents for his ransom, he
laughed at them for not understanding the value of their prisoner, and
voluntarily engaged to give them fifty. He presently despatched those about
him to several places to raise the money, till at last he was left among a set
of the most bloodthirsty people in the world, the Cilicians, only with one
friend and two attendants. Yet he made so little of them, that when he had a
mind to sleep, he would send to them, and order them to make no noise. For
thirty-eight days, with all the freedom in the world, he amused himself with
joining in their exercises and games, as if they had not been his keepers, but
his guards. He wrote verses and speeches, and made them his auditors, and
those who did not admire them, he called to their faces illiterate and
barbarous, and would often, in raillery, threaten to hang them. They were
greatly taken with this, and attributed his free talking to a kind of
simplicity and boyish playfulness. As soon as his ransom was come from
Miletus, he paid it, and was discharged, and proceeded at once to man some
ships at the port of Miletus, and went in pursuit of the pirates, whom he
surprised with their ships still stationed at the island, and took most of
them. Their money he made his prize, and the men he secured in prison at
Pergamus, and made application to Junius, who was then governor of Asia, to
whose office it belonged, as praetor, to determine their punishment. Junius,
having his eye upon the money, for the sum was considerable, said he would
think at his leisure what to do with the prisoners, upon which Caesar took his
leave of him, and went off to Pergamus, where he ordered the pirates to be
brought forth and crucified; the punishment he had often threatened them with
whilst he was in their hands, and they little dreamed he was in earnest.

     In the mean time Sylla's power being now on the decline, Caesar's friends
advised him to return to Rome, but he went to Rhodes, and entered himself in
the school of Apollonius, Molon's son, a famous rhetorician, one who had the
reputation of a worthy man, and had Cicero for one of his scholars. Caesar is
said to have been admirably fitted by nature to make a great statesman and
orator, and to have taken such pains to improve his genius this way, that
without dispute he might challenge the second place. More he did not aim at,
as choosing to be first rather amongst men of arms and power, and, therefore,
never rose to that height of eloquence to which nature would have carried him,
his attention being diverted to those expeditions and designs which at length
gained him the empire. And he himself, in his answer to Cicero's panegyric on
Cato, desires his reader not to compare the plain discourse of a soldier with
the harangues of an orator who had not only fine parts, but had employed his
life in this study.

     When he was returned to Rome, he accused Dolabella of maladministration,
and many cities of Greece came in to attest it. Dolabella was acquitted, and
Caesar, in return for the support he had received from the Greeks, assisted
them in their prosecution of Publius Antonius for corrupt practices, before
Marcus Lucullus, praetor of Macedonia. In this cause he so far succeeded, that
Antonius was forced to appeal to the tribunes at Rome, alleging that in Greece
he could not have fair play against Grecians. In his pleadings at Rome, his
eloquence soon obtained him great credit and favor, and he won no less upon
the affections of the people by the affability of his manners and address, in
which he showed a tact and consideration beyond what could have been expected
at his age; and the open house he kept, the entertainments he gave, and the
general splendor of his manner of life contributed little by little to create
and increase his political influence. His enemies slighted the growth of it at
first, presuming it would soon fail when his money was gone; whilst in the
mean time it was growing up and flourishing among the common people. When his
power at last was established and not to be overthrown, and now openly tended
to the altering of the whole constitution, they were aware too late, that
there is no beginning so mean, which continued application will not make
considerable, and that despising a danger at first, will make it at last
irresistible. Cicero was the first who had any suspicions of his designs upon
the government, and, as a good pilot is apprehensive of a storm when the sea
is most smiling, saw the designing temper of the man through this disguise of
good-humor and affability, and said, that in general, in all he did and
undertook, he detected the ambition for absolute power, "but when I see his
hair so carefully arranged, and observe him adjusting it with one finger, I
cannot imagine it should enter into such a man's thoughts to subvert the Roman
state." But of this more hereafter.

