Book III

When the wind bore down on the yielding sails and drove the fleet forward till the ships ploughed the open sea, all the sailors looked ahead over the Ionian waves. Magnus alone never took his eyes off the land of Italy until the harbours of his country, with the shore he was never to see again and the cloud-veiled hill-tops and mountains, grew dim before his eyes and disappeared. His wearied frame then yielded to drowsy sleep, and straight he saw a dream: Julia, a spectre full of dread and menace, raised her sorrowful head above the yawning earth and stood in the guise of a Fury amid the flames of her funeral pyre. And thus she spoke: "Now that civil war has begun, driven forth from the Elysian Fields and abode of the blest, I am dragged to Stygian darkness and the place of guilty spirits. There I saw with these eyes the Furies, and in their hands were torches, to brandish for kindling the strife between you; the ferryman of scorched Acheron is getting ready countless boats; Tartarus is making wide its borders for the punishment of many sinners; all three Parcae, though their hands are busy, are scarce equal to their task, and the Sisters are weary of breaking the threads. While I was your wife, Magnus, you celebrated joyful triumphs. But your fortune changed with your bride: my rival, Cornelia, condemned by Fate ever to drag down her husbands from power to destruction, supplanted me ere my pyre was cold. She is welcome to cling to your standards on land and sea, if only I have power to trouble and disturb your slumbers, and if no time is left free for love between you, while Caesar takes up your days and Julia your nights. Not even the forgetful shore of Lethe has banished my husband from my memory, and I am permitted by the Rulers of the dead to haunt you. When you fight battles, I shall appear in the centre of the fray: never shall my shade, my ghost, suffer you to forget that you were husband to Caesar's daughter. In vain you sever with the sword the tie of kinship that binds you. The civil war shall make you mine." Thus speaking, the ghost fled away, dissolving in the arms of her eager husband.

Though threatened with disaster by the gods and by the dead, Pompey rushed more eagerly to arms with a mind made up for calamity." Why," said he, "am I terrified by the sight of a meaningless spectre? Either no feeling remains to the soul after death, or death itself matters not at all." The sun was now sinking towards the sea, and had dipped as much of his flaming disk as the moon is wont to lose just before she is at the full or just after; and now a friendly land offered the ships an easy approach; the men hauled in the stays, laid the masts along, and rowed ashore.

When the wind snatched the vessels away from Caesar's grasp and the sea concealed the fleet, he stood on the Italian shore, a leader without a rival; yet he felt no joy in the glory of driving Magnus out, but only vexation that the enemy had fled safely over the deep. No success could any longer satisfy his impetuous haste; even victory in the war was not worth the price of delay. At once he banished thoughts of battle from his mind, and passed his time over problems of peace and the means of winning the fickle favour of the populace; for he knew that the causes of hatred and mainsprings of popularity are determined by the price of food. Hunger alone makes cities free; and when men in power feed the idle mob, they buy subservience; a starving people is incapable of fear. He bade Curio cross over to the cities of Sicily, by the way where the sea either covered the land with sudden inundation or severed it and turned to shore what had once been inland; mighty there is the working of the sea, and its waters ever strive to prevent the severed mountains from renewing their contact. Other troops were detached for the borders of Sardinia. Both islands are famous for their harvest-fields: no foreign lands supplied Italy and the granaries of Rome earlier than these or more abundantly. In fertility of soil Africa hardly excels them, even when the South winds lag and the North wind drives the clouds to the torrid zone, and the rains pour down to produce a mighty harvest.

When he had taken these precautions, the victorious general led his troops, unarmed and wearing the aspect of peace, to the city of his birth. Ah! if he had conquered only the North and the tribes of Gaul before returning to Rome, what a line of exploits, what scenes of war, he might have sent before him in long procession through the city! — the fetters he had laid upon the Rhine and the Ocean, his lofty chariot followed by noble Gauls together with fair-haired Britons! How grand a triumph he lost by adding to his conquests! No joyful throngs from the cities met him on his march; but men looked on with silent fear; no crowd anywhere gathered to meet him. But he was glad to be so dreaded by his countrymen and would not have preferred their love.

