SIESTA.
After being for eight of the most critical years of Rome’s life the
central figure, Scipio, for the remainder of his life, comes only at
intervals into the limelight of history. He had saved Rome physically,
and now by retiring into private citizenship he sought to save her
morally. If a man who had attained such unapproachable heights of fame
could sink his own ambition and interests, and show that the State was
greater than the individual, the example might influence later
generations. Supreme self-sacrifice has been one of the greatest moral
forces in the civilisation of the world. But the force of Scipio’s
example was unhappily to be submerged by the self-seeking of such men as
Marius, Sulla, and Cæsar.
To trace the latter and longer part of his career is difficult—the
curtain is raised only on a series of brief scenes. We hear of him
concerned with the resettlement of his soldiers; to each of his Spanish
and African veterans is allotted land in the proportion of two acres for
every year’s active service. Then three years after Zama he was elected
censor, an office which was not only one of the higher magistracies, but
regarded as the crown of a political career. As the title implies, the
censors, two in number, conducted the census, which was not merely a
registration but an occasion for checking the condition of public and
private life. It was then that the censors issued edicts concerning the
moral rules they intended to enforce, then that they punished
irregularities of conduct, and then that they chose fresh members of the
Senate. The censors were immune from responsibility for their acts, and
the only limitation was that re-election was forbidden, and that no act
was valid without the assent of both censors. Scipio’s period of office
seems to have been marked by unusual harmony, and a clean sheet as
regards punishments.
We have to wait until 192 B.C. before we hear of him again, and once
more the incident is an illuminating example of his generosity and
breadth of view. In the seven years since the peace after Zama, Hannibal
had been turning his genius into new channels—the restoration of
Carthage’s prosperity and the improvement of its administration. But in
this labour he incurred the hostility of many of his own countrymen. In
his efforts to safeguard the liberty of the people he stopped the abuse
of the judicial power—an abuse which recalls the worst days of Venice.
Similarly, finding that the revenue could not raise the annual payment
to Rome without fresh taxation, he made an investigation into the
embezzlement which lay at the root of this faulty administration. Those
who had been plundering the public combined with the order of judges to
instigate the Romans against Hannibal. The Romans, whose fear of the
great Carthaginian had not faded, had been watching with envy and
distrust the commercial revival of Carthage. They eagerly seized on such
a pretext for intervention. From Livy, however, we learn that “a
strenuous opposition was for long made to this by Scipio Africanus, who
thought it highly unbecoming the dignity of the Roman people to make
themselves a party to the animosities and charges against Hannibal; to
interpose the public authority in the faction strife of the
Carthaginians, not deeming it sufficient to have conquered that
commander in the field, but to become as it were his prosecutors in a
judicial process....” Scipio’s opposition delayed but it could not stop
the lust for revenge of smaller men—Cato was consul,—and an embassy was
sent to Carthage to arraign Hannibal. He, realising the futility of
standing his trial, decided to escape before it was too late, and sailed
for Tyre, lamenting the misfortunes of his country oftener than his own.
At the beginning of the next year Scipio was elected consul for the
second time, and his election along with Tiberius Longus afforded a
coincidence in that their fathers had been consuls together in the first
year of the Hannibalic war. Scipio’s second consulship was comparatively
uneventful, at least in a military sense, for the Senate decided that as
there was no immediate foreign danger both consuls should remain in
Italy. To this decision Scipio was strongly opposed, though he bowed to
it, and once again history was to confirm his foresight and rebuke the
“wait and see” policy of the near-sighted Roman Senators.
During the interval between Zama and his second consulship, Rome had
been engaged in a struggle in Greece. The freedom of action which Zama
conferred had combined with certain earlier factors to re-orient, or
more literally to orient, her foreign policy. Ever since the repulse of
Pyrrhus, Rome had been driving towards an inevitable contact with the
Near East. Here the three great powers were the empires into which after
Alexander the Great’s death his vast dominion had been divided—Macedon,
Egypt, and Syria, or, as it was then termed, Asia.
With Egypt, Rome had made an alliance eighty years before, and this
alliance had been cemented by commercial ties. But Philip V. of Macedon
had allied himself with Hannibal, and though his help was verbal rather
than practical, the threat of an attack on Italy had driven the Romans
to take the offensive against him, with the aid of a coalition of the
Greek States. The drain on her resources elsewhere made Rome seize the
first chance, in 205 B.C., for an indecisive peace. Taking advantage of
her preoccupation with Hannibal, Philip made a compact with Antiochus of
Syria to seize on and share the dominions of Egypt.
