Lucan, Civil War Book 2 Translated by H. T. Riley (1853) Formatted and by C. Chinn (2008) AND now was the wrath of the Deities displayed, and the universe gave manifest signs of war; foreknowing nature by her monster-bearing confusion overthrew the laws and the compacts of things, and proclaimed the fatality. Why, ruler of Olympus, has it seemed good to thee 5 to add this care to anxious mortals, that by means of direful omens they should know of misfortunes about to come? Whether it is that, when first the parent of the world, the flame receding, set apart the shapeless realms and unformed matter, he established causes to endless time, by which he rules all things, 10 binding himself as well by a law, and, with the immovable boundaries of fate, allotted the world to endure its destined ages; or whether it is that nothing is preordained, but Chance wanders in uncertainty, and brings and brings round again events, and accident rules the affairs of mortals: may that be instantaneous, whatever thou dost intend; may the mind of man 15 be blind to his future fate; to him who dreads may it be allowed to hope. Therefore when they perceived at the price of how vast calamity to the world the truthfulness of the Gods of heaven was about to be realized, there was a general mourning in token of woe throughout the City; clad in the plebeian garb all honors lay concealed; the purple accompanied no fasces. 20 Then did they withhold expression of their griefs, and great anguish without a voice pervaded all. Thus at the moment of death the astounded house is silent while the body is lying not yet called upon by name, nor as yet does the mother with her disheveled locks prompt the arms of the female domestics to the cruel beatings on their breasts; 25 but when, life fled, she presses the stiffened limbs and the lifeless features, and the eyes swimming in death, no longer is it anguish, but now it is dread; distractedly she throws herself down, and is astounded at her woes. The matron has laid aside her former habit, and sorrowing throngs occupy the shrines. 30 These sprinkle the Gods with tears; these dash their breasts against the hard ground, and, awe-stricken, throw their torn-out hair upon the sacred threshold, and with repeated howlings strike upon the ears accustomed to be addressed in prayer. And not all lay in the Temple of the Supreme Thunderer; 35 they made division of the Deities, and at no altar was there wanting a parent to create discontent; one of whom, tearing her bedewed cheeks, and blackened with blows, upon her livid arms, exclaimed, "Now, O wretched matrons, beat your breasts, now tear your locks, nor defer this grief and preserve it 40 for our crowning woes. Now have you the power to weep, while the fortune of the chieftains is undecided; when one shall have proved the conqueror, you must rejoice." With these incentives did grief encourage itself. The men likewise, repairing to the hostile camps, are pouring forth well-grounded complaints against the relentless Divinities. 45 "Oh luckless lot, that we were not born for the Punic days of Cannae and of Trebia, a youthful race! Gods of heaven, we do not ask for peace; inspire with anger foreign nations; at once arouse the enraged cities; let the world conspire in arms; let the Median ranks descend from Achaemenian Susa; 50 let the Scythian Ister not confine the Massagetan; let the Albis pour forth the yellow-haired Suevi from the extreme north and the unsubdued sources of the Rhine; make us the foes of all nations; but avert civil warfare. On the one side let the Dacian press upon us, the Getan on the other; let the one meet 55 the Iberians, the other turn his standards against the eastern quivers. Let no hand, Rome, of thine, enjoy leisure. Or if, ye Gods of heaven, it is your pleasure to blot out the Hesperian name, gathered into fires let the entire aether descend in lightnings upon the earth. Enraged Parent, at the same instant smite both partisans and leaders, 60 while not as yet they have deserved it. Do they with an extent so great of unheard of crimes, seek to know which of the two is to rule the City? Hardly would it have been worth the while to levy civil war, that neither might." Such complaints did piety, doomed to be bootless, pour forth; but a care their own afflicted wretched parents, 65 and they detested the long-lived destiny of a sorrowing old age, and years reserved for civil warfare a second time. And one, seeking precedents for their great alarm, exclaimed, "Not other commotions did the Fates intend at the time when, victorious after the Teutonic and the Libyan triumphs, 70 the exiled Marius concealed his head amid the slimy sedge. The pools of the plashy soil and the fenny marshes concealed, Fortune, thy deposit; next did the chains of iron eat into the aged man, and prolonged squalor in prison. A Consul, and fated to die successful in the subdued City, 75 beforehand did he pay the penalty of his crimes. Death herself fled full oft from the hero, and in vain was power granted to his enemy over the hated blood; who, at the very stroke of death stood riveted and from his faltering hand let fall the sword. He had beheld an intense light in the darkened cell, 80 and the dread Goddesses of crime, and the Marius of a future day, and in alarm he had heard, 'It is not right for thee to touch this neck; to the laws of fate does he owe many deaths before his own; lay aside thy vain fury. If it is your wish to avenge the destruction of your extinct race, 85 Cimbrians, do you preserve this aged man!' Not by the favour of the Deity, but by the mighty anger of the Gods of heaven was this cruel man protected, and he sufficed for Fate when desiring to ruin Rome. He, too, borne over the stormy main to a hostile land, and driven among the deserted cottages, 90 lay amid the spoiled realms of the conquered Jugurtha, and trod upon the Punic ashes. Carthage and Marius exchanged consolation for their fates, and equally prostrate, patiently submitted to the Gods. There did he collect together the resentfulness of Libya. When first, his fortune returning, he set free troops of slaves, 95 the iron wrought up into swords, the slaves' dungeons sent forth the ruthless bands. To no one were entrusted the ensigns of their leader to be carried, except to him who had now gained experience in wickedness, and had brought crime into the camp. Oh ye Fates! what a day, what a day was that, on which the victorious Marius seized 100 the walls! and with strides how vast did cruel Death hurry on! With the commonalty the nobles fall; and far and wide stalks the sword, and the weapon is withdrawn from the breast of none. Gore stands in the temples, and red with plenteous slaughter the slippery stones are wet. To no one was his age a protection. 