Now he had passed the heights of Anxur on its crag, and the spot where a miry way cleaves the Pomptine marshes; he had passed the hilly grove and temple where Scythian Diana reigns, and the place where the Roman consuls ascend Alba's height.' At last from a high cliff he caught a distant view of Rome. Never had he seen it through all the time of his wars in the North, and now he gazed in wonder and thus addressed the walls of Rome, his mother city: "Were you, the abode of gods, abandoned by men whom no stress of war compelled? What city then will find arms to strike a blow for her.'' Heaven be thanked that the furious East — swift Sarmatians allied with Pannonians, and Getae combined with Dacians — did not choose this time to fall on the borders of Italy! It was a mercy of Fortune that Rome, with so faint-hearted a leader, had to fight against Romans only." — With these words he entered a city paralysed with fear. For men believed that, as if he had taken Rome, he would destroy the walls with smoky fires and hurl her gods hither and thither. The measure of their fears was this: they deemed that his will was equal to his power. Their minds are not free to feign words of good omen or to make pretence of rejoicing with mirthful shouts; and scarcely free to utter curses. Authority to summon the Senate was wanting; but a mob of senators, brought out from their hiding-places, filled the temple of Apollo on the Palatine; the splendour of the consuls was absent from their sacred seats; the praetors, by law next in office were not in attendance, and the empty chairs of office were removed from their places. Caesar was all in all, and the Senate met to register the utterance of a private man. Should he demand kingly power and divine honours for himself, or execution and exile for the Senate, the assembled Fathers were ready to give their sanction. Fortunately, there were more things that he was ashamed to decree than Romans were ashamed to allow. Nevertheless, Freedom did break out in wrath and tried, in the person of one man, whether right could resist might. Stubborn Metellus, when he saw main force used to burst open the temple of Saturn, hurried thither, broke through the ranks of Caesar's soldiers, and took his stand at the gates before the locks were broken. (So true it is that love of money alone is incapable of dreading death by the sword. When the constitution was lost and destroyed, it made no difference; but money, the meanest thing of all, stirred up strife.) Loudly the tribune protested, striving to restrain the conqueror from robbery: Never, except over my body, shall the temple be opened to your assault; no wealth, unless sprinkled with sacred blood, shall you win by robbery. It is certain that violence done to this office finds gods to avenge it; for the curses of the tribune, which imprecated defeat upon Crassus, followed Crassus to the battlefield. Draw your sword at once; you need not fear a crowd to witness the crime — the city in which we stand has been abandoned by its people. Your soldiers shall not be paid for their wickedness out of our wealth; there are other nations for you to overthrow, other cities for you to hand over to them. No poverty forces you to the spoliation of the peace you have cast aside: you have war to enrich you." His words fired the conqueror with high indignation." In vain, Metellus," he cried, "you hope for a glorious death: never shall my hand be stained by your blood. No office shall make you worthy of my wrath. Are you the champion in whose charge freedom has been left for safety? The course of time has not wrought such confusion that the laws would not rather be trampled on by Caesar than saved by Metellus."