But after Zama, Rome was free to respond to the appeal of her ally, and
eager also to take revenge for Philip’s unneutral act in sending four
thousand Macedonians to aid Hannibal in the final battle. The Senate,
however, could only persuade the assembly of the people—anxious to enjoy
the fruits of peace—by pretending that Philip was on the point of
invading Italy. At Cynoscephalæ the legion conquered the phalanx, and
Philip was forced to accept terms which reduced him to a second-rate
power—like Carthage, stripped of his foreign possessions, and forbidden
to make war without the consent of Rome.
The Roman Senate did not realise, however, that this removal of the
Macedonian danger made war inevitable with Antiochus of Syria, for the
tide of Roman dominion clearly threatened his own submersion sooner or
later. Rome had in effect swallowed first Carthage and then Macedon, and
Antiochus had no liking for the rôle of Jonah. The Mediterranean world
was too small to hold them both. Antiochus, inflated with his own
grandiloquent title of “King of Kings,” decided to take the initiative
and enlarge his own dominions while the opportunity was good. In 197-196
B.C. he overran the whole of Asia Minor, and even crossed into Thrace.
Greece was obviously his next objective, but the Romans could not see
this, though Scipio did. In a prophetic speech he declared “that there
was every reason to apprehend a dangerous war with Antiochus, for he had
already, of his own accord, come into Europe; and how did they suppose
he would act in future, when he should be encouraged to a war, on one
hand by the Ætolians, avowed enemies of Rome, and stimulated, on the
other, by Hannibal, a general famous for his victories over the
Romans?”—for Hannibal had recently moved to the court of Antiochus. But
the Senate, acting like the proverbial ostrich, rejected this advice,
and decided that not only should no new army be sent to Macedonia, but
that the one which was there should be brought home and disbanded. Had
Scipio been allotted Macedonia as his province, the danger from
Antiochus might have been nipped in the bud and the subsequent invasion
of Greece prevented.
Politically, the main feature of his year of office was a wide extension
of the policy of settling colonies of Roman citizens throughout Italy—a
safeguard against such a dangerous revolt of the Italian States as had
followed the invasion of Hannibal. Scipio himself enjoyed the honour of
being nominated by the censors as prince of the Senate, an office which
apart from its honour had greater influence than that of president,
which it had replaced. For the president’s functions were limited to
those of the modern “Speaker,” whereas the prince of the Senate could
express his opinions as well as presiding.
The only serious hostilities during this year were in north-western
Italy, where the Insubrian and Ligurian Gauls and the Boii had made one
of their periodical risings. Longus, the other consul, whose province it
was, moved against the Boii. Finding how strong and determined were
their forces, he sent post-haste to Scipio, asking him, if he thought
proper, to join him. The Gauls, however, seeing the consul’s defensive
attitude and guessing the reason, attacked at once before Scipio could
arrive. It is evident that the Romans narrowly escaped a disaster, but
the battle was sufficiently indecisive for them to retire unmolested to
Placentia on the Po, while the Gauls withdrew to their own country.
The sequel is obscure, though some writers say that Scipio, after he had
joined forces with his colleague, overran the country of the Boii and
Ligurians as far as the woods and marshes allowed him to proceed. In any
case he went there, for it is stated that he returned from Gaul to hold
the elections. One other incident of his term of office was that, on his
proposal, the Senators were for the first time allotted reserved and
separate seats at the Roman games. While many held that this was an
honour which ought to have been accorded long before, others opposed it
vehemently, contending that “every addition made to the grandeur of the
Senate was a diminution of the dignity of the people,” that it distilled
class feeling, and if the ordinary seats had been good enough for five
hundred and thirty-eight years, why should a change be made now. “It is
said that even Africanus himself at last became sorry for having
proposed that matter in his consulship: so difficult is it to bring
people to approve of any alteration of long-standing customs” (Livy).
All very petty; and yet Scipio’s good-natured consideration for the
comfort and dignity of others—it could not enhance his own—may have
contributed to weaken his old influence with the people, who had been
his support against the short-sighted Senators.
After the election of his successors, Scipio retired once more into
private life, instead of taking a foreign province, as retiring consuls
so often did. This circumstance has led one or two of the latter Roman
historians to search for a motive. Thus Cornelius Nepos, the biographer
of Cato, says that Scipio wanted to remove Cato from his province of
Spain and become his successor, and that failing to obtain the Senate’s
assent, Scipio, to show his displeasure, retired into private life when
his consulship was ended. Plutarch also, in his life of Cato,
contradicts this, and says that Scipio actually succeeded Cato in Spain.