105 There was no shame at having hurried on the closing day of the aged man in his declining years; nor in the very threshold of life at cutting short the rising destiny of the wretched infant. By what criminality could little children be deserving of slaughter? But now enough is it to be able to die. The very impetuosity of frenzy 110 hurries them on, and it seems like sluggishness to be in search of the guilty. To swell the number a large portion falls; and the blood-stained victor seizes the head cut off from an unknown neck, as he is ashamed to go with an empty hand. The only hope of safety is to imprint trembling kisses on the polluted right hand. 115 Although a thousand swords attended the unheard-of signals for death, O degenerate people, hardly would it be becoming for men thus to earn lengthened ages of existence, much less the short-lived disgrace of surviving, and life until Sulla returns. Who has the leisure to bewail the deaths of the multitude? Hardly thee, Baebius, rent asunder by thine 120 entrails, and how that the countless hands of the dismembering throng tore thy limbs to pieces; or thee, Antonius, foreteller of woes, whose features, hanging by the torn white hair, dripping with blood, the soldier carrying placed upon the festive table. Fimbria mangled the beheaded Crassi. 125 The relentless prison was steeped with Tribunitial gore. Thee also, Scaevola, neglected by the unscrupulous right hand, before the very shrine of the Goddess and her ever-burning hearths they slew; but exhausted old age poured forth little blood from thy throat, and spared the flames. 130 These things his seventh Consular year followed, the fasces regained. That was the closing period of the life of Marius, who had endured all things which evil fortune is able to effect, and who had enjoyed all things which a better fortune can bring, and had experienced what fortune can destine for man. "Now at Sacriportus how many dead bodies fell prostrate, 135 or how many slaughtered troops did the Collinian Gate endure, at the time when the sovereignty of the world and the sway of power, transferred, had almost changed its site, and the Samnite hoped for Roman wounds exceeding the Caudine Forks! Sulla, too, added as an avenger to the boundless slaughter. 140 He shed the little blood that was remaining to the City, and while he amputated the limbs now too corrupt, the healing art exceeded its limits, and the hand followed too far where the malady led it. The guilty perished; but when now the guilty alone could possibly be surviving. 145 Then was scope given to hatred, and, let loose from the rein of the laws, anger rushed on. Not for one crime were all sacrificed, but each one framed a criminality of his own. Once for all had the victor given his commands. Through the entrails of his master did the servant plunge the accursed sword; sons were steeped in a father's blood. 150 The contention was, to whom the severed head of the parent belonged; brothers fell as a reward to brothers. The tombs were filled by flight, and living bodies were intermingled with the buried, and the dens of wild beasts received the throng. This one broke his neck and his compressed throat with the halter; 155 another hurling himself, with weight falling headlong, dashed against the hard ground, burst asunder; and from the blood-stained victor they snatched away their own slaughter; this one himself heaped up the oaken fabric of his own funeral pile, and, all his blood not yet poured forth, leaped down into the flames, and, while yet he might, took possession of the fires. 160 The heads of chieftains are carried on javelins throughout the trembling City, and heaped up in the midst of the Forum. Whatever crime there is anywhere existing is then known. Not Thrace beheld so many hanging in the stables of the Bistonian tyrant, nor Libya upon the posts of Antaeus; nor did lamenting 165 Greece weep for torn limbs so many in the halls of Pisa. When now they had mouldered away in corruption, and confused, in length of time lost their marks, the right hand of the wretched parents collected them, and, recognized, stealthily removed them with timid theft. I remember, too, that I myself, anxious to place the disfigured features 170 of my slain brother upon the pile and the forbidden flames, searched about among all the carcases of this Sullanian peace, and amid all the trunks sought for one with which the head lopped from the neck would correspond. Why shall I make mention of the shades of Catulus appease? When Marius the victim made 175 a sad sacrifice to perhaps an unwilling shade, an unutterable atonement to an insatiate tomb; when we beheld the mangled limbs, and the wounds equal in number with the members, and no one given fatal to life, although upon a body mangled all over, and the ruthless usage of an accursed 180 cruelty to forego the death of him who was thus perishing. Hands torn off fell down, and the tongue cut out still quivered, and with noiseless movement beat the vacant air. This one cuts off the ears, another the nostrils of the aquiline nose; that one gouges out the eye-balls from their hollow sockets, 185 and, his mangled limbs viewed by himself, put out his