     The first proof he had of the people's good-will to him, was when he
received by their suffrages a tribuneship in the army, and came out on the
list with a higher place than Caius Popilius. A second and clearer instance of
their favor appeared upon his making a magnificent oration in praise of his
aunt Julia, wife of Marius, publicly in the forum, at whose funeral he was so
bold as to bring forth the images of Marius, which nobody had dared to produce
since the government came into Sylla's hands, Marius' party having from that
time been declared enemies of the State. When some who were present had begun
to raise a cry against Caesar, the people answered with loud shouts and
clapping in his favor, expressing their joyful surprise and satisfaction at
his having, as it were, brought up again from the grave those honors of
Marius, which for so long a time had been lost to the city. It had always been
the custom at Rome to make funeral orations in praise of elderly matrons, but
there was no precedent of any upon young women till Caesar first made one upon
the death of his own wife. This also procured him favor, and by this show of
affection he won upon the feelings of the people, who looked upon him as a man
of great tenderness and kindness of heart. After he had buried his wife, he
went as quaestor into Spain under one of the praetors, named Vetus, whom he
honored ever after, and made his son his own quaestor, when he himself came to
be praetor. After this employment was ended, he married Pompeia, his third
wife, having then a daughter by Cornelia, his first wife, whom he afterwards
married to Pompey the Great. He was so profuse in his expenses, that before he
had any public employment, he was in debt thirteen hundred talents, and many
thought that by incurring such expense to be popular, he changed a solid good
for what would prove but a short and uncertain return; but in truth he was
purchasing what was of the greatest value at an inconsiderable rate. When he
was made surveyor of the Appian Way, he disbursed, besides the public money, a
great sum out of his private purse; and when he was aedile, he provided such a
number of gladiators, that he entertained the people with three hundred and
twenty single combats, and by his great liberality and magnificence in
theatrical shows, in processions, and public feastings, he threw into the
shade all the attempts that had been made before him, and gained so much upon
the people, that every one was eager to find out new offices and new honors
for him in return for his munificence.

     There being two factions in the city, one that of Sylla, which was very
powerful, the other that of Marius, which was then broken and in a very low
condition, he undertook to revive this and to make it his own. And to this
end, whilst he was in the height of his repute with the people for the
magnificent shows he gave as aedile, he ordered images of Marius, and figures
of Victory, with trophies in their hands, to be carried privately in the night
and placed in the capitol. Next morning, when some saw them bright with gold
and beautifully made, with inscriptions upon them, referring to Marius'
exploits over the Cimbrians, they were surprised at the boldness of him who
had set them up, nor was it difficult to guess who it was. The fame of this
soon spread and brought together a great concourse of people. Some cried out
that it was an open attempt against the established government thus to revive
those honors which had been buried by the laws and decrees of the senate; that
Caesar had done it to sound the temper of the people whom he had prepared
before, and to try whether they were tame enough to bear his humor, and would
quietly give way to his innovations. On the other hand, Marius' party took
courage, and it was incredible how numerous they were suddenly seen to be, and
what a multitude of them appeared and came shouting into the capitol. Many,
when they saw Marius' likeness, cried for joy, and Caesar was highly extolled
as the one man, in the place of all others, who was a relation worthy of
Marius. Upon this the senate met, and Catulus Lutatius, one of the most
eminent Romans of that time, stood up and inveighed against Caesar, closing
his speech with the remarkable saying, the Caesar was now not working mines,
but planting batteries to overthrow the state. But when Caesar had made an
apology for himself, and satisfied the senate, his admirers were very much
animated, and advised him not to depart from his own thoughts for any one,
since with the people's good favor he would erelong get the better of them
all, and be the first man in the commonwealth.

