CHAPTER THE TENTH.

FROM THE TRIBUNESHIP OF C. LICINIUS TO THE DEFEAT OF THE
GAULS BY VALERIUS.

Roman Soldier. Roman Soldier.

ome was now overwhelmed with debt, and fresh taxes were imposed to rebuild the wall of stone; but it would have been as easy to have got blood out of the stones themselves, as money from the pockets of the people. The more they went on not paying, the more were they called upon to pay; and ruin appeared inevitable, until it occurred to the great financial reformers of the day that there can be no permanent balance to the credit of a state without a due adjustment of the balance of power. Happily for the interests of humanity, there is scarcely ever a crisis requiring a hero, but there is a hero for the crisis,—no situation demanding a man, without a man for the situation; and though there may be on hand a formidable list of those who perpetually "Want places," we have the consolation of feeling that when there is a vacant place to be filled up, there is no lack of the material required to fill it.

The man for the situation in which Rome then happened to be, was a certain C. Licinius, who had married the younger daughter of the patrician, M. Fabius. The lady was considered to have wed below her station, and the Roman noses of her relatives were converted into snubs, by the habit of turning up for the purpose of snubbing her. Being on a visit with her sister, who was the wife of Servius Sulpicius, the Consular Tribune, she was one day alarmed by such a knocking at the door as she had never yet heard, and on inquiring the cause, she found that the lictors of old, like the modern footmen, were in the habit of estimating, by the number of raps he was worth, the dignity of their master. The elder Fabia, perceiving her sister's surprise, took the opportunity of administering a rap on the knuckles, through the medium of the knocker, and observed, that if the latter had not married a low plebeian, she would have been accustomed to hearing her own husband knock as loud, instead of being obliged to knock under.

The vanity of Fabia had received a blow which had deprived her of sense; and the effect of the knocking at the door had been so stunning, that she could scarcely call her head her own. She was resolved that her husband should make as much noise in the world as her brother-in-law,—that he should gain an important post, and win the privilege of knocking as violently as he chose at his own threshold.

Miss Fabia, the Younger, astonished at the Patrician's double-knock. Miss Fabia, the Younger, astonished at the Patrician's double-knock.

Those who would supply a higher motive to the ambition of C. Licinius, have asserted that his wife must have been accustomed to the loud knockings at the house of her father, who had once been consul; but whether the young lady heard them, unless she remained at home to answer the door, may be an open question. Whatever may have been the spur used to stir up ambition in his breast, we, at all events, know the fact, that C. Licinius was elected a tribune of the people, in conjunction with his friend Lucius Sextius; so that even if the former were roused by the knocker, it is not likely that ambition was hammered into the latter by the same ignoble instrument.

Having obtained their places, they began to bid very high for popularity; but, like many other bold bidders in the same market, it was by no means at their own expense that they proposed to make their purchases. They introduced three new laws: the first, touching other people's money; the second, touching other people's land; and, in reference to both these matters, touching and taking were nearly synonymous.

The first of these laws related to the debts of the plebs, and furnished an easy mode of payment, by providing that all the money paid as interest should be considered as principal. By this arrangement, if Spurius owed his tailor one hundred asses, and paid him five per cent., by way of interest, the tailor would, in thirty years, not only have had his debt cancelled, without receiving his money, but he would have to refund no less than fifty asses to Spurius.

This law was sure to obtain for its framers a certain kind of popularity; for as those who do not meet their engagements are always a numerous class, it is a safe clap-trap to legislate in favour of the insolvent classes of the community. C. Licinius became at once the idol of all those who were continually running into debt one day, and out of the way the next, and whose valour far outstripped the discretion of those who had trusted them.

The second law related to land, enacting that no one should occupy more than five hundred jugera, or acres, and that if he had a surplus, he should be deprived of it, for the benefit of those who wished to settle their own liabilities with other people's property. From this arrangement there was no appeal, for the land was taken away; and if the owner wished to complain, he had no ground for it.

The third law provided for the restoration of the Consuls, and stipulated that one should always be a plebeian; but the patricians, who wanted everything their own way, just as the plebeians wanted everything theirs, succeeded in putting a veto upon the propositions.

In the meantime, the people, placed between two parties—one of which was seeking popularity at any price, while the other was endeavouring to preserve its exclusive interests at any cost—were for eight years deprived of all benefit from either side; and though the public would have accepted a compromise, Licinius, who knew that when the point was settled his popularity would be on the wane, declared that they should either have all or nothing. This policy, which is the same as that of prohibiting a starving man from accepting a moderate meal, unless he is invited to a banquet, was well adapted to the purposes of those whose happiness depends upon the dissatisfaction of all around, and to whom the success of all their avowed designs is the consummation of failure.

