Chapter XIX

THE RULE OF THE RESTORATION.

G

121-101 B.C.

|RACCHUS had fallen, and with him the structure he had reared; nor was there anyone left fit to take the lead of the Gracchan party. But, though the aristocracy once more ruled, it was the rule of a restoration, which is always in itself a revolution; and in this case it was not so much the old government as the old governor that was restored. The senate practically continued to govern with the constitution of the Gracchi, though no doubt resolved to purge it in due time from the elements hostile to its own order. The distributions of grain, the taxation of Asia, and the new arrangements as to jurymen and tribunals remained as before; nay, the senate exceeded Gracchus in the homage it paid to the mercantile class, and, more especially, to the proletariate. But the noble scheme of Gracchus to introduce legal equality, first between the Roman burgesses and Italy, and then between Italy and the provinces, and also his attempt to solve the social question by a comprehensive system of emigration, were alike disregarded by the aristocrats. They still held fast to the principle that Italy ought to remain the ruling land, and Rome the ruling city in Italy. The colony of Narbo, founded in 118 B.C., was the sole exception to the success of the government in preventing assignations of land outside Italy. So also the Italian colonies of Gracchus were canceled, and, where already planted, were again broken up; those who had received domain lands, not by virtue of being members of a colony, retained their possessions. With regard to those domain lands, which were still held by the right of occupation, and from which to a great extent the thirty-six thousand new allotments promised by Drusus were to have been formed, it was resolved to maintain the rights of the present occupiers, so as to preclude the possibility of future distribution.

The allotment commission was abolished in 119 B.C., and a fixed rent imposed on the occupants of the domain land, the proceeds of which went to benefit the populace of the capital.

111-102 B.C.

The final step was taken in III B.C., when the occupied domain land was converted into the rent-free private property of the former occupants. It was added that in future domain land was not to be occupied at all, but was either to be leased or lie open as public pasture; thus too late the injurious character of the occupation system was officially recognized, when the state had lost almost all its domain lands. The aristocracy thus converted all the occupied lands they still held into private property, and pacified the Italian allies by preserving their rights with regard to the Latin domain land, though they did not actually confer it upon them.

But practically the restored government was powerless in the presence of the dread forces evoked by Gracchus. The proletariate of the capital continued to have a recognized claim to being kept by largesses of corn; and the attempt by the consul Quintus Caepio in 106 B.C., to transfer the courts back again to the senatorial order, resulted in failure. The miserable condition of the senate at this period is only too apparent: its rule rested on the same basis as that of Gracchus, and its strength lay only in its league with the city rabble or with the mercantile order; confronted with either, it was powerless. It sat on the vacated throne with an evil conscience and divided hopes, indignant at the institutions of the state which it ruled, and yet incapable of even systematically assailing them, vacillating in all its conduct except where its own material advantage prompted decision, a picture of faithlessness towards its own as well as the opposite party, of inward inconsistency, of the most pitiful impotence, of the meanest selfishness-an unsurpassed ideal of misrule. Moral and intellectual decay had fallen upon the whole nation, and especially on the upper classes. The aristocracy returned to power with the curse of restoration upon it, and it returned neither wiser nor better. Incompetency marked alike its leaders in the world of politics and on the field of battle. ruin spread apace; small farm-holders quickly disappeared; and in 100 B.C. it was said that among the whole burgesses there were scarce two thousand wealthy families. Slave insurrections became almost annual in Italy, the most serious of which was in the territory of Thurii, headed by a Roman knight named Titus Vettius, whom his debts had driven to take this step in 104 B.C. Piracy was practiced in the Mediterranean by the magisterial and mercantile classes of Rome as well as by professional freebooters. At last the government was forced to dispatch a fleet, in 102 B.C., and occupy

Social

104-101 B.C.

stations on the coast of Cilicia, the main seat of the pirates, and this was the first step to the establishment of the province of Cilicia; but piracy flourished in spite of these precautions.

Throughout the provinces slaves constantly rose in insurrection; and the most terrible tumults occurred, as usual, in Sicily, which swarmed with slaves brought from Asia Minor to work on the plantations. Practically, too, the free natives were little better than slaves, and many had become enrolled as such. Publius Nerva, the governor of Sicily, in 104 B.C. was ordered by the senate to hold a court at Syracuse, and to investigate the cases of those who applied for freedom. Numbers were declared free, and, in alarm, the planters succeeded in causing Nerva to suspend the court and to order the rest of the applicants to return to their former masters. This set ablaze the smoldering embers of revolt. A band of slaves defeated part of the garrison at Enna, and thus supplied themselves with arms; they placed a slave at their head with the title of King Tryphon. The open country between Enna and Leontini was overrun by their forces, and they defeated a hastilycollected force of militia under the Roman governor with ridiculous ease.