Thus Caesar spoke; and when the tribune still refused to leave the doors, his anger grew fiercer, and he looked round for his ruthless swords, forgetting to act the part of peace. But Metellus was forced by Cotta to renounce his too bold design." When a people is held down by tyranny," said Cotta, "freedom is destroyed by freedom of speech; but you keep the semblance of freedom if you acquiesce in each behest of the tyrant. Because we were conquered, we submitted to repeated acts of oppression; for our disgrace and ignoble fear there is but one excuse — that refusal was in no case possible. Let Caesar with all speed carry off the baneful germs of cursed warfare. Loss of money touches nations that are protected by their own laws; but the poverty of slaves is felt by their master, not by themselves." Metellus was drawn aside and the temple at once thrown open. Then the Tarpeian rock re-echoed, and loud grating bore witness to the opening of the doors; then was brought forth the wealth of the Roman people, stored in the temple vaults and untouched for many a year — treasure from the Punic wars and Parses, and the spoil of conquered Philip; the gold that the Gaul in his hasty flight forfeited to Rome, and the gold that could not bribe Fabricius to sell Rome to the king; all that the thrift of our ancestors saved up; all the tribute paid by the wealthy nations of Asia, and all that was handed over to conquering Metellus by Minoan Crete; and the store that Cato brought across the sea from distant Cyprus. Lastly, the riches of the East were brought to light, the far-fetched treasure of captive kings that was borne along in Pompey's triumph. Dismal was the deed of plunder that robbed the temple; and then for the first time Rome was poorer than a Caesar. Meanwhile over all the earth the reputation of Magnus had brought forth to battle nations doomed to share his fall. Greece, the nearest country, sent soldiers for her neighbour's war. From Phocis, Amphissa sent her men, and rocky Cirrha; and both peaks of Parnassus were abandoned. The leaders of Boeotia 'assembled, men whom swift Cephisus surrounds with its oracular stream and Cadmean Dirce; there were men from Pisa and the Alpheus which transmits its waters under the sea to the people of Sicily. Maenalus also was left behind by the Arcadians, and Oeta of Hercules by the soldiers of Trachis. Thesprotians and Dryopes rush to war, and the ancient Selloi left their silent oaks on the hill of Chaonia. Though Athens was drained of all her men by the levy, few were her vessels that reached the harbour of Apollo, and but three keels claim credence for the tale of Salamis. Next to join the fray was Crete, the ancient island of a hundred peoples, a land dear to Zeus, with Gnosos skilled to ply the bow, and Gortyna rivalling the Parthian archers. These were followed by the men who dwell in Trojan Oricos, the Athamanes who rove scattered in mountain forests, and the Encheliae, whose ancient name testifies to the death and transformation of Cadmus. Colchian Absyrtos that foams in the Adriatic sea came also, and the men who till the fields about Peneus, and those by whose toil Thessalian ploughs turn up the soil of Haemonian Iolcos. (From Iolcos the sea was first challenged, when the untried Argo scorned the shore and brought together nations that before were strangers; she first matched mankind against the raging winds and waves of ocean, and by her means a new form of death was added to the old.) Next, Mount Haemus in Thrace was abandoned, and Pholoe with its false legend of a twy-formed people. Strymon was left deserted — Strymon that each year entrusts to the warm Nile the birds of Bistonia; and rude Cone, where one mouth of the branching Danube loses its Sarmatian waters and washes Peuce sprinkled by the sea. Mysia was deserted, and the land of Idalus, saturated with the cold waters of Caicus, and Arisbe, whose soil is all too shallow. The people of Pitane assembled, and of Celaenae that mourns the invention of Pallas Celaenae condemned when Apollo won the match; in that land the Marsya, running swiftly down in straight channel, joins the winding Maeander and turns back after their union; and there earth has suffered Pactolus to issue forth from mines rich in gold, and Hermus, rich as Pactolus, cleaves the corn-lands. The soldiers of Ilium also, ever ill-fated, joined the standards of the doomed army, undeterred by the tale of Troy or the pretended descent of Caesar from Trojan Iulus. The nations of Syria came also, leaving behind the Orontes, and Ninos of whose prosperity legend tells; they left wind-swept Damascus, Gaza, Idume rich in palm-plantations, tottering Tyre, and Sidon precious for its purple. Their ships were steered to war by the pole-star and kept an unerring course over the sea: to no ships is the pole-star a more trusty guide than to them. (These Phoenicians first made bold, if report speak true, to record speech in rude characters for future ages, before Egypt had learned to fasten together the reeds of her river, and when only the figures of birds, beasts, and other animals, carved in stone, preserved the utterances of her wise men.) Men left the woods of Taurus, and Tarsos where Perseus alighted, and the Corycian cave that yawns with hollowed rocks. Mallos and distant Aegae are filled with the noise of their dockyards; and the Cilicians, no longer pirates, put forth in regular ships of war. The news of war roused also the distant parts of the East, where Ganges and its peoples are — Ganges, the one river on earth that dares to unlock its mouths opposite the rising sun and drives its flood forward in the teeth of the East wind; here it was that the Macedonian captain halted, with the outer Ocean in front of him, and confessed that he was beaten by the vastness of the world. Roused was the land where the Indus, bearing along its swift stream with two-fold flood, is unchanged by the addition of the Hydaspes to its waste of waters. Up rose the men who drink sweet juices from soft reeds; and those who colour their hair with saffron dye and loop up their robes of cotton with bright-hued gems; and those who build pyres for themselves and climb, while yet alive, upon the burning heap. How glorious for a people to lay violent hands on death, and, when satiated with life, to refuse the remnant of it from the gods! The savage Cappadocians came; and the men who find the soil of Mount Amanus too hard to till; and the Armenians, who dwell where the Niphates rolls along boulders in its course. The Choatrae abandoned their forests that reach the sky; the Arabs entered a world unknown to them, and marvelled that the shadows of the trees did not fall to the left. The remote Orestae too were disturbed by the madness of Rome, and the chiefs of Carmania — where the sky, beginning to incline southwards, sees part at least of the Bear sink below the horizon, and where Bootes, swift to set, is visible only for a short portion of the night — and the land of Aethiopia, which would not be covered by any part of the Zodiac, did not the leg of hunched-up Taurus give way and the tip of his hoof project; and the land where the mighty Euphrates and rushing Tigris uplift their heads. They rise in Persia from springs not far apart; and, if earth suffered them to meet, who can say which of the names the waters would bear? But the Euphrates, diffused over the land, fertilises it as the Nile fertilises Egypt; whereas the Tigris is suddenly swallowed up by a chasm in the earth, which hides its course from the eye, but then gives birth to it again from a new source and suffers the river to reach the sea. The warlike Parthians remained neutral between the army of Caesar and the host opposed to him: it was enough for them that they had reduced the rivals to two. The nomad peoples of Scythia, bounded by the cold stream of Bactros and the endless forests of Hyrcania, dipped their arrows in poison. From one quarter came the Heniochi of Spartan blood, a dangerous people when they shake their bridles, and the Sarmatians, akin to the savage Moschi. Men came from the regions where the Phasis cleaves the rich land of the Colchians, where flows the Halys that brought doom to Croesus, and where the Tanais, falling down from the Riphaean heights, gives the names of two worlds to its two banks, bounding Asia and Europe as well — it keeps the central part of earth from union, and, according to its windings, enlarges now one continent and now the other — and where the Euxine drains the rushing waters of the Maeotian Mere through the strait; and thus men deny that Gades alone lets in the Ocean and the Pillars of Hercules are robbed of their boast. From another quarter came the Essedonian tribes, the Arimaspians who loop up their hair bound with gold, the brave Arians, the Massagetae who break the long fast of battle with Sarmatians by bleeding the horse that bore them from the fight, and the fleet Geloni. Neither Cyrus, when he led his host from the land of morning and the Persians came down with an army that was numbered by the casting of darts, nor he that avenged his brother's wrong — neither of these smote the sea with such mighty fleets; never did so many kings obey a single leader, never did nations meet so different in dress, never was there such a confusion of tongues. Fortune roused all those peoples, to send them as escort for measureless disaster, and provided them as a funeral train befitting the burial of Magnus. Nor was horned Ammon slow to send to battle African squadrons from the whole extent of parched Libya — from the Moors in the West to Egyptian Syrtes on the eastern coast. That Caesar, favoured by Fortune, might win all at a single cast, Pharsalia presented him the whole world to conquer at once.