eyes the last. Hardly will there be any believing that one person could have endured the punishments thus numerous of a crime so dreadful. Thus under the mass of ruins limbs are broken beneath the vast weight; nor more disfigured do the headless carcases come to shore 190 which have perished in the midst of the ocean. Why has it pleased you to lose your pains, and to disfigure the features of Marius, as though an ignoble person? That this criminality and slaughter on being made known might please Sulla, he ought to have been able to be recognized. Praenestine Fortune beheld all her citizens cut off together by the sword— 195 a people perishing at a moment by a single death. Then fell the flower of Italy, now the sole youth of Latium, and stained the sheepfolds of wretched Rome. So many youths at the same instant to fall by a hostile death, full oft has famine, the rage too of the ocean, and sudden earthquake caused, 200 or pestilence of climate and locality, or slaughter in warfare, vengeance it never was that did so. Hardly, amid the masses of the dense multitude, and the pallid throngs, could the victors, death inflicted, move their hands. Hardly, the slaughter completed, do they fall, and with neck still dubious they totter; but the vast carnage 205 bears them down, and the carcases perform the part of slaughter; the trunks falling heavily smother the living. Unconcerned he sat above, a careless spectator of wickedness so great; he repented not that he had ordered so many thousands of the hapless multitude to die. The Etrurian stream 210 received all the Sullanian corpses heaped together. Into the river the first ones fell, upon the bodies the last. Ships sailing with the tide stuck fast, and, choked up in its waters by the bloody carnage, the mouth of the river flowed out into the sea. The following waves stood still at the mass, until the stream 215 of deep blood made a passage for itself, and, pouring forth over all the plain and rushing with headlong stream down to the floods of Tiber, aided the impeded waters; and now no longer does its bed nor yet its banks, contain the river, and it throws back the corpses on the plain. At length having struggled with difficulty down to the 220 Etrurian waves, with the flowing blood it divided the azure sea. For this did Sulla merit to be styled the saviour of the state; for this to be called the Fortunate; for this to raise for himself a tomb in the middle of the Plain of Mars? These wrongs await us to be again endured; in this order of warfare will they proceed; this conclusion will await the civil strife. 225 Although still greater calamities do our alarms anticipate, and they rush to battle with much greater detriment to the human race. Rome recovered was the greatest reward of war to the exiled Marii, nor more did victory afford to Sulla than utterly to destroy the hated faction. 230 These, Fortune, on other grounds thou dost invite, and, raised to power already, they meet in combat. Neither would be commencing civil war, if content with that with which Sulla was." Thus did old age lament, sorrowing and mindful of the past, and fearful of the future. But terror did not strike the breast of the noble Brutus, 235 nor was he a portion of the trembling populace weeping in alarm so great at the commotion; but in the drowsy night, when the Parrhasian Helice was turning her chariot obliquely, he knocked at the not extensive halls of his kinsman Cato. He found him with sleepless anxiety reflecting on the public affairs, 240 the fates of men, and the fortunes of the City, both fearful for all and regardless for himself; and in these words he began to address him:-- "Do thou, now the sole refuge for virtue expelled and long since banished from all lands, whom by no tempestuous shock Fortune shall tear away from thee, direct me wavering 245 in mind, do thou confirm me in doubt with assured strength; for let others follow Magnus or the arms of Caesar, Cato shall be the sole leader of Brutus. Dost thou adhere to peace, keeping thy footsteps unshaken while the world is in doubt? Or has it been thy pleasure, mingling in slaughter with the leaders 250 of crime and of the maddened populace, to forgive the civic strife? Each one do his own reasons hurry away to the accursed combat: these a polluted house, and laws to be dreaded in peace; these hunger to be driven away by means of the sword, and plighted faith to be lost sight of amid the ruins of the world. Fury has impelled no one to arms; 255 overcome by a vast reward, they are repairing to the camps: for its own sake is the warfare pleasing to thee alone? What has it availed thee so many years to have remained untouched by the manners of a corrupt age? This sole reward of thy long-practised virtues shalt thou receive; others the wars shall find thyself they shall make, guilty. 260 O Gods of heaven, let not so much be allowed to the fatal arms as even to have moved these hands; and let no javelins hurled by thy arms be borne in the dense cloud of weapons; nor let valour so great be thrown away on chance. All the fortune of the war will rest itself on thee. Who shall he unwilling, 265 although falling by the wound from another, to die by this sword, and for the crime to be thine own? Better alone without arms wilt thou live in tranquil inactivity, just as the stars of heaven ever unmoved roll onward in their course. The air nearer to the earth is inflamed with the lightnings, 270 and the lowermost regions of earth receive the winds and the flashing streaks of flame; Olympus, by the will of the Gods, stands above the clouds. The least of things does discord disturb; the highest enjoy peace. How joyously will the ears of Caesar learn that a citizen so great has come forth to battle! 