JULIUS CÆSAR.
48--44.
With Pompeius fell the hopes of those who were faithful to the old
government, such as Cicero and Cato. They had only to wait and see what
Cæsar would do, and with the memory of Marius in their minds.
[Illustration: JULIUS CÆSAR.]
Cæsar did not come at once to Rome; he had first to reduce the East to
obedience. Egypt was under the last descendants of Alexander's general
Ptolemy, and was an ally of Rome, that is, only remaining a kingdom by
her permission. The king was a wretched weak lad; his sister Cleopatra,
who was joined with him in the throne, was one of the most beautiful and
winning women who ever lived. Cæsar, who needed money, demanded some
that was owing to the state. The young king's advisers refused, and
Cæsar, who had but a small force with him, was shut up in a quarter of
Alexandria where he could get no fresh water but from pits which his men
dug in the sand. He burnt the Egyptian fleet that it might not stop the
succors that were coming from Syria, and he tried to take the Isle of
Pharos, with the lighthouse on it, but his ship was sunk, and he was
obliged to save himself by swimming, holding his journals in one hand
above the water. However, the forces from Syria were soon brought to
him, and he was able to fight a battle in which the young king was
drowned; and Egypt was at his mercy. Cleopatra was determined to have an
interview with him, and had herself carried into his rooms in a roll of
carpet, and when there, she charmed him so much that he set her up as
queen of Egypt. He remained three months longer in Egypt collecting
money; and hearing that Pharnaces, the son of Mithridates, had attacked
the Roman settlements in Asia Minor, he sailed for Tarsus, marched
against Pharnaces, routed and killed him in battle. The success was
announced to the Senate in the following brief words, "_Veni, vidi,
vici_"--"I came, I saw, I conquered."
[Illustration: CATO.]
He was a second time appointed Dictator, and came home to arrange
affairs; but there were no proscriptions, though he took away the
estates of those who opposed him. There was still a party of the
senators and their supporters who had followed Pompeius in Africa, with
Cato and Cnæus Pompeius, the eldest son of the great leader, and Cæsar
had to follow them thither. He gave them a great defeat at Thapsus, and
the remnant took refuge in the city of Utica, whither Cæsar followed
them. They would have stood a siege, but the townspeople would not
consent, and Cato sent off all his party by sea, and remained alone with
his son and a few of his friends, not to face the conqueror, but to die
by his own sword ere he came, as the Romans had learned from Stoic
philosophy to think the nobler part.
[Illustration: FUNERAL SOLEMNITIES IN THE COLUMBARIUM (lit. _Pigeon-house_)
OF THE HOUSE OF JULIUS CÆSAR AT THE PORTA CAPENA IN ROME.
(The rows of niches for the cinerary urns in a Roman sepulchre were
called by this name from their resemblance to a dovecot.)]
Such of the Senate as had not joined Pompeius were ready to fall down
and worship Cæsar when he came home. So rejoiced was Rome to fear no
proscription, that temples were dedicated to Cæsar's clemency, and his
image was to be carried in procession with those of the gods. He was
named Dictator for ten years, and was received with four triumphs--over
the Gauls, over the Egyptians, over Pharnaces, and over Juba, an African
king who had aided Cato. Foremost of the Gaulish prisoners was the brave
Vercingetorix, and among the Egyptians, Arsinoë, the sister of
Cleopatra. A banquet was given at his cost to the whole Roman people,
and the shows of gladiators and beasts surpassed all that had ever been
seen. The Julii were said to be descended from Æneas and to Venus, as
his ancestress, Cæsar dedicated a breastplate of pearls from the river
mussels of Britain. Still, however, he had to go to Spain to reduce the
sons of Pompeius. They were defeated in battle, the elder was killed,
but Cnæus, the younger, held out in the mountains and hid himself among
the natives.
After this, Cæsar returned to Rome to carry out his plans. He was
dictator for ten years and consul for five, and was also imperator or
commander of an army he was not made to disband, so that he nearly was
as powerful as any king; and, as he saw that such an enormous domain as
Rome now possessed could never be governed by two magistrates changing
every year, he prepared matters for there being one ruler. The influence
of the Senate, too, he weakened very much by naming a great many persons
to it of no rank or distinction, till there were nine hundred members,
and nobody thought much of being a senator. He also made an immense
number of new citizens, and he caused a great survey to be begun by
Roman officers in preparation for properly arranging the provinces,
governments, and tribute; and he began to have the laws drawn up in
regular order. In fact, he was one of the greatest men the world has
ever produced, not only as a conqueror, but a statesman and ruler; and
though his power over Rome was not according to the laws, and had been
gained by a rebellion, he was using it for her good.
He was learned in all philosophy and science, and his history of his
wars in Gaul has come down to our times. As a high patrician by birth,
he was Pontifex Maximus, or chief priest, and thus had to fix all the
festival days in each year. Now the year had been supposed to be only
three hundred and fifty-five days long, and the Pontifex put in another
month or several days whenever he pleased, so that there was great
confusion, and the feast days for the harvest and vintage came,
according to the calendar, three months before there was any corn or
grapes.
To set this to rights, since it was now understood that the length of
the year was three hundred and sixty-five days and six hours, Cæsar and
the scientific men who assisted him devised the fresh arrangement that
we call leap year, adding a day to the three hundred and sixty-five once
in four years. He also changed the name of one of the summer months
from Sextile to July, in honor of himself. Another work of his was
restoring Corinth and Carthage, which had both been ruined the same
year, and now were both refounded the same year.
He was busy about the glory of the state, but there was much to shock
old Roman feelings in his conduct. Cleopatra had followed him to Rome,
and he was thinking of putting away his wife Calphurnia to marry her.
But his keeping the dictatorship was the real grievance, and the remains
of the old party in the Senate could not bear that the patrician freedom
of Rome should be lost. Every now and then his flatterers offered him a
royal crown and hailed him as king, though he always refused it, and
this title still stirred up bitter hatred. He was preparing an army,
intending to march into the further East, avenge Crassus' defeat on the
Parthians, and march where no one but Alexander had made his way; and if
he came back victorious from thence, nothing would be able to stand
against him.
The plotters then resolved to strike before he set out. Caius Cassius, a
tall, lean man, who had lately been made prætor, was the chief
conspirator, and with him was Marcus Junius Brutus, a descendant of him
who overthrew the Tarquins, and husband to Porcia, Cato's daughter, also
another Brutus named Decimus, hitherto a friend of Cæsar, and newly
appointed to the government of Cisalpine Gaul. These and twelve more
agreed to murder Cæsar on the 15th of March, called in the Roman
calendar the Ides of March, when he went to the senate-house.
Rumors got abroad and warnings came to him about that special day. His
wife dreamt so terrible a dream that he had almost yielded to her
entreaties to stay at home, when Decimus Brutus came in and laughed him
out of it. As he was carried to the senate-house in a litter, a man gave
him a writing and begged him to read it instantly; but he kept it rolled
in his hand without looking. As he went up the steps he said to the
augur Spurius, "The Ides of March are come." "Yes, Cæsar," was the
answer; "but they are not passed." A few steps further on, one of the
conspirators met him with a petition, and the others joined in it,
clinging to his robe and his neck, till another caught his toga and
pulled it over his arms, and then the first blow was struck with a
dagger. Cæsar struggled at first as all fifteen tried to strike at him,
but, when he saw the hand uplifted of his treacherous friend Decimus,
he exclaimed, "_Et tu Brute_"--"Thou, too, Brutus"--drew his toga over
his head, and fell dead at the foot of the statue of Pompeius.
[Illustration]