When Caesar left the walls of terrified Rome, he rushed with swift march over the cloud-capped Alps. Though other peoples cowered at the terror of his name, the Phocaean warriors, with steadfastness rare in Greeks, dared to be faithful in the hour of danger to their solemn compacts, and to follow the right rather than fortune. But first they tried by peaceable argument to turn aside the reckless rage and stern heart of Caesar; and when the enemy drew near, they appealed to him thus, holding out before them the leaves of Athenian Minerva:

Every age included in Italian history bears witness that Massilia has shared the fortunes of the Roman people in their foreign wars. And now too, if you seek triumphs in some unknown region, here at your service are our swords to fight against the foreigner. But if Romans are divided, and if you purpose ill-omened battles and accursed strife, then we offer tears for civil war, and we stand aside. No other hand should meddle with the wounds of gods. If frenzy had armed the immortals, or if the earthborn Giants assailed the sky, the piety of man, nevertheless, would shrink from aiding Jupiter either with arms or with prayers; and the human race, ignorant of what was happening in heaven, would know only from his thunderbolts that the Thunderer still reigned in the sky without a rival. Moreover, countless nations are speeding to the fray from every quarter; nor is mankind so slow to fight, so averse to the contagion of crime, that civil war need compel recruits. We wish indeed that all men had this purpose — to refuse a share in Roman destiny, and that no foreign soldier should fight in your quarrel. What Roman arm will not be enfeebled by the sight of his father? who will not be hindered from hurling his weapon when he sees his brothers in the ranks of the foe? The civil war will soon end, if you refrain from enlisting those whom alone it is lawful to enlist. For ourselves, this is the sum total of our petition: leave your dreaded eagles, your formidable standards, at a distance from our city, and be willing to trust yourself within our walls; permit us to let Caesar in and keep war out. Let there be one spot exempt from crime, safe for Magnus and safe for you. So, if Fortune is merciful to unconquered Rome and peace is resolved upon, you two will have a place where you can meet unarmed. Again, when you are summoned to Spain by so great a crisis of the war, why do you turn hither your hasty march? We have no weight in affairs, no power to turn the scale. Our people has never been victorious in war. Driven from the ancient seat of our nation, when Phocis was burnt down and her towers were removed, we dwell on a foreign shore and owe our safety to narrow walls; and our only glory is our fidelity. If you intend to blockade our walls and break down our gates by storm, then we are ready: we shall receive firebrands and missiles upon our houses; if you divert our springs, we shall dig for a hasty draught of water and lick with parched tongues the earth we have dug; and, if bread run short, then we shall pollute our lips by gnawing things hideous to see and foul to touch. In defence of freedom we do not shrink from sufferings that were bravely borne by Saguntuni when beset by the army of Carthage. Our infants, torn from their mothers' arms and tugging in vain at breasts dry with famine, shall be hurled into the midst of the flames; wives shall seek death at the hands of loved husbands; brother shall exchange wounds with brother, and shall choose, if driven to it, that form of civil war." Thus the Greeks ended speaking, and Caesar's wrath, betrayed already by his clouded countenance, at last proved his resentment by spoken word: "'These Greeks trust to my haste, but their trust is vain; though I am hastening to the western region of the world, I have time to destroy Massilia. Rejoice, my soldiers! By favour of destiny war is offered you in the course of your march. As a gale, unless it meets with thick-timbered forests, loses strength and is scattered through empty space, and as a great fire sinks when there is nothing in its way — so the absence of a foe is destructive to me, and I think my arms wasted if those who might have been conquered fail to fight against me. They say that their city is open to me if I disband my army and enter alone and degraded. Their real purpose is not merely to keep me out, but to shut me in. They say that they seek to drive away the horrid taint of war. They shall suffer for seeking peace; they shall learn that in my days none are safe but those who fight under my banner." With these words he turned his march against the citizens who feared him not; and then he saw the walls closed and fenced with a crowded ring of warriors.