275 For that the rival camp of the chieftain Magnus has been preferred to his own he will never grieve. Too much does he please himself, if civil war is pleasing to Cato. A large portion of the Senate and a Consul, about to wage war under a general a private person, and other nobles as well, cause me anguish; to whom add Cato 280 under the yoke of Pompey, then throughout the whole world Caesar alone will be free. But if for the laws of thy country it pleases thee to take up arms, and to defend liberty, already thou dost have Brutus the enemy neither of Pompey nor of Caesar, but after the war, of the conqueror." Thus he speaks. But Cato 285 utters to him from his secret breast these hallowed words:-- "Brutus, I confess that civil warfare is wickedness in the extreme; but whither the fates lead, virtue with clear conscience shall follow. It shall be the crime of the Gods of heaven to have made even me guilty. Who is able to look upon the stars and the world falling to ruin, 290 void of fear himself? Who, when the lofty sky is rushing downwards, the earth is quaking, the weight of the confused universe mingling together, can keep his hands folded in inactivity? Shall stranger nations follow the frenzy of Hesperia and the Roman wars, and Kings be led over the seas beneath other climes, 295 and shall I alone live in inactivity? Far hence avert, O Gods of heaven, the frantic notion that Rome may fall, in its ruin to affect the Dahans and the Getans, while I am free from care. As grief itself bids the parent bereaved by the death of his sons, to head the long funereal procession to the tomb; it gives him satisfaction to have thrust his hands 300 amidst the blackening flames, and himself to have held the swarthy torches in the heaped-up structure of the pile; I will not be torn away, before, Rome, I shall have embraced thee lifeless, and Liberty, thy name, and shall have followed thy unsubstantial shade. So let it be; let the unappeased Gods receive a full expiatory 305 sacrifice, of no blood let us defraud the warfare. And would that it were possible for the Gods of heaven and of Erebus to expose this head of mine condemned to every punishment! The hostile troops bore down the devoted Decius; me let two armies assail, me let the barbarian multitude from the Rhine 310 aim at with their darts; may I, accessible, in the midst, receive from all the lances the wounds of the entire warfare. May this blood redeem the people; by my fate may it be atoned for, whatever the Roman manners have deserved to pay the penalty for. Why should the people ready for the yoke--why should those desirous 315 to endure a harsh sway, perish? Myself alone attack with the sword— myself who in vain maintain our laws and empty rights; this throat, this, will provide peace, and an end of their hardships for the nations of Hesperia; after I am gone there is no need of war for him who wishes to reign. Why do we not then follow the standards 320 of the state and Pompey as our leader? And yet, if Fortune shall favour, it has been well ascertained that he as well promises himself the sway over the whole world. Let him conquer therefore, myself his soldier, that he may not suppose that for himself he has conquered." Thus he spoke, and he applied sharp incentives to his indignation and aroused 325 the warm blood of the youth to too great fondness for civil war. In the meantime, Phoebus dispelling the chilly shades of night, the door, being knocked at, sent forth a sound; and the hallowed Marcia entered in grief, having left the tomb of Hortensius; once, a virgin, joined in wedlock to a better husband; 330 afterwards when, the price and the reward of wedlock, her third progeny was born, she in her pregnancy was given to fill another home with her offspring, destined to unite two houses by a mother's blood. But after she had enclosed in the urn the last ashes, hurrying with tearful countenance, 335 tearing her disheveled hair, and beating her breast with repeated blows, and bearing the ashes of the tomb, not destined to please her husband in other guise, thus in sadness did she speak:-- "While I had in me the strengthening blood, while strength to endure a mother's pains, Cato, I performed thy commands, and pregnant, two husbands did I receive. 340 My vitals wearied and exhausted by child-bearing I now return, to no other husband to be handed over. Grant the unenjoyed ties of our former union; grant only the empty name of wedlock; let it be allowed to inscribe on my tomb, 'Marcia, the wife of Cato;' nor let it be enquired as doubtful in remote posterity 345 whether I abandoned my first marriage torch, repudiated or only transferred. Thou dost not receive me as a partner in joyous circumstances: amid thy cares and to share thy griefs, do I come. Allow me to attend the camp. Why shall I be left in the safety of peace, and Cornelia be near to the civic strife?" 350 These words influenced the hero, and though the times were unsuited for wedlock, Fate now summoning him to the war, still a solitary union pleased him, and nuptials devoid of empty pomp, and the admission of the Gods alone as witnesses of the solemnities. No festive garlands hang from the wreath-bound threshold, 355 and no white fillet runs along the two doorposts, nor are there the usual torches, nor does the couch stand on high with its ivory steps, or variegate its coverings with embroidered gold: and no matron, pressing her forehead with the turreted crown, forbids her, with foot lifted over, to touch the threshold. 360 No saffron-colored veil lightly to hide the timid blushes of the bride, concealed her downcast features; the girdle with its gems did not encircle her flowing robes, no necklace her graceful neck; and no scanty under-tunic, clinging to the lower part of the shoulders, enveloped her bared arms. 365 Even so, just as she was, she preserved the mournful ensigns of the garb of woe, and in the way in which her sons, in the same her husband, did she embrace. Covered by the funereal wool the purple was concealed. None of the wonted jests acted their merry part, nor after the Sabine usage did the sorrowing husband receive the festive taunts. 