Apart from the known historical inaccuracies of both these later
writers, such pettiness would be inconsistent with all the assured facts
of Scipio’s character. We know that Cato and Scipio were always at
variance, but the animosity, so far as speeches are recorded, was all on
the side of Cato, to whom Scipio’s Greek culture was as a red rag to a
bull, and not less his moderation towards Carthage. The man whose parrot
cry was _Delenda est Carthago_—fit ancestry of the Yellow Press—could
not brook the man whose loftier soul and reputation stood in his way,
nor his narrow spirit rest until he had brought about the destruction
both of Carthage and Scipio. Their quarrel, if one-sided spite can be so
called, dated from Zama, when Cato—serving as quæstor under Scipio, and
already hating his Greek habits so much that he would not live in the
same quarters—took violent exception to his general’s lavish generosity
to the soldiers in the distribution of the spoil.
Fortunately there are external facts which demolish the statements of
both Nepos and Plutarch on this matter. A decision to disband Cato’s
army in Spain was made by the Senate at the same time as they refused
Scipio’s request to allot Macedonia as his consular province, and
disbanded that army also. Cato accordingly returned, and received a
triumph at the outset of Scipio’s consulship. As there was no army there
was obviously no post for a proconsul, which shows the futility of the
statement that Scipio desired to go to Spain at the end of his
consulship.
His real motive, however, in staying at Rome instead of seeking some
other foreign province is not difficult to guess. He had predicted the
danger from Antiochus, and as the Senate’s refusal to anticipate it made
a struggle inevitable, Scipio would wish to be on hand, ready for the
call that he felt sure would come. He was right, for Hannibal was even
then proposing to Antiochus an expedition against Italy, maintaining as
ever that a campaign in Italy was the only key to Rome’s defeat, because
such invasion crippled the full output of Rome’s man-power and
resources. As a preliminary Hannibal proposed that he should be given a
force to land in Africa and raise the Carthaginians, while Antiochus
moved into Greece and stood by, ready for a spring across to Italy when
the moment was ripe.
An envoy of Hannibal’s, a Tyrian called Aristo, was denounced by the
anti-Hannibalic party at Carthage. Aristo escaped, but the discovery
caused such internal dissension that Masinissa thought the moment ripe
to encroach on their territory.
The Carthaginians sent to Rome to complain, and he also to justify
himself. The embassy of the former aroused uneasiness by their account
of Aristo’s mission and escape, and the envoys of Masinissa fanned this
flame of suspicion. The Senate decided to send a commission to
investigate, and Scipio was nominated one of the three, but after making
an inquiry “left everything in suspense, their opinions inclining
neither to one side or the other.” This failure to give a verdict is
hardly to the credit of Scipio, who had the knowledge and the influence
with both parties to have settled the controversy on the spot. But Livy
hints that the commissioners may have been acting on instructions from
the Senate to abstain from a settlement, and adds that in view of the
general situation “it was highly expedient to leave the dispute
undecided.” By this he presumably means that as Hannibal was meditating
an invasion it was policy to keep the Carthaginians too occupied to
support him.
At the end of the year an incident occurred that sheds a significant
light—rather twilight—on Scipio’s career. The two candidates for the
patrician vacancy as consul were Lucius Quinctius Flamininus, brother of
the victor of Cynoscephalæ, and Publius Cornelius Scipio, namesake and
half-brother to Africanus.
The upshot is aptly told by Livy: “Above everything else, the brothers
of the candidates, the two most illustrious generals of the age,
increased the violence of the struggle. Scipio’s fame was the more
splendid, and in proportion to its greater splendour, the more obnoxious
to envy. That of Quinctius was the most recent, as he had received a
‘triumph’ that same year. Besides, the former had now for almost two
years been continually in people’s sight; which circumstance, by the
mere effect of satiety, causes great characters to be less revered.”
“All Quinctius’s claims to the favour of the public were fresh and new;
since his triumph, he had neither asked nor received anything from the
people; ‘he solicited votes,’ he said, ‘in favour of his own brother,
not of a half-brother; in favour of his _legatus_ and partner in the
conduct of the war’”—his brother having commanded the fleet against
Philip of Macedon. “By these arguments he carried his point.” Lucius
Quinctius was elected, and Scipio Africanus received a further rebuff
when Lælius, his old comrade and lieutenant, failed to secure election
as plebeian consul despite Scipio’s canvassing. The crowd, eternally
fickle and forgetful, preferred the rising star to the setting sun.
Meantime the war clouds were gathering in the East. Antiochus had
safeguarded his rear by marrying his daughter to Ptolemy, King of Egypt.
He then advanced to Ephesus, but lost time by waging a local campaign
with the Pisidians. Across the Ægean, the Ætolians were labouring hard
to stir up war against the Romans, and to find allies for Antiochus.
Rome, on the contrary, was weary and exhausted with years of struggle,
and sought by every means to postpone or avert a conflict with
Antiochus. To this end the Senate sent an embassy to him, and Livy
states that, according to the history written in Greek by Acilius,
Scipio Africanus was employed on this mission. The envoys went to
Ephesus, and while halting there on their way “took pains to procure
frequent interviews with Hannibal, in order to sound his intentions, and
to remove his fears of danger threatening him from the Romans.” These
meetings had the accidental and indirect but important consequence that
the report of them made Antiochus suspicious of Hannibal.