As long as the bills continued to be thrown out year after year, C. Licinius and Sextius were pretty sure of their annual election to the tribuneship. At about the end of the fifth year, the opposition began to wane, and it became exceedingly likely that the three bills would pass, when Licinius kept the popularity market brisk, by proposing a fourth measure, which was sure to be strenuously objected to. This was a proposal to put on eight new hands to the keeping of the Sibylline books, by increasing from two to ten the number of the librarians. As the books were but three, there would, of course, be no less than three book-keepers and a fraction to each volume,—an arrangement as objectionable as pluralism, though in an opposite direction; for it is scarcely worse to give ten offices to one man, than to put ten men into one office. Excuses were, however, found for the suggestion, on the ground that as five of the book-keepers were to be plebeians, the skill they would acquire in the interpretation of auguries would qualify a larger number for the consulship; the patricians having maintained that at least a smattering of the fortune-telling art was required for the due execution of the office.

Rome was now suffering from domestic wounds, when, fortunately, a little counter-irritation was got up, by an attack of the Veliternians on Tusculum. There is no better cure for a family quarrel, than the sudden incursion of a neighbour; and when relatives are breaking each other's heads at Number One, a stone thrown from the garden of Number Two will frequently, by the establishment of a single new wound, be the cause of healing half a-dozen. The threatened aggression from without had caused the ten Tribunes to agree to the measures of their colleagues, Licinius and Sextius; but the patricians still held out, and appointed the veteran Furius Camillus to the dictatorship. The tribes were in the act of voting, when Furius ordered them away, with violent menaces; but the fury of Furius was impotent from age, and the Tribunes coolly threatened him with a fine of five hundred thousand asses. They had come to the correct conclusion that he could not get together so many asses without selling himself up; he thought it better to abdicate, and P. Manlius was chosen to stop the fermentation that the sour old man had created.

The bills were now all passed; and L. Sextius had been appointed plebeian consul, when the patricians, refusing to sanction what they could not prevent, declined to ratify the election. As the avalanche does not wait for the consent of the object it is about to sweep away, so the will of the public overcame the feeble opposition of the patricians. The latter, however, succeeded in taking a large portion of power from the consuls, and giving it to a new magistrate, called a Prætor, who was invested with authority that some historians have described as almost preternatural. He was chosen from the patricians, and was, in fact, a sort of third consul, whose duty it was Jus in urbe dicere,[26] to lay down the law—a privilege that, if improperly exercised, might include the prostration of justice—in the city. The patricians thus kept to themselves the power of interpreting the law; and as ambiguity seems inherent in the very nature of law, almost any latitude was left to those who were at liberty to declare its meaning. The power of the patricians was further augmented by the appointment of two curule or aristocratic Ædiles, in addition to the two chosen from the plebeians; and though their duties related chiefly to the mending of the roads, they had opportunities of paving the way for many encroachments on the part of their own order.

The struggle between the patrician and the plebeian parties was severe, and each endeavoured to represent itself as the only real friend of the people. Among other acts, in the interest of the masses, was a measure introduced by C. Poetelius, consisting of a lex de ambitû, an election law, relating to the getting round, or circumventing, of the electors by the candidates. It will astonish those acquainted with election practices to be told, that the word "candidate" is derived from candidus, in allusion to the white robe usually worn as an emblem of purity by the seeker of popular suffrages. The white robe, however, was notoriously, in many cases, a white lie, and the law de ambitû was passed to prohibit canvassing on market-days, when many more things were purchased than the articles ostensibly sold; and the butcher has been known to include in the price of a calf's head, the value he placed upon his own judgment.

The cause of reform made slow but inevitable progress, though it was occasionally discredited by some of those incidents which still cause us to look well to our pockets in the presence of the professional lover of liberty. C. Licinius, the framer of the law against occupying more than a certain quantity of the public land, was, it is said, the first to pay the fine, for holding a double allowance, comprising five hundred jugera in his own name, and five hundred in that of his son; a piece of duplicity which was detected and duly punished. Other instances of private peculation were discovered among those most clamorous for the public good; and it became necessary in those days, as in our own, to look among the loudest talkers for the smallest doers, and the greatest doos of the community.