Not far from the walls a hill rose above the level land and expanded into a small plain at its flattened top. This height seemed to Caesar capable of being surrounded by a line of fortifications, and a safe site to pitch his camp. The nearest part of the town rises in a lofty citadel as high as the hill outside, and the land between sinks in hollows. Then Caesar decided on a plan that would cost endless toil — to join the opposing heights by an immense rampart of earth. But first, in order to blockade the town entirely on its landward side, he carried a long line of works from his lofty camp to the sea, cutting off by a trench the water-springs and pasture-land; and with turf and freshly dug soil he built up his lines, crowned by frequent battlements.

For the Greek city this alone was fame enough and immortal glory — that she was not overborne or laid low by mere terror, but arrested the headlong rush of war blazing over the world; that, when Caesar made short work with all else, she alone took time to conquer. It was a great thing to hinder destiny, and to cause Fortune, in her haste to set Caesar above all the world, to lose those days. Now all the woods were felled and the forests stripped of their timber far and wide; for, since light earth and brushwood made the mid-structure loose, the timber was intended to compress and bind the soil by the carpentry of the sides, and to keep the mound from sinking under the weight of the towers. a space of darkness and cold shade, and banished the sunlight far above. No rural Pan dwelt there, no Silvanus, ruler of the woods, no Nymphs; but gods were worshipped there with savage rites, the altars were heaped with hideous offerings, and every tree was sprinkled with human gore. On those boughs — if antiquity, reverential of the gods, deserves any credit — birds feared to perch; in those coverts wild beasts would not lie down; no wind ever bore down upon that wood, nor thunderbolt hurled from black clouds; the trees, even when they spread their leaves to no breeze, rustled of themselves. Water, also, fell there in abundance from dark springs. The images of the gods, grim and rude, were uncouth blocks formed of felled tree-trunks. Their mere antiquity and the ghastly hue of their rotten timber struck terror; men feel less awe of deities worshipped under familiar forms; so much does it increase their sense of fear, not to know the gods whom they dread. Legend also told that often the subterranean hollows quaked and bellowed, that yew-trees fell down and rose again, that the glare of conflagration came from trees that were not on fire, and that serpents twined and glided round the stems. The people never resorted thither to worship at close quarters, but left the place to the gods. For, when the sun is in mid-heaven or dark night fills the sky, the priest himself dreads their approach and fears to surprise the lord of the grove.

This grove was sentenced by Caesar to fall before the stroke of the axe; for it grew near his works. Spared in earlier warfare, it stood there covered with trees among hills already cleared. But strong arms faltered; and the men, awed by the solemnity and terror of the place, believed that, if they aimed a blow at the sacred trunks, their axes would rebound against their own limbs. When Caesar saw that his soldiers were sore hindered and paralysed, he was the first to snatch an axe and swing it, and dared to cleave a towering oak with the steel: driving the blade into the desecrated wood, he cried: "Believe that I am guilty of sacrilege, and thenceforth none of you need fear to cut down the trees." Then all the men obeyed his bidding; they were not easy in their minds, nor had their fears been removed; but they had weighed Caesar's wrath against the wrath of heaven. Ash trees were felled, gnarled holmoaks overthrown; Dodona's oak, the alder that suits the sea, the cypress that bears witness to a monarch's grief, all lost their leaves for the first time; robbed of their foliage, they let in the daylight; and the toppling wood, when smitten, supported itself by the close growth of its timber. The peoples of Gaul groaned at the sight; but the besieged men rejoiced; for who could have supposed that the injury to the gods would go unpunished? But Fortune often guards the guilty, and the gods must reserve their wrath for the unlucky. When wood enough was felled, waggons were sought through the countryside to convey it; and the husbandmen, robbed of their oxen, mourned for the harvest of the soil left untouched by the crooked plough.

