Tiberius was the first who attempted to scale the walls of Carthage, which was no mean exploit. We may add the peace which he concluded with the Numantines, by which he saved the lives of twenty thousand Romans, who otherwise had certainly been cut off. And Caius, not only at home, but in war in Sardinia, displayed distinguished courage. So that their early actions were no small argument that afterward they might have rivaled the best of the Roman commanders if they had not died so young.
Of the Gracchi, neither the one nor the other was the first to shed the blood of his fellow-citizens; and Caius is reported to have avoided all manner of resistance, even when his life was aimed at, showing himself always valiant against a foreign enemy, but wholly inactive in a sedition. This was the reason that he went from his own house unarmed, and withdrew when the battle began, and in all respects showed himself anxious rather not to do any harm to others than not suffer any himself. Even the very flight of the Gracchi must not be looked on as an argument of a mean spirit, but an honorable retreat from endangering others.
The greatest crime that can be laid to Tiberius’s charge was the disposing of his fellow-tribune, and seeking afterward a second tribuneship for himself. Tiberius and Caius by nature had an excessive desire for glory and honors. Beyond this, their enemies could find nothing to bring against them; but as soon as the contention began with their adversaries, their heat and passions would so far prevail beyond their natural temper that by them, as by ill-winds, they were driven afterward to all their rash undertakings. What would be more just and honorable than their first design, had not the power and faction of the rich, by endeavoring to abrogate that law, engaged them both in those fatal quarrels, the one for his own preservation, the other to avenge his brother’s death who was murdered without law or justice.
CAIUS MARIUS.
By JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE.
[An able Roman general and leader of the democratic faction, born 157 B.C., died 86. The military skill of Marius finished the Jugurthine war and saved Rome from the Cimbri and Teutons. Though of plebeian birth he married into an eminent patrician family, and became thereby the uncle of Julius Cæsar, who attached himself to the Marian party in the political wars which raged between the popular and patrician factions, the latter being led by Sylla. The worst stain on the memory of Marius is the massacre which he permitted at the beginning of his last consulate. References: Mommsen’s “History of Rome,” Froude’s “Life of Cæsar,” Plutarch’s “Lives.”]
Marius was born at Arpinum, a Latin township, seventy miles from the capital. His father was a small farmer, and he was himself bred to the plow. He joined the army early, and soon attracted notice by the punctual discharge of his duties. In a time of growing looseness, Marius was strict himself in keeping discipline and in enforcing it as he rose in the service. He was in Spain when Jugurtha [6] was there, and made himself specially useful to Scipio;[7] he forced his way steadily upward by his mere soldier-like qualities to the rank of military tribune. Rome, too, had learned to know him, for he was chosen tribune of the people the year after the murder of Caius Gracchus. Being a self-made man, he naturally belonged to the popular party. While in office he gave offense in some way to the men in power, and was called before the senate to answer for himself. But he had the right on his side, it is likely, for they found him stubborn and impertinent, and they could make nothing of their charges against him.
He was not bidding, however, at this time for the support of the mob. He had the integrity and sense to oppose the largesses of corn, and he forfeited his popularity by trying to close the public granaries before the practice had passed into a system. He seemed as if made of a block of hard Roman oak, gnarled and knotted but sound in all its fibers. His professional merit continued to recommend him. At the age of forty he became prætor,[8] and was sent to Spain, where he left a mark again by the successful severity by which he cleared the provinces of banditti. He was a man neither given himself to talking nor much talked about in the world; but he was sought for wherever work was to be done, and he had made himself respected and valued; for after his return from the peninsula he had married into one of the most distinguished of the patrician families.
Marius by this marriage became a person of social consequence. His father had been a client of the Metelli; and Cæcelius Metellus, who must have known Marius by reputation and probably in person, invited him to go as second in command in the African campaign.[9] The war dragged on, and Marius, perhaps ambitious, perhaps impatient at the general’s want of vigor, began to think he could make quicker work of it. There was just irritation that a petty African prince could defy the whole power of Rome for so many years; and though a democratic consul had been unheard of for a century, the name of Marius began to be spoken of as a possible candidate. Marius consented to stand. The patricians strained their resources to defeat him, but he was chosen with enthusiasm.
A shudder of alarm ran, no doubt, through the senate house when the determination of the people was known. A successful general could not be disposed of as easily as oratorical tribunes. Fortunately Marius was not a politician. He had no belief in democracy. He was a soldier and had a soldier’s way of thinking on government and the methods of it. His first step was a reformation in the army. Hitherto the Roman legions had been no more than the citizens in arms, called for the moment from their various occupations to return to them when the occasion for their services was past. Marius had perceived that fewer men, better trained and disciplined, could be made more effective and be more easily handled. He had studied war as a science. He had perceived that the present weakness need be no more than an accident, and that there was a latent force in the Roman state which needed only organization to resume its ascendancy.
“He enlisted,” it was said, “the worst of the citizens”—men, that is to say, who had no occupation, and became soldiers by profession; and as persons without property could not have furnished themselves at their own cost, he must have carried out the scheme proposed by Gracchus, and equipped them at the expense of the state. His discipline was of the sternest. The experiment was new; and men of rank who had a taste for war in earnest, and did not wish that the popular party should have the whole benefit and credit of the improvements were willing to go with him; among them a dissipated young patrician, called Lucius Sylla, whose name was also destined to be memorable.