But the main interest to us of these interviews, assuming that Acilius’s
witness is reliable, is the account of one of the conversations between
Scipio and Hannibal. In it Scipio asked Hannibal, “Whom he thought the
greatest captain?” The latter answered, “Alexander ... because with a
small force he defeated armies whose numbers were beyond reckoning, and
because he had overrun the remotest regions, merely to visit which was a
thing above human aspirations.” Scipio then asked, “To whom he gave the
second place?” and Hannibal replied, “To Pyrrhus, for he first taught
the method of encamping, and besides no one ever showed such exquisite
judgment in choosing his ground and disposing his posts; while he also
possessed the art of conciliating mankind to himself to such a degree
that the natives of Italy wished him, though a foreign prince, to hold
the sovereignty among them, rather than the Roman people....” On Scipio
proceeding to ask, “Whom he esteemed the third?” Hannibal replied,
“Myself, beyond doubt.” On this Scipio laughed, and added, “What would
you have said if you had conquered me?” “Then I would have placed
Hannibal not only before Alexander and Pyrrhus, but before all other
commanders.”
“This answer, turned with Punic dexterity, and conveying an unexpected
kind of flattery, was highly grateful to Scipio, as it set him apart
from the crowd of commanders, as one of incomparable eminence.”
From Antiochus this embassy gained no direct result, for the “king of
kings” was too swollen with pride on account of his Asiatic successes,
too sure of his own strength, to profit by the examples of Carthage and
Macedon. His standards of military measurement were strictly
quantitative.
Realising at last that war was inevitable and imminent, the Roman Senate
set about the preparations for this fresh struggle. As a first step they
pre-dated the consular election so as to be ready for the coming year;
the new consuls were Publius Scipio, the rejected of the previous year,
and Manius Acilius. Next, Bæbius was ordered to cross over with his army
from Brundisium (Brindisi) into Epirus, and envoys were sent to all the
allied cities to counteract Ætolian propaganda. The Ætolians,
nevertheless, gained some success by a mixture of diplomacy and force,
and besides causing general commotion throughout Greece, did their best
to hasten the arrival of Antiochus. Had his energy approximated to his
confidence, he might well have gained command of Greece before the
Romans were able to thwart him. Further, to his own undoing, he
abandoned Hannibal’s plan and the expedition to Africa, from a jealousy
inspired fear that if Hannibal were given an executive rôle public
opinion would regard him as the real commander. Even when he made his
belated landing in Greece, with inadequate forces, he missed such
opportunity as was left by frittering away his strength and time in
petty attacks against the Thessalian towns, and in idle pleasure at
Chalcis.
Meantime, at Rome the consuls cast lots for their provinces; Greece fell
to Acilius, and the expeditionary force which he was to take assembled
at Brundisium. For its supply, commissaries had been sent to Carthage
and Numidia to purchase corn. It is a tribute alike to the spirit in
which the Carthaginians were seeking to fulfil their treaty with Rome,
and to Scipio’s wise policy after Zama, that they not only offered the
corn as a present, but offered to fit out a fleet at their own expense,
and to pay in a lump sum the annual tribute money for many years ahead.
The Romans, however, whether from proud self-reliance or dislike of
being under an obligation to Carthage, refused the fleet and the money,
and insisted on paying for the corn.
In face of all these preparations, Antiochus awoke to his danger too
late. His allies, the Ætolians, provided only four thousand men, his own
troops delayed in Asia, and in addition he had alienated Philip of
Macedon, who stood firm on the Roman side. With a force only ten
thousand strong he took up his position at the pass of Thermopylæ, but
failed to repeat the heroic resistance of the immortal Spartans, and was
routed. Thereupon, forsaking his Ætolian allies to their fate, Antiochus
sailed back across the Ægean.
Rome, however, was unwilling to rest content with this decision. She
realised that in Greece her army had defeated only the advanced guard
and not the main body of Antiochus’s armed strength, and that unless he
was subdued he would be a perpetual menace. Further, so long as he
dominated Asia Minor from Ephesus, her loyal allies, the Pergamenes and
Rhodians, and the Greek cities on the Asiatic side of the Ægean, were at
his mercy. All these motives impelled Rome to counter-invasion.
Once more Hannibal’s grand strategical vision proved right, for he
declared that “he rather wondered the Romans were not already in Asia,
than had doubts of their coming.” This time Antiochus took heed of his
great adviser, and strengthened his garrisons as well as maintaining a
constant patrol of the coast.