But Caesar could not brook this protracted warfare before the walls: he turned to the army in Spain and the limits of the world, leaving orders that the operations should go on. The mound was built up with planks arranged lattice-wise, and two towers, as high as the town walls, were placed upon it; the timber of the towers was not driven into the ground, but they crawled from far, moved by hidden means. When the tall structure nodded, the besieged believed that wind, seeking to burst forth, had shaken the hollow caverns of the earth, and marvelled that their walls remained standing. From the towers missiles were thrown against the lofty citadel of the town. But the shot of the Greeks fell with greater force on the bodies of the Romans; for their javelins, not sped merely by men's arms, but hurled by the tension of the powerful catapult, pierced more than one body before they were willing to stop: through armour and through bones they cleft a broad way and passed on, leaving death behind them; after dealing its wound the weapon flew on. And every boulder launched by the mighty impulse of a released cord, like a crag which length of time, aided by the blast of the winds, tears from a mountain-top, broke all things in its course, not merely crushing out the lives of its victims, but annihilating limbs and blood together. But when brave men approached the enemy's wall in close formation — the foremost carrying shields which overlapped the shields of those behind, and their helmets protected by the roof of bucklers — then the missiles which had dealt death at long range, flew over their heads; nor was it easy for the Greeks to shift the range or change the aim of engines made to hurl their bolts to a distance; and so they heaved over boulders with unaided arms, relying on the weight alone. The locking of the shields, while it continued, flung off every missile, just as a roof rattles under the harmless blows of hail; but when the weariness and wavering valour of the soldiers made gaps in the armament, the shields gave way, one by one, to the unceasing battery. Next, mantlets, lightly covered with turf, were brought up; and the besiegers, screened by the boards and covered fronts of the mantlets, strove to sap the foundations and upset the walls with tools of iron; and now the ram, more effective with its swinging blow, tries by its impact to break the solid fabric of the wall and remove one stone from those laid above it; but smitten from above by fire and huge jagged stones, by a rain of stakes and by blows from oaken poles hardened by fire, the hurdles gave ground, and the besiegers, foiled after so great an effort, went back weary to their tents.

The safety of their walls had been the utmost that the Greeks hoped for; but now they prepared to take the offensive. By night they hid flaming torches behind their shields, and their warriors boldly sallied forth. The weapon they bore was neither spear nor death-dealing bow, but fire alone; and the wind, whirling the conflagration along, bore it swiftly over the Roman works. Though contending with green wood, the fire was not slow to put forth its strength: flying from every torch, it followed close on huge volumes of black smoke, and consumed not merely timber but mighty stones; and hard rocks were dissolved into crumbling dust. Down fell the mound, and looked even larger on the ground.

The defeated Romans despaired of success on land and resolved to try their fortune on the sea. Their ships were not adorned with painted timbers or graced with a glittering figure-head: unshaped trees, even as they were felled on the hills, were joined together to form a steady platform for fighting at sea. By now too the fleet, escorting the turretship of Brutus, had come down with the waters of the Rhone to the sea, and was anchored off the land of the Stoechades. The Greeks were no less ready to trust all their forces to the mercy of fortune: they put aged sires together with striplings in the ranks. They manned their fleet which rode at anchor, and even searched their dockyards for ships past service. The sun scattered his morning beams over the sea and splintered them on the water; the sky was free from clouds; the North wind was at rest and the South winds held their peace; the sea lay smooth, reserved for battle. Then each man started his vessel from its anchorage, and the two fleets leaped forward with rival strength of arm — Caesar's ships on one side and the fleet rowed by Greeks on the other; the hulls tremble to the beat of the oars, and the rapid stroke tears the tall vessels through the water. The wings of the Roman fleet were closed in by ships of many kinds — stout triremes, and vessels driven by four tiers of rowers rising one above another, and others that dipped in the sea a still greater number of blades. These heavy ships were set as a barrier against the open sea; the galleys, content to rise aloft with but two banks of oars, were further back in crescent formation. Towering above them all, the flag-ship of Brutus, driven by six rows of oars and advancing its bulk over the deep, reaches for the water far below with its topmost tier.

When only so much of sea separated the fleets as each of them could cover with one lusty stroke of oars, then countless cries rose together in the wide heaven, till the splash of the blades was drowned by shouting and no trumpet could be heard. Then the men sweep the sea, bending back to the thwarts behind and bringing the oars against their chests. As soon as beak met beak and clashed, the ships backed astern, and a volley of missiles covered the sky and, as they fell, the sea between the ships. And now the Romans deploy their wings, leaving space between the prows, and their open order gives entrance to the enemy's ships. As, when the tide runs against winds from West or East, the waves are driven in one direction and the body of the sea in another; so, when the vessels ploughed furrows in the sea this way and that, the water which the oars of one ship threw behind it was thrown by another in the opposite direction. But the Greek ships were easily handled for attack or retreat, quick to change course with a sharp turn and to answer the guiding helm, while the Roman ships were safer in this — that they offered a steady platform to the fighter and a foothold like dry ground. Then Brutus hailed his steersman who sat on the poop beside the ensign: "Why suffer the battle to straggle over the sea? why seek to rival the foe's manoeuvres? Mass the ships for fighting at once, and offer our broadsides to the beaks of the Phocaeans." The man obeyed and exposed the ship's broadside to the enemy. Thereafter, each ship that tested the timber of Brutus was defeated by its own blow and clung, a captive, to the vessel it had rammed, while others were noosed by grappling-irons and smooth chains, or were entangled by their own oars. The sea was no longer visible, and the battle became stationary.