     At this time, Metellus, the High-Priest, died, and Catulus and Isauricus,
persons of the highest reputation, and who had great influence in the senate,
were competitors for the office; yet Caesar would not give way to them, but
presented himself to the people as a candidate against them. The several
parties seeming very equal, Catulus, who, because he had the most honor to
lose, was the most apprehensive of the event, sent to Caesar to buy him off,
with offers of a great sum of money. But his answer was, that he was ready to
borrow a larger sum than that, to carry on the contest. Upon the day of
election, as his mother conducted him out of doors with tears, after embracing
her, "My mother," he said, "to-day you will see me either High-Priest, or an
exile." When the votes were taken, after a great struggle, he carried it, and
excited among the senate and nobility great alarm lest he might now urge on
the people to every kind of insolence. And Piso and Catulus found fault with
Cicero for having let Caesar escape, when in the conspiracy of Catiline he had
given the government such advantage against him. For Catiline, who had
designed not only to change the present state of affairs, but to subvert the
whole empire and confound all, had himself taken to flight, while the evidence
was yet incomplete against him, before his ultimate purposes had been properly
discovered. But he had left Lentulus and Cethegus in the city to supply his
place in the conspiracy, and whether they received any secret encouragement
and assistance from Caesar is uncertain; all that is certain is, that they
were fully convicted in the senate, and when Cicero, the consul, asked the
several opinions of the senators, how they would have them punished, all who
spoke before Caesar sentenced them to death; but Caesar stood up and made a
set speech, in which he told them, that he thought it without precedent and
not just to take away the lives of persons of their birth and distinction
before they were fairly tried, unless there was an absolute necessity for it;
but that if they were kept confined in any towns of Italy Cicero himself
should choose, till Catiline was defeated, then the senate might in peace and
at their leisure determine what was best to be done.

     This sentence of his carried so much appearance of humanity, and he gave
it such advantage by the eloquence with which he urged it, that not only those
who spoke after him closed with it, but even they who had before given a
contrary opinion, now came over to his, till it came about to Catulus' and
Cato's turn to speak. They warmly opposed it, and Cato intimated in his speech
the suspicion of Caesar himself, and pressed the matter so strongly, that the
criminals were given up to suffer execution. As Caesar was going out of the
senate, many of the young men who at that time acted as guards to Cicero, ran
in with their naked swords to assault him. But Curio, it is said, threw his
gown over him, and conveyed him away, and Cicero himself, when the young men
looked up to see his wishes, gave a sign not to kill him, either for fear of
the people, or because he thought the murder unjust and illegal. If this be
true, I wonder how Cicero came to omit all mention of it in his book about his
consulship. He was blamed, however, afterwards, for not having made use of so
fortunate an opportunity against Caesar, as if he had let it escape him out of
fear of the populace, who, indeed, showed remarkable solicitude about Caesar,
and some time after, when he went into the senate to clear himself of the
suspicions he lay under, and found great clamors raised against him, upon the
senate in consequence sitting longer than ordinary, they went up to the house
in a tumult, and beset it, demanding Caesar, and requiring them to dismiss
him. Upon this, Cato, much fearing some movement among the poor citizens, who
were always the first to kindle the flame among the people, and placed all
their hopes in Caesar, persuaded the senate to give them a monthly allowance
of corn, an expedient which put the commonwealth to the extraordinary charge
of seven million five hundred thousand drachmas in the year, but quite
succeeded in removing the great cause of terror for the present, and very much
weakened Caesar's power, who at that time was just going to be made praetor,
and consequently would have been more formidable by his office.

     But there was no disturbance during his praetorship, only what misfortune
he met with in his own domestic affairs. Publius Clodius was a patrician by
descent, eminent both for his riches and eloquence, but in licentiousness of
life and audacity exceeded the most noted profligates of the day. He was in
love with Pompeia, Caesar's wife, and she had no aversion to him. But there
was strict watch kept on her apartment, and Caesar's mother, Aurelia, who was
a discreet woman, being continually about her, made any interview very
dangerous and difficult. The Romans have a goddess whom they call Bona, the
same whom the Greeks call Gynaecea. The Phrygians, who claim a peculiar title
to her, say she was mother to Midas. The Romans profess she was one of the
Dryads, and married to Faunus. The Grecians affirm that she is the mother of
Bacchus whose name is not to be uttered, and, for this reason, the women who
celebrate her festival, cover the tents with vinebranches, and, in accordance
with the fable, a consecrated serpent is placed by the goddess. It is not
lawful for a man to be by, nor so much as in the house, whilst the rites are
celebrated, but the women by themselves perform the sacred offices, which are
said to be much the same with those used in the solemnities of Orpheus. When
the festival comes, the husband, who is either consul or praetor, and with him
every male creature, quits the house. The wife then taking it under her care,
sets it in order, and the principal ceremonies are performed during the night,
the women playing together amongst themselves as they keep watch, and music of
various kinds going on.