370 No pledges of the house, no relations met together. They were united in silence, and contented with the auspices of Brutus. Nor did Cato remove the grim long hair from his hallowed face, or admit of joyousness on his rigid features. Since first he had beheld the deadly arms upraised, 375 he had allowed the unshorn white hair to descend upon his rugged brow and the woeful beard to grow upon his cheeks. Because, forsooth, he had leisure for one thing alone--free from factions and from hate--to weep for mankind. Nor were the ties of their former connexion renewed; his continence withheld from even lawful 380 love. These were the manners, this was the unswerving rule of the rigid Cato; to observe moderation, and to adhere to his end; to follow the guidance of nature, and to lay down his life for his country; and not to believe himself born for himself, but for the whole world. To subdue hunger was a banquet to him, and to keep away by a 385 mere roof the winter's cold, an opulent abode; to wrap a shaggy toga around his limbs, after the manner of the Roman follower of Quirinus, was a costly robe; to him, too, the especial object of sexual desire was offspring; he was the City's husband, and the City's sire; a worshipper of justice, an observer of strict honor; he was a good man 390 for the common weal; and upon none of Cato's deeds did pleasure, born but for herself, make inroad and exact her share. In the mean time, Magnus departing with the hastening throng, took possession of the Campanian walls of the Dardanian colonist. This seat of war was to his mind, for him, exerting all his might, 395 thence to spread abroad his scattered party to meet the foe, where with its shady hills Apennine raises on high the mid part of Italy, than which no land swells with its peaks to a loftier height, or approaches more nigh to Olympus. The mountain in the midst extends itself between the two waters 400 of the Lower and the Upper sea; and on the one side does Pisa, that, with its shallows, breaks the Etrurian waves, on the other, Ancona, opposed to the Dalmatian billows, bound the mountain ridges. From vast sources does it produce boundless streams, and extend its rivers along the space that separates the two seas. 405 On the left side descend both the swift Metaurus, and the rapid Crustumium, and the Sapis uniting with the Isaurus, and the Sena, the Aufidus, too, that beats the Adriatic waves; and, (into a river more vast than which no region dissolves itself,) the Eridanus rolls down dismantled forests into the main, 410 and by its waters empties Hesperia of streams. The story is, that this river was the first to shade its banks with a poplar crown; and that, when Phaëton, his bounds overstepped, bringing headlong downwards the light of day, set the skies on fire with his blazing reins, the streams throughout the scorched earth being swept away, 415 this one had waves equal to quenching the fires of Phoebus. Not less is it than the Nile, if the Nile did not lie stagnant far and wide over the flat surface of level Egypt, the Libyan sands. Nor less is it than the Ister, except that while the Ister flows through the globe, it receives streams that might have fallen as rivers into any 420 seas whatever, and not by itself is discharged into the Scythian waves. The waters that seek the right-hand declivities of the mountain range form the Tiber, and the Rutuba in its cavities. Thence downward glide both the swift Vulturnus, and the Sarnus, the producer of night-like mists, and the Liris impelled by the Vestine waters through the realms 425 of shady Marica, and the Siler, skimming along the cultivated fields of Salernum; the Macra, too, which in its shallows admits of no barks, runs into the sea of neighbouring Luna. Where, extending still beyond, it rises with its ridges elevated in the air, it beholds the Gallic fields, and looks down upon the declining Alps. 430 Then, fertile for the Umbrians and the Marsians, and subdued by the Sabine ploughshare, embracing with its pine-clad rocks all the native races of Latium, it deserts not Hesperia before it is cut short by the waves of Scylla, and extends its rocks to the Lacinian temples; 435 longer than Italy, until the sea pressing on cut short its boundaries, and the ocean forced back the land. But after the earth was separated by the two seas, the extremity of the range ended in Sicilian Pelorus. Caesar, furious for war, is not pleased at having a way otherwise than by 440 the shedding of blood, and that he cannot lay waste the limits of Hesperia now free from an enemy, and rush down upon the deserted fields, and he would not lose the advantage of his march, and would be leading on force hand to hand with force. It delights him not so much to enter the opening gates, as to have broken them down; nor so much for the fields to be ploughed by 445 the submitting husbandman, as if the land were laid waste with fire and sword. By paths permitted he is reluctant to proceed, and to appear to be a fellow-citizen. Then the cities of Latium, in doubt, and wavering with varying party feelings, although about to yield at the first alarm of the approaching warfare, still with stout ramparts strengthen their 450 walls, and surround them on every side with the deep trench. Round masses of stone, too, and darts which may be hurled from above against the foe, they provide upon the lofty towers of the walls. The multitude is more favourable to Magnus, and attachment struggles with threatening terror; just as when the south wind, with his 455 dread-sounding blasts, possesses the sea, him do all the billows follow: if again the earth, loosened by the stroke of the Aeolian trident, sends forth the eastern gales over the swelling waves, although swept by this fresh one, the billows still retain the effects of the former wind, and while the heavens give way to the eastern winds sweeping along the clouds, 460 the waves still obey the southern gales. But terror was able readily to change their feelings, and fortune swayed their wavering attachment. The Etrurian