No longer were weapons hurled from vigorous arms, no longer were the wounds of the hurtling steel inflicted at a distance; but men fought hand to hand. The sword played the chief part in that fight at sea. Each man leaned forward from the bulwark of his own ship to strike his foe, and none fell dead upon their own decks. Their blood foamed deep upon the wave, and a crust of gore covered the sea. The ships that were caught and dragged by the iron chains were prevented from coming close by the crowded corpses. Some sailors sank half alive into the bottomless deep and drank the brine mixed with their own blood. Others, while still drawing breath that struggled against tardy death, perished by the sudden downfall of their wrecked craft. Weapons that missed their aim killed men in the water on their own account; and every missile that fell with its heavy blow baffled was met and found a mark in mid-ocean.

A Roman ship, hemmed in by Phocaean craft, was defending her port and starboard with divided crew but equal hardihood. Catus, while fighting on the raised poop and boldly grasping the stern-ornament of a foe, was pierced in back and breast at the same moment by weapons launched together; the weapons met in his body, and the blood stayed, uncertain through which wound to flow; at last the torrent from his veins drove out both javelins at once, parting his life in two and distributing his death between the wounds. Hither also ill-fated Telo steered his bark; to no hand were ships on stormy seas more obedient than to his; and none, from observation of the sun or the moon's horns, could better forecast the morrow, so as ever to set his sails to the coming winds. He would have rammed the side of the Roman vessel, had not flying javelins pierced to the centre of his breast; and the hand of the dying helmsman steered his ship aside. While Gyareus sought to clamber over into his friend's craft, a grapnel was launched and caught him through the middle as he dangled in air; and there he hung, held fast by the engine to the gunwale.

Twin brothers fought there, the pride of a fertile mother; but the same womb gave them birth for different deaths. The cruel hand of death made distinction between them; and the wretched parents, no longer puzzled by the likeness, recognised the one survivor but found in him a source of unending sorrow; for he keeps their grief ever present and recalls his lost brother to their mourning hearts. One of these twins dared to catch hold of a Roman ship from his own deck, when the oars were entangled and overlapped each other. The hand was lopped off by a heavy downward blow; but still it clung with the effort of its first grip and, holding on with strained muscles, stiffened there in death. His valour rose with disaster; mutilated, he displays yet more heroic ardour. Fiercely he renews the fight with his left hand and leans forward over the water to rescue his right hand; the left hand also and the whole arm were cut off. Then bereft both of shield and sword, nut hiding away in the bottom of the ship but full in view, he protects his brother's shield with his own bare breast, standing firm, though pierced with many a point, and, although he had amply earned his death already, stopping missiles that would in their fall have made an end of many. Then the life that was departing through many wounds he gathered together into his spent frame, and bracing his limbs with all his remaining strength, he sprang on board the Roman ship; his sinews had lost their power, and his only weapon was his weight. She was piled high with the carnage of her crew and ran with blood; she suffered blow after blow on her broadside; and, when her sides were shattered and let in the sea, she filled up to the top of her decks and sank down into the waves, sucking in the water round her with curling eddy. As the ship sank, the sea parted asunder and then fell back into the room she had occupied. And many other strange forms of death were seen that day upon the deep.

Thus Lycidas was pierced by a grappling-iron that hurled its swift hooks on board. He would have sunk in the sea, but for his comrades who seized his legs as they swung in air. He was torn asunder, and his blood gushed out, not trickling as from a wound, but raining on all sides from his severed arteries; and the free play of the life coursing through the different limbs was cut off by the water. No other victim's life escaped through so wide a channel. The lower half of his body resigned to death the limbs that contain no vital organs; but where the lungs were full of air and the heart of heat, there death was long baffled and struggled hard with this part of the man, till with difficulty it mastered the whole body.

On one of the ships the crew, too eager for battle, leaned on the tilted gunwale and left empty the side where there was no enemy. Their combined weight upset the craft, so that she covered over both sea and sailors with her hull; it was impossible to strike out on the open sea, and they died in their ocean prison. On that day was seen an unexampled form of dreadful death: it chanced that a man in the water was pierced by the beaks of two ships meeting one another. His breast was cloven in two by the dreadful impact; the bones were ground to powder, and the body could not hinder the brazen prows from clashing. The belly was crushed; blood, mixed with flesh, spouted gore through the mouth. When the ships backed water and withdrew their beaks, the corpse with mutilated breast sank and suffered the water to pass through its wounds. Of another crew most were shipwrecked and swam for their lives till they crowded to get help from a friendly craft; then, when they caught hold of the gunwale high up, though they were warned off, because the ship was unsteady and would have sunk if she had rescued them all, the others without pity chopped their arms in two with the sword from their deck. Their arms still hanging on the Greek ship, they fell and left their hands behind them; nor did the surface of the sea support any longer the weight of the mutilated bodies.