     As Pompeia was at that time celebrating this feast, Clodius, who as yet
had no beard, and so thought to pass undiscovered, took upon him the dress and
ornaments of a singing woman, and so came thither, having the air of a young
girl. Finding the doors open, he was without any stop introduced by the maid,
who was in the intrigue. She presently ran to tell Pompeia, but as she was
away a long time, he grew uneasy waiting for her, and left his post and
traversed the house from one room to another, still taking care to avoid the
lights, till at last Aurelia's woman met him, and invited him to play with
her, as the women did among themselves. He refused to comply, and she
presently pulled him forward, and asked him who he was, and whence he came.
Clodius told her he was waiting for Pompeia's own maid, Abra, ^1 being in fact
her own name also, and as he said so, betrayed himself by his voice. Upon
which the woman shrieking, ran into the company where there were lights, and
cried out, she had discovered a man. The women were all in a fright. Aurelia
covered up the sacred things and stopped the proceedings, and having ordered
the doors to be shut, went about with lights to find Clodius, who was got in
the maid's room that he had come in with, and was seized there. The women knew
him, and drove him out of doors, and at once, that same night, went home and
told their husbands the story. In the morning, it was all about the town, what
an impious attempt Clodius had made, and how he ought to be punished as an
offender, not only against those whom he had affronted, but also against the
public and the gods. Upon which one of the tribunes impeached him for
profaning the holy rites, and some of the principal senators combined together
and gave evidence against him, that besides many other horrible crimes, he had
been guilty of incest with his own sister, who was married to Lucullus. But
the people set themselves against this combination of the nobility, and
defended Clodius, which was of great service to him with the judges, who took
alarm and were afraid to provoke the multitude. Caesar at once dismissed
Pompeia, but being summoned as a witness against Clodius, said he had nothing
to charge him with. This looking like a paradox, the accuser asked him why he
parted with his wife. Caesar replied, "I wished my wife to be not so much as
suspected." Some say that Caesar spoke this as his real thought; others, that
he did it to gratify the people, who were earnest to save Clodius. Clodius, at
any rate, escaped; most of the judges giving their opinions so written as to
be illegible, that they might not be in danger from the people by condemning
him, nor in disgrace with the nobility by acquitting him.

[Footnote 1: Abra was the Greek word for the favorite waiting-maid; and was,
also, this girl's own proper name. Clodius said he was waiting for Pompeia's
Abra, that being, also, as it happened, her name.]

     Caesar, in the mean time, being out of his praetorship, had got the
province of Spain, but was in great embarrassment with his creditors, who, as
he was going off, came upon him, and were very pressing and importunate. This
led him to apply himself to Crassus, who was the richest man in Rome, but
wanted Caesar's youthful vigor and heat to sustain the opposition against
Pompey. Crassus took upon him to satisfy those creditors who were not uneasy
to him, and would not be put off any longer, and engaged himself to the amount
of eight hundred and thirty talents, upon which Caesar was now at liberty to
go to his province. In his journey, as he was crossing the Alps, and passing
by a small village of the barbarians with but few inhabitants and those
wretchedly poor, his companions asked the question among themselves by way of
mockery, if there were any canvassing for offices there; any contention which
would be uppermost, or feuds of great men one against another. To which Caesar
made answer seriously, "For my part, I had rather be the first man among these
fellows, than the second man in Rome." It is said that another time, when free
from business in Spain, after reading some part of the history of Alexander,
he sat a great while very thoughtful, and at last burst out into tears. His
friends were surprised, and asked him the reason of it. "Do you think," said
he, "I have not just cause to weep, when I consider that Alexander at my age
had conquered so many nations, and I have all this time done nothing that is
memorable?" As soon as he came into Spain he was very active, and in a few
days had got together ten new cohorts of foot in addition to the twenty which
were there before. With these he marched against the Calaici and Lusitani and
conquered them, and advancing as far as the ocean, subdued the tribes which
never before had been subject to the Romans. Having managed his military
affairs with good success, he was equally happy in the course of his civil
government. He took pains to establish a good understanding amongst the
several states, and no less care to heal the differences between debtors and
creditors. He ordered that the creditor should receive two parts of the
debtor's yearly income, and that the other part should be managed by the
debtor himself, till by this method the whole debt was at last discharged.
This conduct made him leave his province with a fair reputation; being rich
himself, and having enriched his soldiers, and having received from them the
honorable name of Imperator.