On the west coast a still more serious revolt arose under the leadership of Athenion, who had been a robber captain in Cilicia, and was alike versed in military tactics and in the superstitious arts so necessary for gaining a hold on vulgar minds. He avoided jealous quarrels by submitting to King Tryphon, and the two ruled. all the flat country in Sicily and laid siege to many towns, Messana itself being all but captured by Athenion. Rome was at that time engaged with the war against the Cimbri, but in 103 B.C. it sent a large force under Lucullus, who gained a victory, but did not follow it up. Nor was his successor Servilius any more fortunate; and, on the death of Tryphon, Athenion, in 102 B.C., stood sole ruler of the greater part of the island. In IOI B.C. Manius Aquillius, who had gained distinction in the war with the Teutones, arrived, and, after two years of hard struggles, quelled the revolt and killed Athenion, thus terminating the war after five years.

A clear proof of the gross incompetency of the senate is furnished by the origin and conduct of this second Sicilian slave war. If we turn our eyes to Africa, this is still more clearly proved by the fourteen years' insurrection and usurpation successfully achieved by Jugurtha. Numidia included the greatest portion of the terri

121-112 B.C.

tory held by Carthage in its days of prosperity, as well as several old Phoenician cities, and thus embraced the largest and the best part of the rich seaboard of northern Africa. This kingdom was now ruled over by Adherbal, grandson of Massinissa, and his illegitimate cousin, Jugurtha, who had secured the assassination of another heir, and was constantly intriguing against Adherbal. Civil war arose between the two in 118 B.C., in which all Numidia took part. Jugurtha was victorious, and seized the whole kingdom, while Adherbal escaped and made his complaints in person at Rome. Jugurtha's envoys, however, bribed the senators, and, notwithstanding the disgust of the leading men in Rome, the senate divided the kingdom equally between the two, and sent Lucius Opimius to arrange the division. An unfair distribution gave Jugurtha far the best half of the kingdom. But, not content, he tried to provoke Adherbal to war, and, finding this impossible, made war upon him, and laid siege to Cirta, which was defended more vigorously by the resident Italians than by Adherbal's troops. In answer to the latter's complaints, the senate sent a commission of inexperienced youths, whose demands Jugurtha contemptuously rejected. At last, when matters were getting desperate at Cirta, Rome sent another commission, headed by the chief man of the aristocracy, Marcus Aemilius Scaurus; but the conference at Utica ended without any result. In the end, Cirta capitulated, and Jugurtha put all the males, whether Italian or African, to the sword, in II2 B.C. This was too much for the people in Italy; a storm broke out against the government, headed by Gaius Memmius, tribune designate for the next year, and war was declared against Jugurtha. A Roman army was sent to Africa, and Bocchus, the father-in-law of Jugurtha and king of Mauretania, took the Roman side, but he neglected to bribe the Roman commanders, and so his alliance fell through. Jugurtha, on the other hand, more wisely made free use of the treasures left by Massinissa, and gained a peace on most favorable terms, being merely condemned to pay a moderate fine and give up his war elephants. On this the storm again broke out in Rome; all men now knew that even Scaurus, who was serving in Africa, was amenable to bribes, and Gaius Memmius pressed for the appearance of Jugurtha to answer the charges made against him. The senate yielded, and granted a safe conduct to Jugurtha; but his gold was as powerful as ever, and the colleague of Memmius interposed his veto, when the latter addressed his first question

4

110-107 B.C.

to the king. Endless discussions took place in the senate as to the validity of the peace, and Massiva, a grandson of Massinissa, living in Rome, was induced to claim the throne of Numidia. He was at once assassinated by Bomilcar, one of Jugurtha's confidants. This new outrage caused the senate to cancel the peace and dismiss. Jugurtha from the city, at the beginning of 110 B.C. War was resumed under the command of the consul Spurius Albinus; but, owing to the utterly demoralized state of the African army, and, possibly, to the gold of Jugurtha, Albinus could effect nothing. His brother, however, in 109 B.C., rashly conceived the plan of storming the town of Suthul, where Jugurtha kept his treasures. The attack failed, and the Roman general pursued the troops of Jugurtha, who purposely decoyed him into the desert. In a night attack the Roman army was utterly routed, and the terms dictated by Jugurtha were accepted, which involved the passing of the Romans under the yoke, the evacuation of Numidia, and the renewal of the canceled peace.

On news of this peace the fury of the popular party, allied for the time with the mercantile classes at Rome, swept away by public prosecutions many of the highest aristocrats. The second treaty of peace was canceled, and Quintus Metellus, an aristocrat inaccessible to bribes and experienced in war, had the conduct of the campaign in Africa. Gaius Marius accompanied him as one of his lieutenants.

Metellus speedly reorganized the army in Africa, and in 108 B.C. led it over the Numidian frontier. He returned an evasive answer to Jugurtha's proposals for peace, and tried to end the war by having Jugurtha assassinated. Failing in this, he destroyed the Numidian army in battle and occupied most of the country, but his object was not gained, and the Roman army had to retire into winter quarters. The capture of Jugurtha was all-important to the speedy conclusion of the war. Vaga, one of the Numidian cities occupied by the Romans, revolted early in 107 B.C., and put to death the whole Roman garrison; and, although Metellus surprised the town and gave it over to martial law, such a revolt sufficiently indicated the difficulty of the Roman enterprise.

In 107 B.C. the war in the desert went on, but Jugurtha nowhere withstood the Romans; now here, now there, he was perpetually appearing and then vanishing from the scene. Metellus took Thala, a city situated on the edge of the great desert and only to be reached