LEPIDUS AND SERTORIUS
We now enter upon the last stage in the decline and fall of the republic.
By a violent effort Sulla had restored the government to the senatorial
nobility. But symptoms intimating the insecurity of the fabric which
he had hastily reared on blood-bathed foundations showed themselves
even before his death. After his secession, Q. Catulus became the chief
of the senatorial party. He was son of the Catulus who shared the
Cimbrian triumph with Marius, and in the year 79 B.C. he appeared among
the candidates for the consulship with the certainty of election. The
person who aspired to be his colleague was M. Æmilius Lepidus, a man of
illustrious family, but of vain and petulant character. He was supported
by many friends, among others by young Pompey. Sulla knew the man, and
warned Pompey against entrusting him with power. But Pompey, who already
began to talk of “the setting and the rising sun,” disregarded the
warning, and Lepidus was elected.
Scarcely was Sulla dead when his words were fulfilled. Lepidus declared
himself the chief of the Italian party, and promised to restore all that
Sulla had taken away. To prevent a renewal of civil war, the senate bound
him and Catulus alike by oath not to take up arms during their consulate.
But Lepidus retired to his province of Transalpine Gaul, and, pretending
that his oath did not bind him there, began to levy troops. The senate
summoned him to return to Rome. He obeyed, but it was at the head of an
army. To oppose him, Catulus took post before the Milvian bridge, with
Pompey for his lieutenant. Here they were attacked by Lepidus, who was
easily defeated. After this failure, he fled to Sardinia, where he died
shortly after. But his lieutenants, M. Perperna and M. Junius Brutus,
father of Cæsar’s murderer, kept the troops together, and waited for the
course of events. A war was raging in Spain, which might well encourage
the hopes of discontented persons.
[Sidenote: [78-75 B.C.]]
It has been mentioned that Q. Sertorius had assumed the government of
Spain. But after a vain struggle against superior forces, he was obliged
to take refuge in Mauretania. The news from Italy was dispiriting. It
seemed as if the Marian cause was lost forever. Sertorius lent ear
to the tales of seamen who had lately made a voyage to the Fortunate
Islands (so the ancients called the Azores), and seemed to recognise the
happy regions which Greek legends assigned as the abode of the blessed.
But while the active soldier was indulging in day-dreams of indolent
tranquillity, he received an invitation from the Lusitanians to head
them in rising against the senatorial governors, and obeyed without a
moment’s hesitation. Viriathus himself did not use with better effect
the energies of the brave mountaineers. The south of Spain was soon too
hot to hold the Sullan leaders; the proscribed Marians came out of their
hiding places and joined the new chief. His progress, in the course of
two years’ time, became so serious that, when Metellus Pius laid down his
consulship, he was sent into Spain to crush Sertorius.
But to crush Sertorius was no easy task. He was no mere soldier, but
possessed political qualities of a high order. Like Hamilcar and
Hasdrubal of old, he flattered the Spaniards with the hope of rising to
independence under his rule. The government which he formed indicated
a disposition to dispute empire with Rome. He formed a senate of three
hundred, consisting partly of proscribed Romans, partly of Spanish
chiefs--a step unparalleled in the provincial government of Rome. All
cities in his power he organised after the Italian model; and at Osca
(now Huesca in Catalonia) he established a school for the noble youth
of Spain. The boys wore the Roman garb, and were taught the tongues of
Rome and Athens. Sertorius is almost the only statesman of antiquity who
tried to use education as an engine of government. It cannot indeed be
pretended that his views were merely philanthropic; no doubt he held the
boys as hostages for the fidelity of their sires.
His great talents, above all his acknowledgment of equality between
provincials and Romans, won him golden opinions. Everywhere the Spaniards
crowded to see him, and loudly protested their readiness to die for
him. Their enthusiastic reverence for his person was increased by the
presence of a white doe, which continually followed him, and was regarded
by the simple people as a familiar spirit, by means of which he held
communication with heaven.
Metellus in two campaigns found himself unequal to cope with the new
ruler of Spain. In the second of these years (77 B.C.) Perperna, who
had retired to Gaul with the best troops of Lepidus, entered Spain, and
joined the popular leader; and the senate hastily despatched Pompey
to reinforce Metellus. On his march through Gaul, the young general
encountered the other remnant of the army of Lepidus under Brutus; and
Brutus, who fell into his hands, was put to death in cold blood.
[Sidenote: [75-72 B.C.]]
Pompey’s aid, however, did not change the face of affairs. In the first
battle the young general was saved by the approach of Metellus, on which
Sertorius said: “If the old woman had not come up, I should have given
the boy a sound drubbing and sent him back to Rome.” At the end of 75
B.C. Pompey wrote a letter to the senate, representing the insufficiency
of his forces, and two more legions were at once sent to reinforce
him. Meantime Sertorius himself had reasons for apprehension. Some of
his Roman friends, disliking his policy of favouring the provincials,
made overtures to the senatorial commanders; and Sertorius, severe by
nature, still further exasperated the Romans of his party by forming
his bodyguard exclusively of Spaniards. But he still maintained his
superiority in the field. Nor was it encouraging to learn that he had
received envoys from Mithridates, who was about to renew war with Rome.
Sertorius agreed to furnish Roman officers to train the soldiers of Asia,
while the king was to repay the loan in ships and money.
The despotic power exercised by Sertorius had corrupted his nature. He
indulged in the immoderate use of wine, was impatient of the slightest
contradiction, and was guilty of many acts of tyranny. Even the Spaniards
began to fall away; and Sertorius in a moment of irritation ordered all
the boys at Osca to be put to death. This cruel and impolitic act would
probably have cost him his power and his life, even if it had not been
terminated by treachery. Perperna, who had at first joined him against
his own inclination, thought that a favourable opportunity had arrived
for grasping power. He invited Sertorius to a banquet at Osca; and the
general, having drunk freely according to his custom, fell an easy prey
to the dagger of the assassin (72 B.C.).
[Illustration: THE ROMANS URGE POMPEY TO AID METELLUS]
But when Perperna had wrought this shameful deed, he found that the
name of Sertorius was still powerful among the Spaniards. Many of them,
now that their great leader was no more, forgot his faults, and with
the devoted enthusiasm of their nation threw themselves into the flames
of his funeral pyre. A few days after the death of Sertorius, Perperna
attempted to lead the soldiery against Pompey, but he sustained an
ignominious defeat. His men were dispersed, and he was taken prisoner.
