Whilst C. Gracchus is unjustly called a demagogue, this name may well be given to Marius, who was one in every sense of the word; for he would fawn upon the lowest rabble as others would upon powerful individuals, and delight in appearing to the common people as if he were one of them. He was not suited to those times: for he had a sensitive pride which was continually wounded, and thus he fell into those unhappy ways which have disgraced him. Moreover, it was then looked upon as indispensable for a man of rank to be well versed in the manners, and literature, and language of the Greeks; just as those of the French were deemed essential in Germany, even to the days of my youth. Old Cato learned Greek only late; yet he learned it, and was well read in the literature of his own country. Unlike him, Marius did not cling to the old traditions which began already to vanish away, and he disdained modern refinement, because he knew nothing of it: he spoke Greek, it is true, which at that time was quite necessary in society, but he despised it. His honesty was without a stain: for though his great wealth must have been acquired in war, he was held to be a vir sanctus, since he had not robbed the commonwealth as the greater part of his contemporaries had done. From this we may judge of the state of morals then. Fabricius, Curius, and others, who centuries before had likewise been called sancti, were also poor. Marius was a first-rate general, the consciousness of which carried him high: he was great in drawing up an army, especially in the day of battle, unrivalled in his mode of conducting a campaign, and just as skilful in encampment. But he had few friends: the leading features of his character were bitterness and hatred, and he was cruel and unamiable. Fate had raised him up to save Rome, the degeneracy of which is to be charged upon those who crushed and irritated so extraordinary, so distinguished a man. Metellus was an ordinary general: had he ever had to face Marius in the field, he would at once have been beaten. Marius, on the contrary, was no common commander; besides the greatest foresight in making his preparations, he was gifted with unbounded energy to execute, and with a quickness of eye which could see everything at a glance. It was his hatred against the so-called optimates, which, perhaps without his being aware of it, led him into his many unrighteous acts against them.
The tribunes of the people at Rome now moved that the province of Numidia should, out of turn, be the first assigned; and as this was unanimously agreed to by the people, Marius got the chief command. Metellus again showed his littleness of mind. Not being able to brook the sight of his successor, he stole away, leaving the army to his legate Rutilius, an excellent man, who afterwards became a victim to party spirit, as he went over to the other side: for, as hitherto the oligarchical faction had shown itself malignant, so did the democrats in their turn, now that they had got the upperhand. Marius ended the war with Jugurtha in less than two years, having displayed the greatest ability and boldness. Sallust particularly mentions, how in the siege of Capsa, he put to flight the enemy’s cavalry, &c. The Romans did not advance much beyond Cirta; Jugurtha went to Bocchus, king of the Mauritanians, a connexion of his by marriage. This prince at first had taken up arms on his side; but he soon listened to the proposal of the Romans, to make his peace with them by betraying his ally. This was done after a great deal of negotiation, Bocchus having wavered for a long time, and even thought of arresting Sylla, by whom this business was transacted: at length he gave up Jugurtha, who was now led by Marius in his triumph. Part of Numidia was united with the province of Africa; most of it, however, was left as an independent kingdom, the kings of which in all likelihood—in what way, we do not know—belonged to Masinissa’s house. Juba, in the time of Cæsar’s wars, was descended from the nameless king who then succeeded. Bocchus was acknowledged as an independent sovereign.
WAR WITH THE CIMBRI AND TEUTONES.
The war in Africa had come to an end, and it was high time that it should; for the republic had quite a different employment for Marius, in comparison with which the war against Jugurtha was mere child’s play. The Cimbri and Teutones were expected on the frontiers of Italy, and they had already routed the armies of Manlius and Cæpio. Contrary to all existing rules, Marius at the unanimous call of the nation was made consul; for the laws both forbade the choice of a man who was absent from the city, and required that ten years should elapse between two consulships of the same person. Marius had his triumph the new year’s day on which he entered upon his second consulate.