race was left defenseless by the flight of frightened Libo, and now, Thermus repulsed, Umbria lost the disposal of itself. Nor with his father's auspices did Sulla wage the civic warfare, 465 turning his back, on hearing the name of Caesar. Varus, when the approaching troops attacked Auximum, rushing through the walls on the opposite side, his rear neglected, flies where are the woods, where are the rocks. Lentulus is driven from the citadel of Asculum. The victor presses upon them retreating, 470 and draws over the troops; and alone out of a force so great the commander escapes, and standards that escort no cohorts. Thou, too, Scipio, dost forsake the deserted citadel of Nuceria, entrusted to thy charge; although a most hardy youthful band is posted in this camp, some time before withdrawn from Caesar's arms 475 by reason of the Parthian panic; with which Magnus reinstated the Gallic losses, and, whilst he himself summoned them to the warfare, gave to his father-in-law the loan of Roman blood. But thee, valiant Domitius, the abodes of Corfinium, surrounded by strong walls, receive; those recruits, which once 480 were placed around the polluted Milo, obey thy trumpet's call. When he beheld afar an immense cloud arising on the plain, and the ranks shining with weapons glittering in the glistening sun, "Run down, my comrades," said he, "to the banks of the river, and sink the bridge under water; and thou, stream, now come forth, 485 in all thy strength, from thy mountain sources, and collect together all the waters, that with thy foaming tide, thou mayst, the structure broken, bear off the alder timbers. At this line let the war come to a stand; upon these banks let the foe at his leisure take his ease. Put a check upon the headlong leader; Caesar first coming 490 to a stop at this spot shall be to us a victory." No more having said, he leads down from the walls his active band, in vain. For when first, from the plains, the river set at liberty, Caesar beheld his passage being cut off, excited by boiling indignation, he said, "Is it not enough to have sought a lurking-place for your cowardice within walls? 495 Do you close up the plains, ye cowards, and attempt to keep me in check with streams? Not, if Ganges with his swelling tide were to separate me, should Caesar now come to a stand at any river, after the waters of Rubicon. Hasten on, ye squadrons of horse; onward, too, ye foot; ascend the bridge about to fall!" 500 When this had been said, the light horsemen gave full rein along the plain, and their stalwart arms hurled the darts to the opposite bank, much like a shower thickly falling. Caesar enters upon the stream left vacant, its guard being put to flight, and is brought safe to the citadel of the enemy. 505 And now he was erecting towers to discharge vast masses, and the mantelet had moved on beneath the midst of the walls; when lo! a crime in warfare, the gates being opened, the troops dragged forth their captive chief, and before the feet of his haughty fellow-citizen he stood. Still, his features contemptuously scowling, 510 with undaunted neck did his high-born courage demand the sword. Caesar was aware both that punishment was wished for and that pardon was dreaded. "Live on," said he, "although thou art unwilling; and by my bounty behold the light of day. To the conquered faction now let there be bright hopes, and the example of myself; even if it pleases thee try arms once more; 515 and nothing for this pardon do I stipulate, if thou shalt be overcome." He thus speaks, and orders the chains to be loosened on his tightened hands. Alas! even his murder perpetrated, how much more becomingly might Fortune have spared a Roman's shame; to whom it is the very greatest of punishments, to be pardoned because he has followed the camp 520 of his country and Magnus for his leader, and the whole of the Senate. He, undismayed, checks his heavy wrath, and to himself he says, "And wilt thou repair, degenerate man, to Rome, and the retreats of peace? Dost thou not prepare to go into the midst of the frenzy of war, destined soon to die? Rush on assured, and burst 525 asunder all delay to losing thy life, and thus be rid of Caesar's gift." In the meantime, not aware of the chieftain being taken, Magnus was preparing arms, that, with strength intermingled, he might recruit his party. And now, on the ensuing day, about to order the trumpet to sound, and thinking that the resentment of the soldiers about to move might be ascertained, 530 with a voice moving veneration he addressed the silent cohorts: "O avengers of crimes, and who have followed the preferable standards, O truly Roman band, to whom the Senate has given arms in no private cause, in your aspirations demand the fight. With ruthless ravages the fields of Hesperia glow; 535 along the icy Alps is poured forth the Gallic rage; already has blood touched the polluted swords of Caesar. Well have the Gods provided, that we were the first to endure the casualties of war. On their side let the criminality commence. Now, even now, myself the umpire, let Rome seek punishment and vengeance. Nor indeed is it right for these 540 to be called real battles, but rather the wrath of an avenging country. No more is this a war than when Catiline prepared the torches to blaze amid the houses, and Lentulus the partner in his fury, and the frantic band of Cethegus, with his naked shoulders. O frenzy of the leader greatly to be pitied! When, Caesar, the Fates 545 could wish to enroll thee among the Camilli and the great Metelli, among the Cinnae and the Marii dost thou come. Assuredly thou shalt be laid prostrate, as by Catulus Lepidus fell, and Carbo, who, submitting to my axe, is buried in a Sicilian sepulchre, Sertorius, too, who, an exile, aroused the fierce Iberians. 