When brought before Pompey, he endeavoured to gain favour by handing him
letters which had been interchanged by Sertorius with some of the chief
men at Rome. But Pompey, with prudent magnanimity, threw the letters into
the fire and refused to hear him. In the course of a year the last relics
of the Marian party in Spain were extinguished.
Before this was effected, Rome was engaged in conflict with Mithridates.
[The history of this war will be given later in the chapter.] But here
must be noticed a formidable outbreak that took place in Italy, and
threatened the very existence of the state. This was:
THE WAR OF THE GLADIATORS
[Sidenote: [73-72 B.C.]]
For the purpose of the barbarous shows which were so much enjoyed at
Rome, it was the custom to keep schools for training gladiators, who were
let out by their owners to the ædiles. At Capua there was a large school
of this kind; and among the gladiators in training there was Spartacus,
a Thracian, who had once led his countrymen against Roman commanders,
but now, having been taken prisoner, was destined to make sport for his
conquerors. He persuaded about seventy of his fellow-bondsmen to join
him in breaking loose; better it was, he argued, to die in battle on
the open field, than on the sand of the amphitheatre. This handful of
brave men took up a strong position upon Mount Vesuvius, where Spartacus
was presently joined by slaves and outlaws of all descriptions. The
gladiators, old soldiers like himself, supplied him with officers.
Œnomaus and Crixus, the former a Greek, the latter a Gaul, acted as his
lieutenants. He enforced strict discipline; and, so long as he was able,
obliged his followers to abstain from acts of rapine. Two Roman prætors
attacked him, but they were beaten with loss, and the numbers of his army
swelled every day. All this happened in 73 B.C., after the Mithridatic
War had broken out, and before the Sertorian War was ended.
In the next year (72 B.C.), the same which witnessed the murder of
Sertorius, Spartacus had become strong enough to take the offensive. He
had to face a formidable power, for both consuls were ordered to take
the field. But, at the head of more than one hundred thousand men, he
forced the passes of the Apennines and entered Picenum. His subordinates,
however, proved unmanageable; and Spartacus, aware that the power of Rome
must prevail, bent all his energies towards forcing his way across the
Alps, in the hope of reaching some remote region inaccessible to Rome. As
he pressed northwards, he was assaulted by both the consuls, but defeated
them both, and made his way to Cisalpine Gaul; but here he was repulsed
by the prætor Cassius, and obliged by the impatience of his followers to
retrace his steps. Still, every other Roman officer who dared to meet him
was defeated; at one time the brave gladiator is said to have meditated
a descent upon Rome itself. But he relinquished his desperate plan, and
spent the remainder of the year in collecting treasure and arms. Little
discipline was now observed. The extent of the ravages committed by
the bands under his command may be guessed from the well-known line of
Horace, in which he promised his friend a jar of wine made in the Social
War, “if he could find one that had escaped the clutches of roaming
Spartacus.”
The management of the war was now committed to Crassus, who had really
won the battle of the Colline Gate. Ever since the triumph of Sulla he
had lived quietly at Rome, profiting by the proscription to buy up
property cheap; and after that period he had been busied in making the
most profitable use of the large fortune which he had amassed.
[Sidenote: [72-71 B.C.]]
Crassus took the field with six new legions, to be added to the remains
of the consular armies. The disorganised battalions of these armies he
punished by the unjust and terrible penalty of decimation; but his rigour
was successful in restoring discipline. He found Spartacus besieging
Rhegium, with the view of establishing a connection with Sicily, and
rekindling the Servile War in that island. The gladiator had even agreed
with a squadron of Cilician pirates to convey two thousand of his men
across the straits; but the faithless marauders took the money and sailed
without the men. Crassus determined to shut up the enemy by drawing
entrenchments across the narrowest part of the Calabrian peninsula. Twice
in one day did Spartacus endeavour to break through the lines; twice he
was thrown back with great slaughter. But he continued to defend himself
with dauntless pertinacity; and the senate, hearing that Pompey was on
his way back from Spain, joined him in the command with Crassus, and
urged him to accelerate his march.
Crassus, afraid of losing his laurels, determined to assault Spartacus;
but the brave gladiator anticipated him by forcing a passage through the
lines, and marching upon Brundusium, where he hoped to seize shipping
and make his escape from Italy. But M. Lucullus, brother of Lucius,
the commander against Mithridates, had just returned with a force of
veteran soldiers from Macedonia to Brundusium. Spartacus, foiled in his
intention, turned like a wolf at bay to meet Crassus. A fearful conflict
ensued, which remained doubtful till Spartacus was wounded by a dart
through the thigh. Supported on his knee, he still fought heroically,
till he fell overpowered by numbers. Most of his followers were cut to
pieces; but a strong body of the insurgents drew off in good order to
the mountains. A division of five thousand made their way to the north
of Italy, where Pompey fell in with them on his way home from Spain,
and slew them to a man. About six thousand more were taken prisoners by
Crassus, who hung them along the road from Rome to Capua.
To Crassus belongs the credit of bringing this dreadful war to a close.
In six months he had finished his work. But Pompey claimed the honour of
concluding not only the Sertorian War, but also the war with Spartacus.
In fact he had not much cause for boasting in either case. The daggers
of Perperna really brought the Spanish contest to an end; and as to the
gladiatorial conflict, the lucky chance by which Pompey intercepted five
thousand fugitives was his only claim to credit. But the young general
was a favourite with the soldiery and with the people, while Crassus
from his greedy love of money enjoyed little popularity. Public opinion,
therefore, seconded claims which were put forward without modesty or
justice.
Neither Pompey nor Crassus would enter the city; for both desired a
triumph, and their armies lay at the gates to share the honours. The
wish of Pompey was at once granted; but to Crassus only an ovation was
conceded.
THE CONSULSHIP OF POMPEY AND CRASSUS
[Sidenote: [71-70 B.C.]]
Before they entered the city, they had both asked permission to offer
themselves as candidates for the consulship. Both were excluded by the
laws of Sulla. Crassus was still prætor, and at least two years ought
to elapse before his consulship. Pompey was only in his thirty-fifth
year, and had not even been quæstor. The senate, however, dared not
refuse Pompey; for he would not disband his army, and his tone brooked no
refusal. And what was granted to Pompey could not be denied to Crassus,
who also kept his soldiers under arms. Thus, at the demand of two chiefs,
each backed by an army, the senate were, within eight years after Sulla’s
death, obliged to break his laws. Pompey was elected by acclamation.