     There is a law among the Romans, that whoever desires the honor of a
triumph must stay without the city and expect his answer. And another, that
those who stand for the consulship shall appear personally upon the place.
Caesar was come home at the very time of choosing consuls, and being in a
difficulty between these two opposite laws, sent to the senate a desire that
since he was obliged to be absent, he might sue for the consulship by his
friends. Cato, being backed by the law, at first opposed his request;
afterwards perceiving that Caesar had prevailed with a great part of the
senate to comply with it, he made it his business to gain time, and went on
wasting the whole day in speaking. Upon which Caesar thought fit to let the
triumph fall, and pursued the consulship. Entering the town and coming forward
immediately, he had recourse to a piece of state-policy by which everybody was
deceived but Cato. This was the reconciling of Crassus and Pompey, the two men
who then were most powerful in Rome. There had been a quarrel between them,
which he now succeeded in making up, and by this means strengthened himself by
the united power of both, and so under the cover of an action which carried
all the appearance of a piece of kindness and good-nature, caused what was in
effect a revolution in the government. For it was not the quarrel between
Pompey and Caesar, as most men imagine, which was the origin of the civil
wars, but their union, their conspiring together at first to subvert the
aristocracy, and so quarreling afterwards between themselves. Cato, who often
foretold what the consequence of this alliance would be, had then the
character of a sullen, interfering man, but in the end the reputation of a
wise but unsuccessful counsellor.

     Thus Caesar being doubly supported by the interests of Crassus and
Pompey, was promoted to the consulship, and triumphantly proclaimed with
Calpurnius Bibulus. When he entered on his office, he brought in bills which
have been preferred with better grace by the most audacious of the tribunes
than by a consul, in which he proposed the plantation of colonies and division
of lands, simply to please the commonalty. The best and most honorable of the
senators opposed it, upon which, as he had long wished for nothing more than
for such a colorable pretext, he loudly protested how much against his will it
was to be driven to seek support from the people, and how the senate's
insulting and harsh conduct left no other course possible for him, than to
devote himself henceforth to the popular cause and interest. And so he hurried
out of the senate, and presenting himself to the people, and there placing
Crassus and Pompey, one on each side of him, he asked them whether they
consented to the bills he had proposed. They owned their assent, upon which he
desired them to assist him against those who had threatened to oppose him with
their swords. They engaged they would, and Pompey added further, that he would
meet their swords with a sword and buckler too. These words the nobles much
resented, as neither suitable to his own dignity, nor becoming the reverence
due to the senate, but resembling rather the vehemence of a boy, or the fury
of a madman. But the people were pleased with it. In order to get a yet firmer
hold upon Pompey, Caesar having a daughter, Julia, who had been before
contracted to Servilius Caepio, now betrothed her to Pompey, and told
Servilius he should have Pompey's daughter, who was not unengaged either, but
promised to Sylla's son, Faustus. A little time after, Caesar married
Calpurnia, the daughter of Piso and got Piso made consul for the year
following. Cato exclaimed loudly against this, and protested with a great deal
of warmth, that it was intolerable the government should be prostituted by
marriages, and that they should advance one another to the commands of armies,
provinces, and other great posts, by means of women. Bibulus, Caesar's
colleague, finding it was to no purpose to oppose his bills, but that he was
in danger of being murdered in the forum, as also was Cato, confined himwelf
to his house, and there let the remaining part of his consulship expire.
Pompey, when he was married, at once filled the forum with soldiers, and gave
the people his help in passing the new laws, and secured Caesar the government
of all Gaul, both on this and the other side of the Alps, together with
Illyricum and the command of four legions for five years. Cato made some
attempts against these proceedings, but was seized and led off on the way to
prison by Caesar, who expected he would appeal to the tribunes. But when he
saw that Cato went along without speaking a word, and not only the nobility
were indignant, but that the people, also, out of respect for Cato's virtue,
were following in silence, and with dejected looks, he himself privately
desired one of the tribunes to rescue Cato. As for the other senators, some
few of them attended the house, the rest being disgusted, absented themselves.
Hence Considius, a very old man, took occasion one day to tell Caesar, that
the senators did not meet because they were afraid of his soldiers. Caesar
asked, "Why don't you then, out of the same fear, keep at home?" To which
Considius replied, that age was his guard against fear, and that the small
remains of his life were not worth much caution. But the most disgraceful
thing that was done in Caesar's consulship, was his assisting to gain the
tribuneship for the same Clodius who had made the attempt upon his wife's
chastity, and intruded upon the secret vigils. He was elected on purpose to
effect Cicero's downfall; nor did Caesar leave the city to join his army, till
they two had overpowered Cicero, and driven him out of Italy.

