Caius Marius
Meanwhile Marius was flying for his life, and hiding the head upon which a price had been set. His romantic adventures are narrated with great animation by his biographer Plutarch. On quitting Rome he was separated in the darkness of the night from the partisans who aided his escape. Retiring to a farm he possessed at Solonium he despatched his son to get provisions from a kinsman in the neighbourhood; but during his absence, fearful of a surprise, or suspicious, perhaps, of his nearest friends, he abandoned this retreat and hurried to Ostia, where he knew that a vessel was in waiting for him. The son reached the place to which he had been sent, but the house was immediately invested by the enemy’s scouts, and he was with difficulty saved from their pursuit, being conveyed in a wagon, hidden under a load of beans, to the house of his wife in Rome. The next night he made his way to the sea, and embarking in a vessel bound for Libya, arrived there in safety.
The elder Marius was wafted along the coast of Italy by a favourable wind, but fearing to fall into the hands of Geminius, a personal enemy, one of the chief people of Tarracina, he charged the mariners to avoid touching at that place. Unfortunately the wind changed, and a strong gale setting in shore, they were unable to keep out at sea. The old man himself, alarmed at his danger, and tormented with sea-sickness, bade them run to land, which they reached near Circeii. They were now also in want of provisions, in search of which they descended from the bark, and wandered along the shore. Some herdsmen to whom they applied, but who had nothing to give them, recognised Marius, and warned him that horsemen had been just seen riding about in quest of him. Weary and famishing, his life at the mercy of companions hardly less harassed than himself, he turned from the road and plunged into a deep forest, where he passed the night in extreme suffering. The next day, compelled by hunger, and wishing to make use of his remaining strength before he was completely exhausted, he once more sought the highways in quest of some hospitable retreat. He kept up his spirits and those of his followers by repeating to them the prodigies which had foretold his greatness in youth, and assured them that he was destined to enjoy the highest magistracy yet a seventh time. He had arrived within two or three miles of Minturnæ, when they perceived a troop of horse advancing towards them, and at the same moment two barks sailing along the coast. Running down to the sea as fast as their strength would allow, and casting themselves into the water, they swam towards the vessels. Marius, corpulent and heavy, and quite overcome with fatigue, was carried or hurried along by the exertions of his slaves, and with difficulty lifted on board, while the horsemen, following closely in pursuit, shouted to the sailors to abandon him in the waves. The sailors touched with pity at first refused to surrender him, and the horsemen rode off in anger; but they presently changed their minds, brought their bark to shore, and induced Marius to quit it, and take food and rest on land, while they waited, as they pretended, for the evening breeze. As soon as he was lifted out of the vessel and laid on the grass his bearers rejoined the ship; the sails were hoisted, and he found himself betrayed and abandoned. For some time he lay in despair; at last he rose, and made another effort to save himself.
The coast near the mouth of the Liris, at which he had been put on shore, was a desolate swamp, through which the wretched Marius waded with pain and difficulty, till he reached an old man’s lonely cottage. Falling at his feet he begged him to save a man who, if he escaped from his present dangers, would reward him beyond all his hopes. The man, who either knew Marius of old, or perceived in the expression of his countenance the greatness of his rank, offered him shelter in his hut, if shelter was all he needed, but promised to conceal him in the marshes, if he was flying from the pursuit of enemies. With the old man’s assistance Marius hid himself in a hole by the river’s side, and covered himself with reeds and sedge.
But Geminius of Tarracina was in hot pursuit. After ransacking every place of refuge far and near, he reached the hut in the morass, and loudly questioned the occupant. Marius, who overheard what was passing, seized with a paroxysm of terror, drew himself out of his hiding-place, and buried himself up to the chin in the water. In this position he was discovered, dragged out, and led naked to Minturnæ. The magistrates here and elsewhere had received orders to make search for the fugitive, and to put him to death when taken. The decurions of Minturnæ met to deliberate, and resolved to execute the sentence and claim the reward. But none of their citizens would undertake the ungracious office. Marius was placed in custody, in a private house; a Cimbrian slave, a captive of Vercellæ, was sent with a sword to despatch him. Marius was crouching in the darkest corner of the chamber, and the man, so ran the legend, declared that a bright flame glared from his eyes, and a voice issued from the gloom, “Wretch, dare you to slay Caius Marius?” The barbarian immediately took to flight, and throwing his sword down rushed through the door, exclaiming, “I cannot kill Caius Marius.” The Minturnians were shocked and penetrated with remorse: “Let him go,” they said, “where he pleases, as an exile, and suffer in some other place whatever fate is reserved for him. And let us pray that the gods visit us not with their anger, for ejecting Marius from our city in poverty and rags.” Thereupon all the chief people of the place presented themselves before him in a body, and offered to conduct him with honour to the seacoast, furnishing him at the same time with everything requisite for his comfort. There was need of expedition, and their nearest way lay through the sacred grove of Marica, into which whatever was once carried was never permitted to be again carried out. But when an old man exclaimed that no road was impassable to Marius, his voice was hailed as a divine monition, and superstition herself fell before the champion of Italy.
Marius thus effected his escape from his nearest pursuers. He set sail for Africa, but landing for water on the coast of Sicily, was very nearly taken and slain. On the shores of Africa he hoped to find allies among the chieftains of Numidia, with whom he had formed relations of amity at the period of his war against Jugurtha. He landed to await the result of his negotiations. While he sat in silent meditation among the ruins of Carthage, himself a livelier image of ruin hardly less appalling, the Roman governor of the province sent to warn him to be gone. The Numidians could not venture to shelter him, and he was compelled to take refuge on an island off the coast, where he continued for a time unmolested.
MARIUS HIDING IN THE MARSHES
While the conqueror of the Cimbrians was thus flying before the face of his own countrymen, and his triumphant rival prosecuting the war against Mithridates in the East, affairs were hurrying on to a new and unexpected revolution at Rome. The Samnites had never entirely laid down their arms at the general pacification of Italy; they rose under their leader, Pontius Telesinus, excited fresh movements among the slaves and bandits in the south of the peninsula, and at one moment threatened a descent upon Sicily. Metellus Pius, to whom the repression of this new Social War was entrusted, was unable to bring the enemy to a decisive engagement, but continued to make head against them with various alternations of success. The army of the north was still arrayed in Picenum, under the banners of Pompeius Strabo, who showed no disposition to relinquish his command at the conclusion of hostilities in that quarter. The senate despatched the late consul Pompeius Rufus to receive its legions from his hands. But it had no means of satisfying the soldiers’ demands for pay or largesses, and its emissary met with a cold reception from these disappointed mercenaries. Their discontent soon broke out in open mutiny, instigated, as has been generally suspected, by Pompeius Strabo himself. Rufus was massacred before the altar at which he was sacrificing. Strabo presently appeared among the mutineers, and restored order, without instituting inquiry or inflicting punishment. Such were the dispositions of the army and the general upon whom Rome was now compelled to rely, both for the pacification of Italy and the maintenance of the established government.