Crassus might have been less successful, had there not been a secret
understanding between him and Pompey. On the calends of January, 70 B.C.,
Pompey and Crassus entered on their memorable consulship.
On that day Pompey gave intimation of his intention to pursue a
popular course of policy. In a set speech he declared his intention of
releasing the tribunes from the trammels imposed upon them by Sulla,
and of attempting a reform of the judicial system. Both of Pompey’s
announcements were received with shouts of applause. To the former the
senate offered but a feeble opposition. The tribunes were restored to the
exercise of their power, and with their restoration it may be said that
the keystone of the arch erected by Sulla fell. With the resuscitation of
this popular power revived also the independence of the tribe assembly,
and hence followed by necessity a struggle between that body and the
senate.
But the other measure broached by Pompey was one which the senate
determined to oppose to the uttermost. They could not tamely abandon
their absolute power over the law courts. Yet in the last ten years,
scandal had been great. Among other persons Cæsar had reason to complain.
After his escape from Sulla’s vengeance, he also, like Cicero, resorted
to the schools of Greek philosophy. On his return, though only in his
twenty-third year, he indicted Cn. Dolabella for misgovernment in
Macedonia. Dolabella was defended by Q. Hortensius, the first advocate of
the day, a determined adherent of the senatorial party, and as a matter
of course he was acquitted. It had, however, been remarked that the
knights were little less corrupt than the senators; and the law proposed
under Pompey’s authority by the city prætor, L. Aurelius Cotta, was so
devised as to establish a court composed of three elements, each of which
might serve as a check upon the other two. In each jury one-third of the
jurymen was to be furnished by the senate, one-third by the knights, and
the remaining third by the tribunes of the treasury. Catulus endeavoured
to promote a compromise; but Pompey was resolute, and the nobles prepared
to maintain their privilege by arms.
An event, however, occurred which smoothed the way for Cotta’s law.
Cicero, after the great credit he had won by his bold defence of Sext.
Roscius, had quitted Rome for two years. He returned in 77 B.C., and
immediately began to dispute with Hortensius the sway which he exercised
in the law courts. Except during the year 75 B.C., when he was serving as
quæstor in Sicily, he was employed as an advocate at Rome. His polished
eloquence excited universal admiration; his defence of many wealthy
clients brought him in much money and connected him with many powerful
families. He was of the same age as Pompey; and, being now a candidate
for the ædileship, he began to be eager for political distinction. To
obtain this by military commands was not suited to his tastes or talents.
But it was possible to achieve it by the public impeachment of some
powerful offender. C. Cornelius Verres, a man connected with some of the
highest senatorial families, had for three years been prætor of Sicily,
from which province he had returned after practising extortions and
iniquities unexampled even in those days. The Sicilians, remembering the
industry and equity with which Cicero had lately executed the functions
of quæstor in their island, begged him to come forward as the accuser of
this man; and the orator, who saw how he might at once strengthen the
hands of Pompey and share the popular triumph of the consul, readily
undertook the cause.
The first attempt which the dexterous advocate of Verres made to elude
Cicero’s attack was to put forward Q. Cæcilius Niger, who had been
quæstor under Verres, to contend that to him belonged the task of
accusation. But Cicero exposed the intended fraud so unanswerably that
even the senatorial jurymen named Cicero as prosecutor. He demanded
ninety days for the purpose of collecting evidence in Sicily. But he only
used fifty of them, and on the fifth of August he opened this famous
impeachment. He had in the meantime been elected ædile. But Hortensius
had also become consul-elect; and one of the Metelli, a warm friend of
the accused, was designated to succeed Glabrio, who now presided in the
court as prætor peregrinus. It was therefore a great object for Verres
to get the trial postponed to the next year, when his great senatorial
friends would fill the most important offices in the state. To baffle
this design, Cicero contented himself with a brief statement of his case,
and at once proceeded to call witnesses. So overpowering was the evidence
that Hortensius threw up his brief, and Verres sought impunity in a
voluntary exile. To show what he could have done, Cicero published the
five great pleadings in which he intended to have set forth the crimes of
Verres; and they remain to us as a notable picture of the misery which it
was in the power of a Roman proconsul to inflict.
[Illustration: ROMAN GENERAL
(From Trajan’s Column)]
Soon after the trial came to this abrupt issue, the law was passed,
seemingly with little opposition; and thus a second great breach was made
in the Sullan constitution.
The corrupt state of the senate itself was made manifest by a step now
taken by Catulus and his friends. They restored the censorial office,
which had been suspended for sixteen years. The censors of the year
70 B.C. discharged their duties with severe integrity, and sixty-four
senators were degraded. For Catulus they revived the high rank of
princeps, and he was the last independent senator who held that rank.
When it was next called into existence, it served to give a title to
the despotic authority of Augustus. The review of the knights was made
remarkable by the fact that the consul Pompey appeared in the procession,
leading his horse through the Forum, and submitting himself to the
censorial scrutiny.
The jealousy of Crassus increased with Pompey’s popularity. Both the
consuls continued to maintain an armed force near the city; and, though
the liberal measures of Pompey had won the Forum, yet the gold of Crassus
commanded many followers. The senate dreaded that the days of Marius or
Cinna might return. But Crassus calculated the risks of a conflict, and
prudently resolved to give a pledge of peace. At the close of the year
he publicly offered his hand to Pompey, which the latter deigned to
accept after the manner of a prince. It did not suit Crassus to disturb
credit and imperil his vast fortune by a civil war; Pompey was satisfied
so long as no other disputed his claim to be the first citizen of the
republic.
Thus ended by far the most remarkable year that had passed since the time
of Sulla. Two generals, backed by an armed force, had trampled on the
great dictator’s laws; and one of them had rudely shaken the political
edifice reared in so much blood. Behind them appeared the form of one who
sought to gain by eloquence and civil arts what had lately been arrogated
by the sword. But it was some years yet before Cæsar descended into the
political arena.[b]
POMPEY SUBDUES THE CILICIAN PIRATES
[Sidenote: [84-67 B.C.]]
During the party struggles in Italy, Sicily, Africa, and Spain, during
the dictatorship of Sulla and its sanguinary effects, felt long
afterwards in the Sertorian and Slave wars, the sufferings of Rome and
her provinces were increased by a scourge of a peculiar character which
had gradually attained alarming proportions.