550 And yet, if there is any belief in me, I grudge, Caesar, to add thee as well to these, and that Rome has opposed my hands to thee in thy madness. Would that Crassus had returned safe after the battles of the Parthians, and victorious from the regions of Scythia, that thou mightst fall by a like cause to that by which the foeman Spartacus fell. 555 If the Gods of heaven have ordained that thou as well shalt be added to my titles of triumph, mighty is my right arm at hurling the javelin; this glowing blood has again waxed warm around my heart; thou shalt learn, that not all who could submit to peace are cowards in war. Although he styles me enfeebled and worn out, 560 let not my age alarm you. In this camp let the chief be more aged, so long as the soldier is more aged in that. To whatever height a free people could elevate a citizen, thither have I ascended, and nothing have I left above me but the sovereignty. No private station does he desire, whoever in the Roman City attempts 565 to be higher than Pompey. Here on our side either Consul is, here on our side are the ranks of our nobles to take their stand. Shall Caesar be the conqueror of the Senate? Not to that degree, O Fortune! dost thou drag onward all things in thy blind career and feel ashamed at nothing. Does Gaul, rebellious now for many a year, and an age spent in labours, 570 impart courage? Is it, because he fled from the cold waves of the Rhine, and, calling the shallows of a fluctuating sea the ocean, he showed his frightened back to the Britons he had sought out? Or do vain menaces swell, because the rumour of his frenzy has driven the City in arms from its paternal abodes? 575 Alas! madman, they fly not from thee; all are following me! who, when I raised my standards gleaming over the whole ocean, before Cynthia had twice filled her completed orb, the pirate abandoned every ford of the sea, and asked for a home in a narrow allotment of land. 580 I too, more fortunate than Sulla, pursued to the death, the monarch hitherto unsubdued and who stayed the destinies of Rome, flying in exile through the retreats of Scythian Pontus. No portion of the world is unconnected with me, but the whole earth is occupied by my trophies, under whatever sun it lies. 585 Hence do the Arctic regions own me as a victor at the cold waves of Phasis; a meridian clime is known to me in hot Egypt, and in Syene, which on no side diverts its shades. The west obeys my laws, and the Hesperian Baetis, that beyond all rivers dashes into the retreating Tethys. 590 The subdued Arab has known me; me the Heniochi, fierce in war, and the Colchians, famed for the fleece borne away. My standards do the Cappadocians dread, and Judaea, devoted to the rites of an unknown God, and the luxurious Sophene. The Armenians, and the fierce Cilicians, and the Taurians have I subdued. 595 What war but a civil one to my father-in-law have I left?" His partisans followed the words of the chieftain with no applause, nor did they demand the speedy trumpet signal for the promised fight. Magnus too himself perceived their fears, and it pleased him that his standards should be borne back, and not to expose to the risks of a combat so decisive 600 troops already vanquished by the fame of Caesar not yet seen by them. Just as among the herds a bull, worsted in the first combat, seeks the recesses of the woods, and, exiled amid the vacant fields, tries his horns upon the opposing trunks; and returns not to the pastures, but when, his neck reinvigorated, 605 his muscles exercised give him confidence; then, soon victorious, the bulls accompanying, he leads the recovered herds, the shepherd unwilling, to any pastures he lists; so, unequal in strength, Magnus surrendered Hesperia, and taking to flight over the Apulian fields ascended the secure towers of Brundisium. 610 This is a city once possessed by Dictaean colonists, whom, flying from Crete, the Cecropian ships bore along the seas, with sails that falsely told that Theseus was conquered. In this region, the coast of Hesperia, which now contracts itself into a narrow arch, extends into the sea a small tongue, 615 which, with its curving horns, shuts in the waves of the Adriatic. Nor yet would this water inclosed in the narrowed inlet form a harbour, if an island did not receive upon its rocks the violent north-west gales, and turn back the dashing waves. On the one side and on the other nature has opposed mountains 620 with craggy cliffs to the open main, and has warded off the blasts, so that, held fast by the shaking cables, ships can stand there. Hence far and wide extends all the ocean, whether the sails are borne, Corcyra, to thy harbours, or whether on the left Illyrian Epidamnus is sought, bordering upon the Ionian waves. 625 Hither is the flight of mariners, when the Adriatic has put forth all its strength, and the Ceraunia have disappeared in clouds, and when the Calabrian Sason is washed by the foaming main. Therefore, when there is no hope in the affairs that have been left behind, and there is no means of turning the warfare to the hardy Iberians, 630 since the Alps, with their immense tracts, lie extended between, then that son, one of a progeny so great, whose age is more advanced, he thus addresses:-- "I bid you try the distant regions of the world. Arouse the Euphrates and the Nile, even as far as the fame of my name has reached, cities through which the fame of Rome has been spread abroad 635 after myself as her general. Bring back to the seas the Cilician colonists scattered amid the fields. On the one side arouse, the Pharian kings and my friend Tigranes. And neglect not, I advise thee, the arms of Pharnaces, nor yet do thou the tribes that wander in either Armenia, and the fierce nations along the shores of Pontus, 640 and the Rhipaean bands, and those whom on its frozen waves the sluggish swamp of Maeotis, enduring the Scythian wagon, bears. But why do I any further delay? Throughout the entire East, my son, thou wilt carry the warfare, and awaken all the cities that have been subdued throughout the entire world; let all my triumphs repair once again to my camp. 645 You too, who mark the Latian annals with your names, let the first northern breeze bear you to Epirus; thence, throughout the fields of the Greeks and the Macedonians acquire new strength, while winter affords time for peace." Thus he speaks, and all obey his commands, and unmoor their hollow ships from the shore. 