     Thus far we have followed Caesar's actions before the wars of Gaul. After
this, he seems to begin his course afresh, and to enter upon a new life and
scene of action. And the period of those wars which he now fought, and those
many expeditions in which he subdued Gaul, showed him to be a soldier and
general not in the least inferior to any of the greatest and most admired
commanders who had ever appeared at the head of armies. For if we compare him
with the Fabii, the Metelli, the Scipios, and with those who were his
contemporaries, or not long before him, Sylla Marius, the two Luculli, or even
Pompey himself, whose glory, it may be said, went up at that time to heaven
for every excellence in war, we shall find Caesar's actions to have surpassed
them all. One he may be held to have outdone in consideration of the
difficulty of the country in which he fought, another in the extent of
territory which he conquered; some, in the number and strength of the enemies
whom he defeated; one man, because of the wildness and perfidiousness of the
tribes whose good-will he conciliated, another in his humanity and clemency to
those he overpowered; others, again in his gifts and kindnesses to his
soldiers; all alike in the number of the battles which he fought and the
enemies who he killed. For he had not pursued the wars in Gaul full ten years,
when he had taken by storm above eight hundred towns, subdued three hundred
states, and of the three millions of men, who made up the gross sum of those
with whom at several times he engaged, he had killed one million, and taken
captive a second.

     He was so much master of the good-will and hearty service of his
soldiers, that those who in other expeditions were but ordinary men, displayed
a courage past defeating or withstanding when they went upon any danger where
Caesar's glory was concerned. Such a one was Acilius, who, in the sea-fight
before Marseilles, had his right hand struck off with a sword, yet did not
quit his buckler out of his left, but struck the enemies in the face with it,
till he drove them off, and made himself master of the vessel. Such another
was Cassius Scaeva, who, in a battle near Dyrrhachium, had one of his eyes
shot out with an arrow, his shoulder pierced with one javelin, and his thigh
with another; and having received one hundred and thirty darts upon his
target, called to the enemy, as though he would surrender himself. But when
two of them came up to him, he cut off the shoulder of one with a sword, and
by a blow over the face forced the other to retire, and so with the assistance
of his friends, who now came up, made his escape. Again, in Britain, when some
of the foremost officers had accidentally got into a morass full of water, and
there were assaulted by the enemy, a common soldier, whilst Caesar stood and
looked on, threw himself into the midst of them, and after many signal
demonstrations of his valor, rescued the officers, and beat off the
barbarians. He himself, in the end, took to the water, and with much
difficulty, partly by swimming, partly by wading, passed it, but in the
passage lost his shield. Caesar and his officers saw it and admired, and went
to meet him with joy and acclamation. But the soldier, much dejected and in
tears, threw himself down at Caesar's feet, and begged his pardon for having
let go his buckler. Another time in Africa, Scipio having taken a ship of
Caesar's in which Granius Petro, lately appointed quaestor, was sailing, gave
the other passengers as free prize to his soldiers, but thought fit to offer
the quaestor his life. But he said it was not usual for Caesar's soldiers to
take, but give mercy, and having said so, fell upon his sword and killed
himself.