The coasts of the western part of that district of Asia Minor known as
Cilicia, where the wild mountains of the Taurus, which intersect the
country, afford a safe refuge to the robber and his prey, had been from
ancient times the home of piracy. The hopeless confusion of the Syrian
kingdom, of which Cilicia formed a part, set order at defiance and for a
long time allowed full play to the lucrative trade which flourished under
the protection of the states of Rhodes, Cyprus, and Egypt, all of them at
enmity with the Syrian monarchy.
We know how in the year 228 Rome had punished the Illyrian pirates, but
it was only about the year 103 that Marcus Antonius was sent against
those of Cilicia and after some time celebrated a hard-earned triumph.
The torpor of the Roman government and the civil disturbances were
more inimical to the safety of the seas than to that of the land; and
in the war against Mithridates, in which civil disturbances played
such a disastrous part, the ships of the Cilicians offered the same
refuge to the vanquished--whether he were of Pontus, Greece, or Rome,
whether Mithridates or Sulla had made him homeless--as they afforded to
escaped convicts, runaway slaves, and the outcasts of every nation and
every country. Their pirate sails were soon to be found all over the
Mediterranean Sea. After the collapse of the Grecian states and the decay
of the Roman sea power there was soon no safety for any merchant ship, or
coast district.
When the captured men could not ransom themselves by large sums of money,
they were taken to the great slave markets of which the island of Delos
was the chief depot, and in the secure and unassailable mountain castles
of Cilicia the corsairs deposited the money and other property which
their boats and fleets had seized throughout the whole district of the
Mediterranean.
The excellent organisation of this roving power added tenfold to its
danger. Any one who belonged to the great association could claim
assistance from any ship that carried the pirate flag. There was no fear
of treachery; a common interest, common foes, a similar life had created
a kind of national cohesion and national feeling among these freebooters
of the sea.
The repeated efforts of the Romans to stem the danger had been without
avail. L. Murena (84-81) accomplished nothing, neither was anything of
a decisive nature effected by P. Servilius Vatia (78-75), although he
conducted the war with much will and energy. He did his best; and by
his capture of the city of Isaura, in Taurus, he won for himself the
surname of Isauricus and a triumph at which he was able to produce rich
booty and, to the especial delight of the people, some pirate captains
as prisoners. Cilicia was formed into a Roman province, but this left
the evil practically untouched. The selection in the year 74 of Marcus
Antonius, a son of the Marcus Antonius mentioned above, as proprætor
against the Cilician corsairs, with considerable means at his disposal,
was also a failure, for the chiefs of the Cretan pirate horde annihilated
the greater portion of his fleet. Emboldened by success, the corsairs of
the Syrian coasts ventured as far as the Pillars of Hercules; they mocked
at the power and sapped the vitality of the Roman state. Notable men
like P. Clodius and Julius Cæsar fell into their hands. Ambassadors of
foreign powers on their way to Rome were captured, and Roman ambassadors
and curule magistrates had to be ransomed. Twelve axes, Cicero moaned,
fell into the hands of the pirates, who with these insignia in their
possession mocked at the supremacy of Rome. Italian cities such as
Caieta, and Misenum, to say nothing of Greek ones like Cnidus, Colophon,
and Samos were plundered, and the pirate squadron--the nimble little
_myoparones_--even appeared at Ostia, at the mouth of the Tiber. Trade
and the free supply of provisions were everywhere seriously obstructed
and this was particularly felt at Rome; the high price of corn, and the
emptiness of the treasury, whose source of replenishment was cut off,
pressed heavily on the nation and at last became unendurable.
The half-measures adopted so far having accomplished nothing, it was
evident that the pirates must either be destroyed by one great blow or
left to do as they pleased.
[Sidenote: [67 B.C.]]
In these circumstances Gabinius, one of the tribunes of the people
for the year 67, a favourite of Pompey and in the pay of the latter,
came forward with the momentous proposal that a general invested with
extensive powers should be entrusted with the extermination of the
pirates. He should be an imperator for three years with proconsular
and irresponsible power extending from the Pillars of Hercules to the
farthest east. He should have unlimited command throughout the sea and
four hundred stadia inland in all countries, including Italy. Fifteen
senatorial legati with a prætor’s privileges, and appointed by himself;
two hundred ships, six thousand Attic talents and whatever land forces
he might require, should be placed at the disposal of this imperator.
In making this proposal no name was given, but everybody knew that it
pointed to Pompey. This rogation was received with great applause.
Pompey had been successful in all his preceding efforts and had just
re-established the tribunician power; he was the idol of every Roman
citizen, and the people reposed in him that unlimited confidence which
the multitude are wont to accord to those whom they have once chosen for
their favourites. Naturally the senate did not receive the appointment in
the same spirit. To give one man such boundless power was the same, it
was said, as to give it to him forever; it was to exchange freedom for
the government of one; to turn, as the punsters said, a navarch into a
monarch. Q. Catulus tried to throw the weight of his esteemed name, and
Q. Hortensius that of his eloquence, into the scale against the dangerous
measure. They sought to obtain the veto of the rest of the tribunes
against the rogation which would place all the power of the republic at
the disposal of one man, and might thus create a regular tyranny, a new
Romulus; and here and there party bitterness may have vented itself in
angry words, saying that the new Romulus should be treated like the old,
whose mangled remains were carried away from the Field of Mars under the
togas of the senators. But when the measure was put to the vote of the
assembly, all opposition was futile against the unanimous and clamorous
voice of the people and of the most renowned leaders of the popular party
whose interests, like those of Julius Cæsar, were intimately connected
with those of Pompey. The tribune Trebellius ventured to interpose his
veto and maintained it until seventeen tribes voted for his removal from
office when his firmness forsook him. It was in vain that Q. Catulus
counselled that the deputies should be appointed by the people and not
by Pompey; all resistance was useless. One hundred and twenty thousand
infantry, five thousand cavalry, twenty-four deputies and five hundred
ships, which exceeded the first commission, were placed at the service of
Pompey, who with assumed modesty begged to be spared the difficult task.
And so high were the hopes centred in him that the price of corn fell
immediately on his appointment and before he had done anything.