The Cimbri[83] were not, properly speaking, Gaels; but they were akin to the Cymri, the inhabitants of the greater part of the western coast of England, of Wales, and of Cumberland (which has its name from them, and where even so late as a hundred years ago, traces of the Cymric tongue were met with): the Basbretons also belonged to the same race. Whether any Cymri dwelt in Ulster, is problematical: the Picts were likewise of the Cymric stock; and so were the Belgians: for though these were not unmingled with Gaels, the Cymri must have been predominant among them. On their great migration, they went in the fourth or fifth century to the borders of the Ukraine, and ruled as Celto-Scythians as far as the banks of the Dnieper, or even beyond: there they were called Galatians. Owing to circumstances of which we have no exact knowledge, very likely in consequence of the advance of the Sarmatians or Sclavonians, they were driven out of their settlements,—and they fell back upon their countrymen in Moldavia, Wallachia, Hungary, and the neighbouring countries: they first of all expelled the Bastarnians; then the Scordiscans and Tauriscans; and in 639, before the outbreak of the war with Jugurtha, they threw themselves upon the country of the Noricans in Carniola and Carinthia. Here, on the frontier of Italy, were the abodes of the Carnians and other Gallic tribes, which, though not subject to the Romans, were of course in a state of dependence, as is always the case with small nations when they are neighbours of great ones. The Cimbri made their appearance on the banks of the middle Danube and in Bohemia, and attacked the Boians; but they were repelled. It must have been while they were on the middle Danube, that they fell upon every people which they met with, and leagued themselves with the Teutones. These, as even their name seems to show, were of German stock, quite as certainly as the Cimbri were of Gallic race in the widest sense of the word (thus many Gallic words are found in the Cymric language, and there is a general affinity between them, although Gauls and Cymri did not understand each other). The Teutones may, like the Cimbri, have been chased out of the East by the advance of the Sarmatians: if what we are told from the travels of Pytheas be true, and he fell in with the Teutones on the eastern coast of Prussia, it is likely that they were pushed on from northern Poland by the Sarmatians. In Gaul they clearly appear as the allies of the Cimbrians, and the names of the leaders betoken a Gallic and a German people. When now they rushed forth from Noricum, either together or in separate hosts, the Romans came to the help of the Carnians, and the consul Cn. Papirius Carbo, in all likelihood a son of him who had been driven by Crassus to commit suicide, was defeated and killed near Noreia by the Cimbrians, and his whole army perished with him. But the barbarians did not follow up their victory, nor did they penetrate into Italy; but, what is very strange, they overran the bleak provinces of Austria and Bavaria north of the Alps, which were then inhabited by Celts, and thus went on to Gaul. At the general break up which ensued, they were also joined by the Tigurini, who were Gauls from Helvetia, and by the Ambrones: whence these last came, is more than we can say; most likely, they were Ligurians from the Alps. All of these moved into Gaul, bringing with them a countless number of waggons with women, children, and booty; and now the four peoples, sometimes in one huge host, at other times apart, burst upon the civilized world. It is difficult to say where they defeated either Silanus or Scaurus; for our accounts are scanty beyond belief, as Livy fails us here, and the seventeen books of Dio Cassius which we have not, were also no longer to be found by Zonaras. It might be inferred from one statement, that the Romans advanced as far as the neighbourhood of Rochelle, between Poitou and the Garonne. They had to suffer another defeat under the consul L. Cassius Longinus, near the lake of Geneva, and they purchased their retreat with the loss of half their baggage. Although they wished to protect the Transalpine Gauls, all their efforts were unsuccessful. The devastation of Gaul by these wars was one of the most dreadful calamities ever known: the whole of the country bounded by the Rhone, even from the Rhine to the Pyrenees, was ravaged, which may account for its weakened state in the days of Cæsar; the towns were taken and laid waste, and the inhabitants cruelly treated. Of all the Gallic tribes, the Belgians alone could stand their ground. The worst defeat which the Romans sustained, was on the banks of the Rhone, the year after the consulship of Marius, under the consul Cn. Mallius and the proconsul Cæpio. That eighty thousand Romans and Italians were killed, does not look at all historical;—if that number be correct, many Gallic auxiliaries must have been with them;—but the statement, according to Orosius, seems to rest merely on the authority of Valerius Antias. At all events, both of the Roman armies were completely routed. But most providentially for Rome, when Gaul had everywhere been ransacked, the Cimbri and Teutones, either deterred by the Alps, or perhaps because they also feared the Romans more than they did any other people, turned towards Spain, which country they overran, as the Romans were utterly unable to protect it. Even those places which surrendered to them were horribly treated; and this led the Celtiberians to stand sieges in which they were at last driven to feed on dead bodies, rather than fall into the hands of barbarians. This resolute spirit made the invaders give up all thoughts of conquering Spain, and they retreated back again into Gaul.