The law of debt had been rendered somewhat less severe; but the impossibility of permanently helping those who could not help themselves was strikingly exemplified. The rate of interest had been reduced; and advances were to be made by the State to those who could give security; but those who could give none were to have no assistance whatever. To those who could pay no interest at all, it mattered little whether the interest was moderate or high; and an extension of time for discharging a debt, in the case of a man who could pay nothing, was only like lengthening the rope with which he was to hang himself.

In the year of the City 390, a plague broke out in Rome, and the calamity, which swallowed up thousands, being ascribed to the gods, repasts were prepared for them, under the title of lectisternia, in order to draw off their appetites from the people. The richest luxuries were laid out upon tables, to which the gods were invited; but these tables caused no diminution in the tables of mortality. As the guests did not accept in person the invitations addressed to them, they were represented by images; but this imaginary attendance at a real feast fed nothing but the superstition of the people. A statue of Jupiter was laid, at full length, upon a couch of ivory, covered with the softest cushions; but it was found impossible to produce the sort of impression that was so earnestly desired. Chairs were also set round for the goddesses, but none came forward to take the chair at this unfortunate banquet. An effort was then made to divert the attention of the gods, by getting up stage plays, or histriones:[27] but the gods did not patronise the drama in those days, more than in our own; and whether the Olympian dinner-hour interfered, or whether no interest was felt in an entertainment translated from Etruria, as the English drama is from France, the result was the same in both cases, for the plays, during their short-lived career, were dead failures. To add to the misery of the whole affair, while the stage performances were unattended, there was an inconvenient "succession of overflows" of the Tiber's banks, which damped the spirits and deluged the houses of the inhabitants.

Seizing hold of every piece of superstition, instead of taking the pestilence fairly in hand, the Romans, hearing that a plague had once been stopped by knocking a nail into the wall of a temple, resolved on going on that absurd tack; and, for this purpose, a hammer was put by the ninny-hammers into the hands of Manlius. As the pestilence had by this time begun to wear itself out, the people were foolish enough to suppose that the plague had been driven in with the nail; and Manlius having fulfilled the task, which any carpenter might have performed, resigned the dictatorship.

It is always the fate of a real or supposed benefactor of the public to have plenty of private foes; and, indeed, an elevated position is usually an inviting mark for the arrows of malevolence. Manlius became a target forthwith; and, had the very bull's eye been aimed at, the apple of his eye could not have been more effectually hit, than by a wound sought to be inflicted on him, through his son Titus. The youth had, it seems, an unfortunate hesitation in his speech, which irritated his hasty parent; and as the boy could scarcely stammer out a word, a few words with his father became a very frequent consequence. As he laboured so much in his speech, the unhappy lad was sent to labour with his hands among the slaves; and Pomponius, the plebeian tribune, having a spite against the father, began to regard the son with the most enlarged benevolence.

Pomponius, by way of prosecuting his vindictive plans, resolved on prosecuting Manlius, for cruelty to his son; but the boy, in a powerful fit of filial piety, though he had a considerable hesitation in his own delivery, had no hesitation whatever about the delivery of his father from the hands of his enemies. Proceeding to the house of Pomponius, under the cloak of friendship, and with a dagger under his cloak, he desired to speak with the Tribune, who was still in bed, and not being up to the designs of Titus, ordered his admission to the chamber. The young man had been received in a spirit of friendly confidence by Pomponius, who only discovered that young Manlius was at daggers-drawn, when he was seen to brandish a glittering weapon. He demanded an unconditional withdrawal of the charge against his father; when the terrified Tribune, finding it impossible to bolster up his courage, muttered a promise to stay all proceedings; and Titus, who had formerly irritated his father by stammering, was received with open arms, for having spoken out so boldly in his favour.

Titus threatening Pomponius. Titus threatening Pomponius.

No sooner were the divisions of the people healed, than the city itself began to be torn to pieces in a most extraordinary manner. Rome was convulsed to its centre: the earth began to quake, and the citizens to tremble. A tremendous chasm appeared at length in the Forum; and as the abyss yawned more and more, it was thought unsafe for the people to go to sleep over it. Some thought it was a freak of Nature, who, as if in enjoyment of the cruel sport she occasioned, had gone into convulsions, and split her sides. Others formed different conjectures; but the chasm still remained,—a formidable open question. Some of the people tried to fill it up with dry rubbish, but they only filled up their own time, without producing the least effect upon the cavity. In vain did the largest contractors undertake the job, for it was impossible to contract the aperture, that, instead of being small by degrees and beautifully less, grew every day large by fits and starts, and horribly greater.