By now the fighters had all discharged their missiles, and their hands were empty, but rage found weapons. One hurled an oar at the foe; the strong arms of others launch a whole stern-ornament, or turn out the rowers and tear up the thwarts for a missile; they broke up their ships to fight with. They caught hold of dead bodies as they sank to the bottom, and robbed the corpses of the weapons which had killed them. Many a man, for want of a missile, plucked forth the fatal javelin from his own wounds and clutched his vitals with the left hand, that the blood might have time to deal a sturdy stroke and hurl back the enemy's spear before it flowed forth.

In that sea fight, however, no plague wrought more destruction than the element most hostile to the sea. For fire spread everywhere — fire cleaving to resinous torches and kept alive by hidden sulphur; and thereupon the ships, quick to provide fuel, caught fire at once with their pitch or melting wax. Nor did the waves master the fire, but the flame caught fierce hold of the wrecks now scattered over the deep. Some let in the sea, to put out the fire, while others cling to blazing planks, for fear they drown; among a thousand forms of death, men fear one only — that in which death first approaches them. Even in shipwreck brave men are brave still: they pick up weapons thrown down into the sea and hand them to the crews, or deal feeble blows with erring aim from the water. Some, when other weapons fail, make the sea their weapon: foe grapples fiercely with foe, glad to sink with limbs locked together and to drown while drowning another. One of the combatants was Phoceus; better than all other men could he hold his breath under water, and search the deep for aught which its sands had swallowed; or, when the anchor would not answer the tug of the cable, he could wrench away the flukes that had bitten too deep. He had grappled with a foe and carried him deep down, and now was returning to the surface alive and victorious. Fie believed he was rising where the sea was open; but he struck a ship's bottom and never rose again. Some flung their arms over enemy's oars and checked the flight of their vessels. Their chief anxiety was not to waste their deaths: many a dying man prevented an enemy's beak from ramming by fastening his own wounded body on the stern of his ship.

Tyrrhenus was standing on the lofty bow of his ship, when Lygdamus, a wielder of the Balearic thong, aimed a bullet and slung it; and the solid lead crushed his hollow temples. The blood burst all the ligaments, and the eyes, forced from their sockets, rushed forth. Tyrrhenus stood amazed by his sudden blindness, believing that this was the darkness of death. But when he felt that his limbs retained their strength, he called to his companions: "As you are wont to place your engines, so place me too in the right position for hurling darts. Tyrrhenus must spend what remains of life in every hazard of war. This body, half dead already, can play a soldier's part nobly: I shall be slain in place of a living man." With these words he launched at the foe a dart which, though no eye guided it, was not launched in vain. It struck Argus, a youth of noble race, just where the lower part of the belly meets the groin, and falling forward he drove the steel deeper with his own weight. At the other end of the ship, which was now past fighting, stood the unhappy father of Argus. In his prime he would have matched any man of the Phocaean army, but conquering age had brought low his strength, and the feeble old man could not fight but could show the way to others. When he saw the deadly wound, he made his way with many a stumble along the ship and past the benches, and found the body at the stern still breathing. No tears fell from his cheeks, no blows on his breast, but his hands flew wide apart and all his body became rigid. Night came over him, and thick darkness veiled his eyes; he ceased to recognise the hapless figure of Argus before him. At sight of his father the son raised his sinking head and failing neck; no words followed the unlocking of his throat: he could only ask a kiss with silent look and beg that his father's hand might close his eyes. When the old man recovered from his swoon, and cruel grief began to assert its power, "I will not waste," he cried, "the respite granted by the ruthless gods, but will use it to pierce this aged throat. Argus, forgive your wretched father for refusing your last embrace and your parting kiss. The warm blood has not yet ebbed from your wounds and you lie there still breathing; it is still possible for you to survive me." Thus he spoke, and not content with driving his sword through his body till the hilt was stained, he sprang headlong into the deep, so eager to die before his son that he would not trust to a single form of death.

The fortunes of the leaders were no longer evenly balanced, and the issue of the fight was no longer doubtful. Of the Greek ships most were sunk, others with changed crews now carried their conquerors, and only a few gained the dockyards by nasty flight. What tears were shed by parents in the city! how loud was the lamentation of mothers along the shore I Many a wife clasped a Roman corpse, mistaking the face, with features disfigured by the sea, for her husband's; beside lighted pyres hapless father strove with father for possession of a headless body. On the other side, Brutus by his victory at sea first conferred naval glory on Caesar's arms.