The Historians' History of the World 05

Upon his entering into the Civil War, the centurions of every legion offered each of them to maintain a horseman at his own expense, and the whole army agreed to serve gratis, without either corn or pay; those amongst them who were rich charging themselves with the maintenance of the poor. No one of them, during the whole course of the war, went over to the enemy; and most of those who were made prisoners, though they were offered their lives upon the condition of bearing arms against him, refused to accept the terms. They endured want, and other hardships, not only when themselves were besieged, but when they besieged others, to such a degree that Pompey, when blocked up in the neighbourhood of Dyrrhachium, upon seeing a sort of bread, made of an herb, which they lived upon, said, “I have to do with wild beasts,” and ordered it immediately to be taken away; because, if his troops should see it, they might be impressed with a dangerous apprehension of the hardiness and desperate resolution of the enemy. With what bravery they fought, one instance affords sufficient proof; which is, that after an unsuccessful engagement at Dyrrhachium, they desired him to punish them; insomuch that their general found it more necessary to comfort than punish them.

In other battles, in different parts, they defeated with ease immense armies of the enemy, though they were much inferior to them in number. To conclude, one battalion of the sixth legion held out a fort against four legions belonging to Pompey, during several hours; being almost every one of them wounded, by the vast number of arrows discharged against them, and of which there were found within the ramparts a hundred and thirty thousand. This is no way surprising, when we consider the behaviour of some individuals amongst them; such as that of Cassius Scæva, or C. Acilius a common soldier. Scæva, after he had an eye struck out, was run through the thigh and the shoulder, and had his shield pierced in a hundred and twenty places, maintained obstinately the guard of a gate in a fort, with the command of which he was intrusted. Acilius, in the sea fight at Marseilles, having seized a ship of the enemy with his right hand, and that being cut off, in imitation of that memorable instance of resolution in Cynægirus amongst the Greeks leaped into the ship, bearing down all before him with the boss of his shield.

They never once mutinied during all the ten years of the Gallic War, but were sometimes a little refractory in the course of the Civil War. They always however returned quickly to their duty, and that not through the compliance but the authority of their general; for he never gave ground, but constantly opposed them on such occasions. The whole ninth legion he dismissed with ignominy at Placentia, though Pompey was at that time in arms; and would not receive them again into his service, until not only they had made the most humble submission and entreaty, but that the ringleaders in the mutiny were punished.

When the soldiers of the tenth legion at Rome demanded their discharge and rewards for their service, with great threats, and no small danger to the city, though at that time the war was warmly carried on against him in Africa, he immediately, notwithstanding all the efforts of his friends, who endeavoured to prevent him from taking such a measure, came up to the legion and disbanded it. But addressing them by the title of “quirites,” instead of “soldiers,” he by this single word so thoroughly regained their affections that they immediately cried out they were his “soldiers,” and followed him into Africa, though he had refused their service. He nevertheless punished the most seditious amongst them, with the loss of a third of their share in the plunder and the land which had been intended for them.

In the service of his clients, while yet a young man, he evinced great zeal and fidelity. He defended the cause of a noble youth, Masintha, against King Hiempsal, so strenuously that in a wrangle which happened upon the occasion he seized by the beard the son of King Juba; and upon Masintha being declared tributary to Hiempsal, while the friends of the adverse party were violently carrying him off, he immediately rescued him by force, kept him concealed in his house a long time, and when, at the expiration of his prætorship, he went to Spain, he carried him with him in his litter, amidst his sergeants, and others who had come to attend and take leave of him.