The devastation of Gaul took place at the time when Metellus was conducting the war against Jugurtha; the expedition into Spain happened during Marius’ second and third consulships. For the reverses which had befallen the Roman arms, had now caused Marius to be made consul for the third time; even his enemies wished him to be chosen, as they saw that no one else could save the state. Every army but that of Numidia had been annihilated; and to train the new soldiers, was the great task which Marius alone was able to achieve, he being himself as thoroughly practised a soldier as he desired every one to be. Marius is beyond all doubt the author of the great change in the Roman tactics, as may be known from Cæsar: this supposition is already to be found in those who have written before us, Colonel Guichard in particular. And moreover this change could only have been the work of a man who always adapted his system to the wants of his age. Down to Marius’ days, even during the Numidian wars, we read of principes, triarii, and hastati; of Marius’ time itself we have indeed no history of any note, written in Latin, though we have an exact knowledge of Cæsar’s legion, in which there are neither hastati, nor principes, nor triarii, but only pilani; the lance is done away with, and the pilum and sword alone are used; the men are no more drawn up in maniples, the legion being now formed in a line which was ten deep, with a proportionate reserve; and when there are several lines of battle, these do not affect the disposition, as they likewise were not placed in maniples, en échelons, but in parallels, one behind the other. The legion is divided into sixty centuries (not as in the earliest times, into five cohorts, each having thirty centuries of thirty men); and its strength besides is raised from 4,500 to 6,000 men. The light troops are detached, the legion being no longer a brigade, but a very strong regiment, all of the same arm; and the cavalry is not a part of the legion. Another, and very essential difference, is, that Marius—and he was very much blamed for it—in levying the troops did not now follow the old system by which all who had less than 12,500 asses, and more than 4,500, were set aside for the reserve; nor yet the later plan by which every one who had even 1,000 sesterces (400 denarii), was enlisted in the line, and those who were below that standard could only serve in the fleet; but he took every able-bodied man, although he might not be above beggary. This was indeed very bad according to the notions of the old times, when there were good reasons for employing in the defence of the country none but those who might be deemed to have an interest in upholding the constitution. But in those days, there were no standing armies; whereas, when once these began to be kept, it was less hard for a man who had nothing to remain for years in the provinces, than it was for an only son who possessed property: thus what had formerly been quite right, had ceased to be so, now that circumstances were changed. On the whole, though I am by no means blind to the grievous faults of Marius,—nay, if you will, to his vices,—it certainly shows a want of sense, to speak of him as if it had been better for the republic that he had never been born. That he was worthy of his high renown, is undeniable; and though his cruelties are not to be excused, he was indeed a great man, and one ought to try to understand and account for his failings. Two such different men, as Cicero and Cæsar, had a great fondness for Marius: Cæsar, when a boy, loved with all his soul the husband of his aunt Julia; and Cicero, even in spite of his party, felt proud of being, as an Arpinate, the countryman of Marius.
Marius now employed his second and third consulships in forming a new army. Happily for Rome, the Cimbri were all this while in Spain. Eleven years had now passed since their first appearance; so that we see how quickly the tide of emigration which no bounds could hitherto stay, set in towards the west: had they succeeded in Spain, it is very possible that they would have gone to Africa. Marius had to find soldiers as he best could: what was left of the old army, was shattered and demoralized, all but the troops which had returned from Numidia; he was therefore obliged to train his raw levies for the field, by mingling them with the few veterans who had won many a battle: in his fourth consulship, his army was formed. In the third already, he had been in the south of France near the Rhone, probably on the frontiers of Provence and Dauphiné, between Arles and Avignon; and that part of the country, which was as near the enemy as could be, he had chosen as his exercising ground, that he might force his men to keep with all their might on the alert: those who were not able to stand the work, sank under it; the rest were so much the better soldiers. As the Rhone, like all the rivers of the Mediterranean, has its mouth choked up with silt, he dug in all haste a canal to open a free communication with the sea. During his fourth consulship he advanced towards the spot where the Isere and the Rhone meet, expecting that the Cimbri and Teutones would return from Spain: it was thought that they would cross the Alps, and follow the same road which Hannibal had once chosen. All feelings of hatred in the Gauls, had of course died away. If it be true that Marius was obliged to use intrigues to get this consulship, it is a very bad case, and a proof of the blind infatuation of the oligarchy.
The barbarians had no wish to attack Marius, and so they separated: the Cimbri went round the northern range of the Alps, that they might invade Italy from the other side, where it was more easily entered; the Teutones remained in Gaul. For what reason Marius should have now retreated from Valence to Aquæ Sextiæ, our scanty sources do not tell us: probably it was for the purpose of getting provisions. The Cimbrians passed with jeers by the camp of Marius, and went round Switzerland: for between the Pennine and the Tridentine Alps, there was not yet at that time any practicable road for such hosts of men with their waggons and baggage: the only way was that across the little St. Bernard, which they could not take on account of the Romans; single troops may have gone by the St. Gotthard and the Splügen. The Romans had opposed to them, near Trent in Italian Tyrol, another army under the command of the consul Q. Lutatius Catulus, a man who was the very opposite of Marius, as he was one of those persons of high rank in that day who had had a Greek education: according to Cicero, he was even a fair author, and he left behind him memoirs in Greek, as was then much the fashion among people of refinement at Rome, Latin prose not being yet cultivated by great writers; just as Frederic the Great wrote his memoirs in French. Incalculable is the loss to us of the books of Livy which treat of this period, as we do not know any thing more about it than we do of earlier centuries; in fact, we know less of the gigantic struggles against the Cimbri and Teutones, than we do of the national emigrations and the wars against the barbarians in the beginning of the fifth century. Here we find Orosius on the whole an unadulterated source, and now and then we have to make shift with Florus; all the epitomizers, however, as Orosius, Eutropius, Florus, are full of discrepancies when compared together, though they every one of them drew from Livy. Quite independent of these is the account of Plutarch, which is the most detailed narrative we have of the Cimbric war.