Pompey justified the hopes of Rome. He turned to the best account the
means placed at his disposal. He divided his command into thirteen
areas under his deputies, and moved with his main forces from west to
east. The corsairs were chased from one lurking-place to another, from
retreat to retreat, and one admiral drove them into another’s net. Before
forty days had elapsed the western Mediterranean was free, and the corn
ships from Africa, Sardinia, and Sicily now had free course into the
Roman harbours, as had not been the case for years. After a short stay
at Rome, Pompey again set sail for Brundusium, and the chase commenced
afresh. Treachery and submission decreased the number of the pirates who
could no longer hold out and who were wisely spared by Pompey when they
submitted. In less than three months he was on the western coast of wild
Cilicia and arrived at the promontory of Coracesium, where a final battle
put an end to the war. The remaining corsairs were there assembled and
were defeated. The seas were now free, and the mountain castles opened
and disgorged their plunder, their arms, their treasure, and their
prisoners. Thirteen hundred ships were burned, seventy-two taken, and 306
surrendered. One hundred and twenty strongholds and towns were destroyed,
ten thousand pirates were killed, and twenty thousand taken prisoners.
The liberated prisoners who now returned to their homes, the soldiers
enriched by the chase, the Roman people saved from hunger, the merchants
of the wide Roman dominions whose commerce was reinstated--all lauded the
name of the great proconsul who had accomplished in three months what had
been vainly desired for seventeen years. In fact, this extermination of
the corsairs of the Mediterranean was probably the most brilliant and in
any case the most meritorious achievement in the life of Pompey, although
it must also be noted that this swift conquest was as illustrative of
the power of Rome when it assembled and united its forces, as it was of
the capacity of Pompey. The pirates themselves moreover had no cause
to complain of undue severity. The better sort were allowed to settle
in the town of Soli in Cilicia, whose name, Pompeiopolis, immortalised
the memory of its conqueror; others found shelter in different inland
places and towns, whilst some were even bestowed in southern Italy. The
temperate way in which Pompey treated the conquered led the Cretans, who
had been conquered in 68 by Q. Metellus and treated with great cruelty,
to send their submission by an embassy.
Pompey accepted it and sent them his deputy L. Octavius; Metellus
protested loudly against this invasion of his province, and took up arms
against him, but his protest was unjustifiable in face of the Gabinian
law. Thus a regular civil war arose in the island, which was of little
importance in itself but greatly increased the very unsettled condition
of the republic and its government.
THE SECOND AND THIRD MITHRIDATIC WARS
[Sidenote: [84-73 B.C.]]
In the meanwhile Pompey was by no means inclined to be contented with
this triumph. He expected that the command in the Pirate War would lead
to a greater and more important one. The war in Asia had always been
the object of his desires, and now, after crushing the corsairs, the
people could not refuse him anything. L. Licinius Murena, left by Sulla
in Asia in the year 84 with the two Fimbrian legions, had recommenced
the war directly after his general’s departure, but without success, and
at Sulla’s command he abandoned it; these military operations, which
ended in the year 81 with the triumph of the proprætor Murena, were
distinguished by the name of the Second Mithridatic War. Mithridates
knew that the peace with Sulla was only a truce, and he saw himself
threatened anew when the Romans made Bithynia a province in the year 75,
its last king, Nicomedes III, having died and bequeathed his kingdom to
the Roman people. We know that through the Marians who had taken refuge
at his court, Mithridates entered into negotiations with Sertorius,
and therefore in the year 74 the consuls, L. Licinius Lucullus and M.
Aurelius Cotta, accepted the king’s challenge to the Third Mithridatic
War.
The king found that the corsairs were allies not to be despised on the
sea; and the Roman outlaws at his court, as well as the officers sent him
by Sertorius, helped him to drill his army in the Roman fashion. Lucullus
and Cotta were entrusted with the direction of the war. The former, a
man belonging to the aristocratic class had exhibited great capacity in
the eastern seat of war, and in all the appointments since filled by
him, he had proved himself a skilful and intelligent officer, while his
moderation and gentleness united with unusual cultivation had won Sulla’s
highest approval.
In the year 74 the war commenced. Mithridates began operations by calling
many districts in Asia Minor to arms and by making himself master
in Bithynia by means of his fleet and army. The Romans had retired
to Chalcedon; and here Cotta, who refused to wait for his advancing
colleague, was beaten by land and water, and the king proceeded in a
southwesterly direction, towards the town of Cyzicus, and laid siege
to it. The Hellenic inhabitants offered a firm resistance, for they
knew the fate that awaited conquered cities at the hands of the Pontian
king. Lucullus was therefore able to move to a spot east of the camp of
Mithridates. By this stroke he cut off the king’s communication with his
Pontian territory and closing the way on the land side left Mithridates
only the sea open to him. At the river Rhyndacus (east of Cyzicus)
Lucullus defeated a portion of the enemy’s army which was attempting to
break through the Roman lines. The sufferings from the winter season and
want of care consequent on the stoppage of the transports had naturally
thinned the ranks of the three hundred thousand men who were besieging
the city. So in the spring of 73 the king was finally forced to raise the
siege and escape with the rest of his fleet; and the failure would have
been fatal to him, had not the Roman ships been burned in the harbour the
previous year.
[Sidenote: [73-70 B.C.]]
Thus the Pontian fleet, which swept the Black Sea and the Propontis,
met with no opposition in its expedition to the Ægean Sea, and it was
said that the Roman exiles who commanded it had decided to attempt a
landing in Italy. However, Lucullus himself, who had turned westward from
Cyzicus, commanded the little fleet, which had been collected in the
Ægean waters and defeated the enemy’s squadron in a battle between Lemnos
and Scyros in which most of the Roman exiles lost their lives.
In the meanwhile, Lucullus’ deputies Voconius, Barba, and Triarius,
united against Mithridates, who was stationed with his troops at
Nicomedia (Bithynia). The king avoided a battle and fled on a pirate
ship, besieged Heraclea on the way, where he assembled the rest of his
fleet which the storm had almost entirely scattered, and then proceeded
past Sinope to Amisus. The foes being now driven back to their own
domains, the Romans took the offensive.
Aurelius Cotta stationed himself at Heraclea. Lucullus himself passed
in the autumn of the year 73 into the Pontian district. Mithridates
avoided a battle and retired inland where the pursuing enemy would find
it difficult to obtain supplies. Lucullus followed, leaving parties to
besiege or watch Amisus and Eupatoria, the most important cities of
Pontus; and deaf to the murmurs of his soldiers, quickly pursued the king
and arrived in the spring of 72 at Cabira (on the Lycus in Pontus).