     This love of honor and passion for distinction were inspired into them
and cherished in them by Caesar himself, who, by his unsparing distribution of
money and honors, showed them that he did not heap up wealth from the wars for
his own luxury, or the gratifying his private pleasures, but that all he
received was but a public fund laid by for the reward and encouragement of
valor, and that he looked upon all he gave to deserving soldiers as so much
increase to his own riches. Added to this, also, there was no danger to which
he did not willingly expose himself, no labor from which he pleaded an
exemption. His contempt of danger was not so much wondered at by his soldiers,
because they knew how much he coveted honor. But his enduring so much
hardship, which he did to all appearance beyond his natural strength, very
much astonished them. For he was a spare man, had a soft and white skin, was
distempered in the head, and subject to an epilepsy, which, it is said, first
seized him at Corduba. But he did not make the weakness of his constitution a
pretext for his ease, but rather used war as the best physic against his
indispositions; whilst by indefatigable journeys, coarse diet, frequent
lodging in the field, and continual laborious exercise, he struggled with his
diseases, and fortified his body against all attacks. He slept generally in
his chariots or litters, employing even his rest in pursuit of action. In the
day he was thus carried to the forts, garrisons, and camps, one servant
sitting with him, who used to write down what he dictated as he went, and a
soldier attending behind with his sword drawn. He drove so rapidly, that when
he first left Rome, he arrived at the river Rhone within eight days. He had
been an expert rider from his childhood; for it was usual with him to sit with
his hands joined together behind his back, and so to put his horse to its full
speed. And in this war he disciplined himself so far as to be able to dictate
letters from on horseback, and to give directions to two who took notes at the
same time, or, as Oppius says, to more. And it is thought that he was the
first who contrived means for communicating with friends by cipher, when
either press of business, or the large extent of the city, left him no time
for a personal conference about matters that required despatch. How little
nice he was in his diet, may be seen in the following instance. When at the
table of Valerius Leo, who entertained him at supper at Milan, a dish of
asparagus was put before him, on which his host instead of oil had poured
sweet ointment. Caesar partook of it without any disgust, and reprimanded his
friends for finding fault with it. "For it was enough," said he, "not to eat
what you did not like; but he who reflects on another man's want of breeding,
shows he wants it as much himself." Another time upon the road he was driven
by a storm into a poor man's cottage, where he found but one room, and that
such as would afford but a mean reception to a single person, and therefore
told his companions, places of honor should be given up to the greater men,
and necessary accommodations to the weaker, and accordingly ordered that
Oppius, who was in bad health, should lodge within, whilst he and the rest
slept under a shed at the door.

     His first war in Gaul was against the Helvetians and Tigurini, who having
burnt their own towns, twelve in number, and four hundred villages, would have
marched forward through that part of Gaul which was included in the Roman
province, as the Cimbrians and Teutons formerly had done. Nor were they
inferior to these in courage; and in numbers they were equal, being in all
three hundred thousand, of which one hundred and ninety thousand were fighting
men. Caesar did not engage the Tigurini in person, but Labienus, under his
directions, routed them near the river Arar. The Helvetians surprised Caesar,
and unexpectedly set upon him as he was conducting his army to a confederate
town. He succeeded, however, in making his retreat into a strong position,
where, when he had mustered and marshalled his men, his horse was brought to
him; upon which he said, "When I have won the battle, I will use my horse for
the chase, but at present let us go against the enemy," and accordingly
charged them on foot. After a long and severe combat, he drove the main army
out of the field, but found the hardest work at their carriages and ramparts,
where not only the men stood and fought but the women also and children
defended themselves, till they were cut to pieces; insomuch that the fight was
scarcely ended till midnight. This action, glorious in itself, Caesar crowned
with another yet more noble, by gathering in a body all the barbarians that
had escaped out of the battle, above one hundred thousand in number, and
obliging them to reoccupy the country which they had deserted, and the cities
which they had burnt. This he did for fear the Germans should pass in and
possess themselves of the land whilst it lay uninhabited.