650 But, never enduring peace and a long cessation from arms, lest it may be in the power of the Fates to work any change, Caesar follows, and presses hard on the footsteps of his son-in-law. To others would have sufficed so many fortified towns captured at the first assault, so many towers overwhelmed, the enemy expelled; 655 thou thyself, Rome, the Capital of the world, the greatest reward of the warfare, so easy to be taken. But Caesar, precipitate in everything, thinking nothing done while anything remains to be done, fiercely pursues; and still, although he is in possession of the whole of Italy, because Magnus is located on its extreme shores, 660 does he grieve that as yet it is common to them; nor on the other hand is he willing that the foe should wander on the open main, but with moles he dams out the waves, and the expansive ocean with rocks hurled down. To no purpose is this labor bestowed on the immense undertaking; the voracious sea sucks in all the rocks, and mingles the mountains with its sands; 665 just as, if the lofty Eryx were thrown down into the midst of the waves of the Aegean Sea, still no rocky heights would tower above the main; or if Gaurus, his pinnacles rooted up, were to fall down to the very depths of stagnant Avernus. Therefore, when in the shoals no mass retained its weight, 670 then it pleased him, the woods cut down, to connect rafts, and to fasten together with wide extent the trunks of trees by immense chains. Fame relates that exulting Xerxes constructed such a passage over the seas, when, daring great things, with his bridges he joined both Europe to Asia, and Sestos to Abydos, 675 and walked over the straits of the rapid Hellespont, not fearing Eurus and Zephyrus; at the time when he would have borne his sails and ships through the midst of Athos. In such manner are the inlets of the deep narrowed by the fall of the woods; then with many a mound the work rises apace, and the tall towers vibrate over the seas. 680 Pompey, seeing the inlets of the deep choked up with land newly-formed, vexed his mind with carking cares how to open the sea, and to spread the warfare over the main. Full oft, filled by the southern gales, and dragged by extended cables through the obstructions of the sea themselves, ships dashed down 685 into the salt tide the summits of the mass, and made room for the barks to enter; the ballista, too, hurled by stalwart arms amid the shades of night, hurled torches cleft into many parts. When at length the occasion suited for a stolen flight, he first ordered his followers that no sailors' clamor should arouse, or clarion divide the hours, 690 or trumpet lead the sailors, instructed beforehand, out to sea. Now had the Virgin, towards her close, begun to precede the claws of the Scorpion that were to bring on Phoebus, when in silence the ships were unmoored. No anchor arouses their voices while from the dense sands its hook is being dragged. 695 While the sailyards are being set to the wind, and while the lofty pine-tree mast is being raised, the anxious masters of the fleet are silent; and the sailors, hanging by the ropes, unfurl the tightened sails, nor shake the stout shrouds, lest the air should breathe a whisper. The chieftain, too, in his aspirations, Fortune, entreats thee, that Italy, 700 which thou dost forbid him to retain, it may be at least allowed him to quit. Hardly do the Fates permit it; for with a loud noise, impelled by beaks of ships, the sea re-echoes, the waters dash, and the billows with the tracks of so many ships there intermingled. Therefore, the enemy being received by the gates, all of which throughout 705 the city attachment changing with fortune has opened, and within the walls, winding along the piers, with precipitate course seek the entrance to the harbor, and are vexed that the fleet has reached the sea. O shame! a slight victory is the flight of Pompey! A narrow pass let the ships out to sea, more limited 710 than the Eubaean tide where it beats upon Chalcis. Here stuck fast two ships, and received the grappling-irons prepared for the fleet; and the warfare being thus dragged to the shore, here, for the first time, did Nereus grow red with the blood of citizens. The rest of the fleet departs, despoiled of the two last ships; 715 just as when the bark from Pagasae sought the waves of Phasis, the earth shot forth the Cyanean rocks into the deep; less by its stern torn off did the Argo escape from the mountains, and in vain did the Symplegas strike at the vacant sea, and, destined to stand, it bounded back. Now, the complexion of the eastern sky 720 no longer the same warns that Phoebus is pressing on, and the pale light is not yet ruddy, and is withdrawing their flames from the nearer stars; and now the Pleiades are dim, now the Wain of the declining Boötes, growing faint, returns to the appearance of the serene heavens, and the larger stars lie hid, and Lucifer himself flies 725 from the warm day. Now, Magnus, thou hadst gained the open sea, not bearing with thee those destinies which thou wast wont, when over the waves throughout all seas thou didst give chase to the pirate. Exhausted by thy triumphs, Fortune has forsaken thee. Banished with wife and children, and dragging all thy household Gods to the warfare, 730 still, a mighty exile thou dost go, nations accompanying thee. A distant spot is sought for thy unworthy downfall. Not because the Gods of heaven prefer to deprive thee of a sepulcher in thy native land are the Pharian sands condemned to be thy tomb. It is Hesperia that is spared; in order that, afar off, in a remote region, 735 Fortune may hide the horrid deed, and the Roman land be preserved unspotted by the blood of her own Magnus.