[Illustration: ROMAN GALLEY]
The king had looked in vain for allies in the winter; neither the
great ruler of Armenia, his son-in-law Tigranes, nor the Parthians
would support him. But a powerful army of forty thousand infantry and
four thousand cavalry was meanwhile levied in his own states under
the command of Diophantus and Taxiles, whilst Lucullus only mustered
three legions. Mithridates’ cavalry, his best support, was completely
defeated by Lucullus’ deputy, M. Fabius Hadrianus, and when the king
ordered a further retreat, the camp became the scene of blind fear and
confusion which was turned into a complete rout by a timely onslaught
from Lucullus. The king fled with two thousand cavalry over the border
of his kingdom to Armenia, where his son-in-law Tigranes received him.
The rich booty of the camp fell into the hands of the Roman soldiers;
by the king’s command an eunuch forced the women of the harem to drink
of a flagon of poison to save them from falling into the hands of the
enemy--the greatest of all disgraces for an oriental ruler.
There was now a pause in the war. The flat country submitted everywhere
to the Romans; only Amisus on the Pontian coast, Sinope and Amastris on
the Paphlagonian, and Heraclea on the Bithynian coast, made an obstinate
resistance, supported by the troops of the king and his allies, the
corsairs, with their ships.
While the deputies were occupied with these sieges, from 72-70, the
commander-in-chief organised the internal affairs of the Asiatic
province, where there was a pressing need for the attention of an upright
man like Lucullus. Sulla’s peace had left the inhabitants of these
beautiful countries to their hopeless misery under Roman tax gatherers.
The twenty thousand talents which Sulla had imposed on them had grown
to a debt of 120,000 talents under the usurious interest of the Roman
capitalists, who advanced the community the money for the indemnity;
and to satisfy the creditors the sacred vessels in the temples of the
gods had to be melted down, freemen sold their sons and daughters into
slavery, and where payment was delayed or impossible every torture was
resorted to which inventive avarice could devise; so that according to
Plutarch’s expression “slavery seemed like peace and _seisachtheia_[101]
in comparison.”
To mitigate this disgraceful state of things, Lucullus issued a decree at
Ephesus forbidding more than twelve per cent. interest, releasing debtors
from the obligation to pay interest whose total exceeded the original
capital, and prohibiting the creditor from claiming more than a quarter
of the debtor’s property.
The provincials congratulated themselves on having such a just and
humane proconsul, but his policy aroused the deadly hatred of the Roman
capitalists as it injured their business, and they spared no efforts in
Rome to accomplish his fall as soon as possible. In this they received
great assistance from the increasing discontent of the soldiers who were
as much opposed to the justice and moderation of Lucullus as they were to
the long continuation of the war, which had just taken a fresh start.
Mithridates had worked the whole winter trying to draw Tigranes into
the Roman war which he must sooner or later be unable to avoid. His own
power had broken down, his son Machares, the satrap of his kingdom of the
Bosporus had made peace with Lucullus on his own account and his ships
returning from Crete and Spain had been destroyed by Lucullus’ deputy at
Tenedos.
THE ARMENIAN WAR
[Sidenote: [70-68 B.C.]]
Tigranes’ kingdom of Armenia had previously been, like so many others,
a province of the Syrian kingdom, and its governor had asserted his
independence under Antiochus the Great. Tigranes had extended it on
every side and had increased it by fragments taken from the Syrian
kingdom which was now falling into ruins, whilst princes of the house of
the Seleucidæ quarrelled over its remains. From the year 83 Syria and
Cilicia appear as Armenian provinces under Armenian governors. But the
great king Tigranes himself held his gorgeous court in eastern fashion
at Tigranocerta near the borders of Mesopotamia. It was one of those
gigantic cities rapidly built and filled at the bidding of a despot, the
ruins of which are to be found in the East scattered here and there as
witnesses to the evanescent character of despotic creations.
In earlier times the Roman government would not have so long delayed
showing this despot his proper place. Lucullus, contrary to the will of
the government now carried the war into Tigranes’ territory, demanding
from the great ruler that he should deliver up Mithridates. This was
suggested by Appius Claudius, whose bold speech filled the barbarian
ruler with astonishment. He was furious and enraged that Lucullus did not
give him his title of “King of Kings,” but only addressed him as king,
and avenged himself by refusing the title of “imperator” to the Roman,
and making common cause with Mithridates whom he had not previously
admitted to his presence.
Lucullus led his unwilling army, of which the Fimbrian legions after
thirteen campaigns were now with some reason demanding to be disbanded,
over the Cappadocian Mountains and then across the Euphrates. This was
an ill-advised course considering the nature of the Armenian territory
and the small numbers and ill-humour of his soldiers who were in no way
pleased to be leaving the Pontian district behind them.
Whilst King Tigranes was still rocking himself in the ignorance of an
eastern prince and listening to his courtiers’ assurances that the Roman
army would never venture to face the hosts of the King of Kings, a
messenger arrived to acquaint him with its approach. The messenger who
brought the unpleasant news was rewarded by death, but it was none the
less true. Mithrobarzanes was given the command of the band now sent
against the Romans as punishment for not having joined the flatteries
of the courtiers, but he was easily beaten. Tigranes left his capital
just before the arrival of the Romans, and reinforcements gradually
arrived from the different nations of his kingdom. Their appearance
and their numbers--there were Arabians, Syrians, Medes, Adiabenians,
Armenians, Iberians, and Albanians from the heights and valleys of the
Caucasus--inspired him with confidence. He rejected the counsel of
Mithridates, who, from his own experience of the Romans, advised him to
avoid a battle and to employ his own superior cavalry to cut off the
enemy’s supplies, and the heights around Tigranocerta were soon covered
with the king’s army of 150,000 heavy infantry, 20,000 light infantry,
and 55,000 mounted men, 17,000 being in coat of mail. Lucullus left 6000
men before the city, and the remainder, who seemed to the king to be too
many for an embassy and too few for an army went up the river to find a
ford. “There they fly, these invincible Roman hoplites!” exclaimed the
king, with confidence. However, he soon afterwards saw to his horror, how
the eagle of the first legion wheeled round and then one cohort after
another crossed the river in the proud and confident manner of Roman
troops. Quickly the king sought to array his followers but it was another
barbarian battle, in which the stampede commenced before the troops
were ranged in order. Driven back by the first attack and thrown into
confusion the masses of men offered a wide target and an easy prey for
the swords of the enemy.