When the Cimbri were gone away, the Teutones and Ambrones followed in the track of Marius: whither the Tigurini went, we cannot tell. To judge from an expression of the epitomizers, the barbarians—a fact which Plutarch does not mention—must have taken the camp of Marius; but this could not have been the one near the ground where the battle was fought, as from the march towards it, and the whole of Marius’ disposition, we may see that he had been stopped when retreating. He had therefore to encamp in a spot where there was no water, and the soldiers were obliged to go out armed and fetch it from a distant well; so that they asked to be led out to fight. Marius wished first to entrench himself, as his foes were quite close, and everything was against him; yet he could not carry out his intention, the distress being so great that the camp-followers in despair went to some water which was in the neighbourhood of the enemy. Here the Ambrones attacked them, on which the soldiers came to their help: the Ligurians first set out, and then cohort after cohort hastened up, without any orders from Marius. Thus an engagement was brought on, in which, strange to say, the Teutones took no share whatever: perhaps they had not yet come up. Even in this conflict, a brilliant victory was gained, most of the Ambrones being destroyed; notwithstanding which, the Romans, who were without entrenchments, now passed an anxious night in which they were busily throwing up works. The next battle was not fought on the following day, as had been expected, but on the day after; most likely because the Teutones and the rest of the Ambrones had only just now arrived. Marius laid all his plans with the talent of a true general, and he sent M. Claudius Marcellus—a man whose family was always distinguished, he being undoubtedly a grandson of that worthy Marcellus so well known in the Iberian war, who had five times been consul—with a division of allies, as it would seem, to attack the enemy’s rear. Yet even before this, the fury of the Teutones had spent itself in vain against the steadfastness and dogged resolution of the Romans, and the more so as it was summer: for the men of the South, owing to their more muscular frame, are able to stand both heat and frost better than others: the Italians in Napoleon’s Russian campaign, suffered much less than the northern nations did. And therefore, as one might easily believe, the natives of Rome bore the glowing heat of the sun much better than the Teutones. The Romans, who were posted on a hill, awaited the onset of the barbarians; these were beaten back, and when they were endeavouring to rally in the plain, Marcellus fell upon them from behind. Part of them tried to make their escape, and were overpowered and slain by the Gallic tribes. The prince of the Teutones was taken prisoner by the Sequani, and the remnant of his army retreated within their rampart of waggons; but the Romans now broke in, and nearly the whole of the nation was destroyed, some very few only being made slaves.
Half of the danger was now warded off. Soon afterwards, the Cimbri burst upon Italy through Tyrol and the Alps of Trent; and this was not from any fault of Catulus, but it was altogether owing to their overwhelming numbers, and the terror which they spread far and wide. The account in Florus of the manner in which the Cimbri opened the way for themselves, is quite childish; just as if these had been the dullest of savages, and had wanted to stop the tide of the Adige with their hands: this shows what a homo umbraticus that writer was. There are indeed some fords in the Adige, and in passing such a river one makes the cavalry cross higher up, and somewhat lower down a close column of infantry, which will break the force of a moderate stream. This the Cimbri may also have tried to do, thinking perhaps that with their huge bodies they would be able to stem the flood; but in the Adige, as it is near Legnano, such a thing is impossible. Afterwards they are said to have thrown trees into the river to dam it up; which is also incredible. They wished rather to have a bridge and to destroy that of the Romans by means of their floats of timbers, and this they succeeded in doing. The Romans being posted at each end of the bridge, on both sides of the stream, one of their two divisions was cut off from the other, and was obliged to surrender to the Cimbri; but these, with unwonted humanity, let it go free. This, however, is true, that in crossing the most impassable parts of the Alps, they glided on their large shields, as on sleighs, down the steepest declivities. At this irruption, Catulus fell back as far as the Po, or yet beyond it: the whole country north of that river was laid waste; the towns of Mantua, Verona, Brescia, which were left to the protection of their walls, defended themselves; but the open places were destroyed. From the winter to the following summer, the Cimbri most unaccountably remained on that side of the Po.