At length the augurs were consulted, who, taking a view of the hole, announced their conviction that the perforation of the earth would continue, and that, in fact, it would become in time a frightful bore, if the most precious thing in Rome were not speedily thrown into it. Upon this, a young guardsman, named Marcus Curtius, fancying there could be nothing more precious than his precious self, arrayed himself in a full suit of armour, and went forth, fully determined to show his metal. Notice was given that at an appointed time a rapid act of horsemanship would be performed by M. Curtius; and as there is always great attraction in a feat which puts life in jeopardy, the attendance, at a performance where death for the man and the courser was a matter of course, was what we should call numerous and respectable. All the rank and fashion of Rome occupied the front seats, at a spectacle throwing every thing else into the shade, and the performer himself into the very centre of the earth, which was to prove to him a centre of so much gravity. Having cantered once or twice round the ring, he prepared for the bold plunge; but his horse having looked before he leaped, began to plunge in a different direction. Taking another circuit, M. Curtius, spurred on by ambition, put his spurs into the animal's side, and the poor brute was hurried into the abyss, though, had there been any way of backing out, he would have eagerly jumped at it. The equestrian performance was no sooner over, than the theatre of the exploit was immediately closed, and a lake arose on the spot, as if to mark the scene as one that might command a continued overflow. The place got the name of the Lacus Curtius, in honour of the hero, if such he may be called; and his fate certainly involved the sacrifice of one of the most precious articles in Rome, for it would have been impossible to find in the whole city such a precious simpleton.

Rome continued at war with the Gauls, who made frequent inroads; and on one occasion, during the dictatorship of T. Quinctius Pennus, came within a short distance from the city. The two armies were divided by the Anio, when the Gauls, who had a giant in their van, sent him on to the bridge, with an offer to fight any one of the enemy. The Gaul being at least twenty stone, was far above the ordinary pitch; but Titus Manlius, a tight-built light-weight—the plebeian pet, who had already proved himself too much for the Tribune, Pomponius—came forward to accept the polite offer of the giant. The fight was one of extreme interest, and both parties came up to the encounter with surly confidence. The plebeian pet wore a suit of plain bronze; but the giant was painted in various colours, presenting a formidable picture. The giant aimed the first blow with his right, but the young one having got away cleverly, commenced jobbing his opponent with such effect, that the latter, finding it a bad job, fell heavily. The giant was unable to continue the contest, and young Manlius, taking the collar, or torques, from his victim's neck, got the title of Torquatus, which, from its connection with his neckcloth, descended to his domestic ties, and became a stock name in his family.

The Gallant Curtius leaping into the gulf. The Gallant Curtius leaping into the gulf.

The Gauls retreated for a while, but having subsequently joined the Volscii, they got into the Pontine Marshes, and resolved to go through thick and thin for the purpose of attacking the Romans. Again a giant appeared in the Gallic ranks, where, it would seem, a giant was always to be found,—an appendage indicating less of the brave than of the fair in the composition of the Gallic army. Again a young Roman was ready to meet an opponent twice his size; and Marcus Valerius declared that if the giant meant fighting, he, Marcus Valerius, was to be heard of at a place agreed upon. The terms were concluded, and the giant came up, with the appearance of contemplating mischief, when a crow, settling on the Gaul's helmet, by way of crest, soon enabled the Roman to crow over his crest-fallen antagonist. The bird, flapping his wings whenever the giant attempted to hit out, put so many feathers in his face as to render his position ticklish; and as he could not see with a bundle of crow-quills in his eye, his look-out became rather desperate. Valerius, in the mean time, laid about him with such vigour and effect, that the giant, who was doubly blinded with rage and feathers, knew not where to have him. The contest soon terminated in favour of the Roman youth, who took the name of Corvus, or the Crow, from the cause already mentioned. The Gauls were vanquished, and Valerius was awarded no less than ten prize oxen; so that he obtained in solid beef, rather than in empty praise, an acknowledgment of his services. At his triumph, 4000 Volscians were drawn up on each side of him in chains; but there is something in the idea of his passing through this Fetter Lane which is repugnant to our more civilised notions of true glory.

Terrific Combat between Titus Manlius and a Gaul of gigantic stature. Terrific Combat between Titus Manlius and a Gaul of gigantic stature.

FOOTNOTES:

[26] Livy, vi., 42.

[27] The word "Histriones" is said to be derived from the Etruscan hister, a dancer. The earliest performers introduced into Rome were dancers—in fact, a ballet company—from Etruria. Those sensitive admirers of the purely classical in the entertainments of the stage, who clamour against opera and ballet, will, perhaps, be surprised to learn that the most truly classical performances are those which they most energetically protest against.