The Romans were almost ashamed at their easy victory, for it cost them
only five dead and 105 wounded. The enemy’s loss was incalculable. The
tiara and diadem of the Armenian king fell into Roman hands; and the city
of Tigranocerta had to surrender. It was taken and given over to the
soldiers to plunder; some of the heterogeneous population were sent back
to their native districts.
Lucullus wished to follow up the victory so as to give the enemy no time
to assemble for a fresh resistance. Submission was made to him by many
of the subjects of Tigranes, and an embassy of the Parthians appeared
with an offering of friendship. Only one more blow was needed to finally
drive the Armenian from his throne. But it was some time before the
general could appease his discontented, unwilling soldiers and the
allied kings made use of the opportunity to reassemble an army of seventy
thousand infantry and thirty-five thousand cavalry. This time they
followed Mithridates’ advice to avoid a battle. However, when Artaxata
(on the Araxes) the second city of the kingdom was threatened, a battle
ensued on the river Arsanias in the neighbourhood. The conflict lasted
somewhat longer this time and the victory was bought more dearly, the
loss of the enemy was somewhat slighter, but the result was the same. No
Asiatic army, albeit large and well chosen, could be victorious over a
well-commanded Roman army.
[Sidenote: [68-67 B.C.]]
But Lucullus had not yet accomplished his purpose. His military capacity
was indisputable, but he was wanting in the power of attaching the
soldiers to himself by that personal charm which was almost a more
important gift in those times.
They murmured that the richest towns had been past by, none had been
taken by storm, so that they had come in for no plunder; but they
maintained that the imperator looked out for himself though he gave them
nothing, and it cannot be denied that Lucullus enriched himself. In his
cold, severe manner the general ignored their desire for loot, and they
hated him not only because he was an aristocrat but because he treated
the inhabitants of the cities with consideration, whilst they, as savage
soldiery, regarded them as profitable booty. The snow-covered mountains
and the endless precipitous roads filled them with aversion; never had
they wintered in a friendly Hellenic city, and the officers concurred
in these complaints, particularly P. Clodius, the brother-in-law of the
general, who actively fostered the feeling against Lucullus in the camp
as well as the capital.
The proconsul could not induce his soldiers to help him to take Artaxata,
the second city of the Armenian kingdom. Half ceding to their pressure
he turned southward to Mesopotamia, whose capital Nisibis surrendered
to him. But here the unwilling machine denied him further service. The
troops insisted on winter quarters in Nisibis and its environs where they
wished to wait for the successor of Lucullus. This was advantageous to
the enemy as it delayed the final blow.
However Tigranes gained nothing, as L. Fannius came opportunely to the
aid of Lucullus’ soldiers whom Tigranes had surprised. Nevertheless
Mithridates strove to benefit by the discontent in the Roman army and
regain his kingdom.
He arrived at Pontus and attacked the Romans, who had excited universal
hatred in the country, with a small force, and not unsuccessfully for
he had learned somewhat in the long war, and in the following year (67)
he defeated the deputy Triarius at Zela on the river Iris (southwest of
Pontus) when the Romans lost seven thousand killed, amongst them a great
number of officers.
Lucullus, hearing the bad news, withdrew to Mesopotamia and returned to
Pontus, and Mithridates carried the war from thence to Cappadocia. When
Lucullus wished to follow him thither, the Fimbrian soldiers declined to
obey him as he was no longer their general and they declared they would
only remain under arms with the other legions, until the autumn.
Mithridates profited by these occurrences. Acilius Glabrio, the governor
of Bithynia who was to have been replaced by Lucullus, and Q. Marcius
Rex, the governor of Cilicia, were inactive in their provinces, and when
the ten commissioners of the Roman senate arrived to join with Lucullus
in organising the conquered district of Pontus as a province, Mithridates
had reconquered the greater part of it. In the meanwhile, the mine laid
at Rome against the general of the aristocracy by his active enemies,
namely, Pompey and his friends, the embittered members of the equestrian
order, the offended officers and the misguided people, was finally sprung
and the inevitable Pompey, who reaped everywhere where he had not sown,
was appointed commander-in-chief in the East and this time with full
powers more comprehensive and extravagant than those conferred in the
previous year by the Gabinian law.[c]
[Sidenote: [67-66 B.C.]]
[Illustration: POMPEY
(From a coin)]
During the year of inaction that had preceded Pompey’s appointment,
Mithridates had collected a fresh army, with which he occupied the
frontier of Pontus. Pompey received his new commission in the summer of
66 B.C., and he at once pushed forward towards Cabira, through a country
wasted by previous campaigns. Mithridates, anxious to avoid a battle,
retired towards the sources of the Halys, but he was overtaken by the
Roman general, and obliged to give battle on a spot afterwards marked
by the city of Nicopolis, founded by Pompey in memory of the battle.
Here Mithridates was entirely defeated, and with only a few stragglers
succeeded in crossing the Euphrates. But Tigranes refused to harbour
him in Armenia, and he made his way northward, with great difficulty,
through the wild mountain tribes of Caucasus to Dioscurias (Iskuria) on
the coast of Circassia. Banished from the regions south of Caucasus,
his adventurous genius formed the conception of uniting the Sarmatian
tribes northward of the Black Sea, and making a descent upon Italy.
Panic-stricken at his father’s approach, Machares, viceroy of the Crimea,
sought death by his own hand; and the Crimea again became subject to
Mithridates.
So great was the terror caused by the victories of the Roman general,
that Tigranes would have prostrated himself at his feet, had not Pompey
prevented the humiliation; and Phraates of Parthia, who had assumed
the proud title of “King of Kings,” lately arrogated by Tigranes, sent
to make an alliance with the victorious Roman, who turned his steps
northward in pursuit of Mithridates. At midwinter he celebrated the
Saturnalia on the river Cyrus (Kur), and in the spring advanced along
the coast to the Phasis. But learning that Mithridates was safe in the
Crimea, he turned back to his old quarters on the Cyrus, and spent
the summer in reducing the tribes which occupied the southern slopes
of Caucasus. One of his victories was celebrated by the foundation of
another Nicopolis. But he was obliged to return to Pontus for winter
quarters. Here he received ambassadors from the neighbouring potentates,
and busied himself in reducing Pontus to the form of a Roman province.
For the next two years he occupied himself by campaigns in the famous
countries to the south of Asia Minor.[b]
THE END OF MITHRIDATES
[Sidenote: [66-63 B.C.]]
Mithridates spent part of his youth away from his father’s court; he
had been put on the wildest horses, which he had learned to master; he
retired into the most impenetrable hunting districts, so that half the
time no one knew where he was. He differed from all kings with whom the
Romans had fought because he had pure Persian and true Asiatic blood
flowing through his veins; for he was descended from Persian satraps.
The aim of his life was to make the throne of Pontus the centre of the
national Asiatic opposition to Rome. Thereby he enjoyed great momentary
success: but he was defeated by the great power of the Romans in their
union with the Greek element. He was then robbed of his father’s lands.
Nothing but the life of an adventurous fugitive remained for him.
His brave wife Hypsicratia, who had to look after him and his horse,
accompanied him to the citadel, where the royal treasure was kept.
Mithridates divided it among the loyal followers who were still around
him. He is said to have entertained the same thoughts attributed to
Philip III of Macedonia of advancing on Italy through the lands of the
Danube, and from the east of seeking the Romans in their home, as did
Hannibal. But these daring chimeras were joined to a feeling of immediate
danger.
Among his followers he divided equal shares of poison, so as to insure
them against the danger of falling into the hands of the Romans. He
himself did not die from poison; he sought support in his Bosporus
possessions. But as there his son rebelled against him, he had the
death-blow given him by a true Gaul. The son, Pharnaces, joined the
Romans.
After Mithridates had been driven out, Pompey turned against Tigranes
in Armenia, who at this time was waging war with the Parthian king
Phraates whom the younger Tigranes had joined. In the midst of all these
dissensions in Armenia, Pompey stepped in, not precisely as an enemy,
but as arbitrator. There are many accounts of the submissiveness which
Tigranes expressed towards Pompey. The main point is that he praised
Pompey as the man into whose hands the fate of the world had now been
laid.
Tigranes had to give up all acquisitions which he had made in war with
the Seleucians; he kept Armenia. The son was led away into captivity.
Armenia had more or less already been drawn into the circle of universal
history. But Pompey can be added to the men who have carried on the
historical movement of the world in provinces which up till this time
had remained undisturbed by it. At the election he met the Albanians,
who still continued in the primitive simplicity of a pastoral people.
With their cavalcades they tried to prevent the Romans from reaching
the Black Sea, or at least, if this was unsuccessful, to make their
return impossible. In the year 65 a battle took place in which the Roman
manœuvres had the upper hand. Albanians, Iberians, and a few other
independent nations sealed a compact with them. Pompey is said to have
had the desire, like Alexander, to seek the Caucasian Rock, to which,
according to Greek tradition, Prometheus was chained. But the Roman
leader was not the man to let himself be led by an illusion of this kind;
it was sufficient for him to have subjected Pontus and Armenia. Already
he felt himself strong enough to deprive the king of the Parthians of the
title of “King of Kings.” He took up the interests of Armenia against
the Parthians. As Tigranes had lost his acquisitions, so Phraates was to
lose his. Phraates did not dare take up arms against the victorious Roman
army. The ambassadors of Elymais and Media appeared at the winter camp of
Pompey at Amisus.
POMPEY IN JERUSALEM
Through the victory in Armenia the Romans at the same time became masters
in Syria, which it was impossible to give back to the Seleucians, as
they did not know how to defend themselves. The survivors of this battle
had to content themselves with the grant of a small province, and
acknowledge the supremacy of Rome. After the example of the Syrian kings,
Pompey could not think of introducing the Greek worship of the gods into
Jerusalem; he occupied himself only with the political interests.[d]
As he advanced southward, his authority was called in to settle a quarrel
between two brothers of that royal family, which had inherited the Jewish
sceptre and high priesthood from the brave Maccabees. Aristobulus was
the reigning king of Judea, but his title was disputed by his brother
Hyrcanus. It was the latter who applied for aid to the Roman general.
Pompey accepted the appeal. But the Jews, attached to the reigning
prince, refused obedience, and Pompey was obliged to undertake the siege
of Jerusalem. For three months the Jews defended themselves with their
wonted obstinacy; but their submission was enforced by famine, and Pompey
entered the Holy City. Pillage he forbade: but, excited by the curiosity
which even then the spiritual worship of Jehovah created in the minds
of Roman idolaters, he entered the sacred precincts of the Temple, and
ventured even to intrude into the Holy of Holies, and to stand behind
that solemn veil which had hitherto been lifted but once a year, and
that by the high priest alone. We know little of the impression produced
upon Pompey’s mind by finding the shrine untenanted by any object of
worship. But it is interesting to compare the irreverent curiosity of the
Roman with the conduct attributed to the Great Alexander upon a similar
occasion. Hyrcanus was established in the sovereignty, on condition of
paying a tribute to Rome: Aristobulus followed the conqueror as his
prisoner.
Aretas, king of the Nabatæan Arabs, defied the arms of Pompey; and the
conqueror was preparing to enter the rocky deserts of Idumæa, so as to
penetrate to Petra, when he received news which suddenly recalled him to
Asia Minor. Mithridates was no more. Pompey hastened to Sinope, to which
place the body of the old king had been sent by his son. It was honoured
with a royal funeral, and placed in the sepulchre of his fathers.
The remainder of the year 63 B.C. was spent by the general in regulating
the new provinces of Bithynia, Pontus, and Syria, and in settling the
kingdoms which he allowed to remain under Roman protection on the
frontiers of these provinces. Pharnaces, son of Mithridates, was left in
the possession of the Crimea and its dependencies; Deiotarus, chief of
Galatia, received an increase of territory; Ariobarzanes was restored for
the fourth time to the principality of Cappadocia. All this was done by
Pompey’s sole authority, without advice from the senate.
[Sidenote: [62-61 B.C.]]
Early in 62 B.C. he left Asia, and proceeded slowly through Macedonia
and Greece--so slowly, that on the 1st of January, 61 B.C., he had not
yet appeared before the walls of Rome to claim his triumph. He had been
absent from Italy for nearly seven years. His intentions were known
to none. But the power given him by the devotion of his soldiers was
absolute; and the senatorial chiefs might well feel anxiety till he
disclosed his will. But before we speak of his arrival in Rome, we must
relate the important events that had occurred during his absence.[b]
FOOTNOTES
[101] The measure by which Solon eased the burdens of the Attic
creditors.
[Illustration]