Index Expurgatorius

“ But in Spain, the senators about Sertorius, and others of the nobility, finding themselves strong enough for their enemies, no sooner laid aside fear, but their minds were possessed by envy and irrational jealousies of Sertorius's power. And chiefly Perpenna, elevated by the thoughts of his noble birth, and carried away with a fond ambition of commanding the army, threw out villanous discourses in private amongst his acquaintance. "What evil genius," he would say, "hurries us perpetually from worse to worse? ”

“ He used to speak proudly of his loss.
“Ah,” he said, “some warriors have chains and crowns as a reward for their victories. But they cannot always wear the chains and crowns, while I carry my token of battle about with me!”
For a while Sertorius stayed in Rome, hoping to rise to a place of power. But Sulla, the Red General, was his foe, and he deemed it wise to retire to Spain, where he held out against Sulla's rule. The Red General sent armies to subdue him, but Sertorius, as clever as he was brave, succeeded in escaping by sea. A violent storm nearly broke up his fleet of ships. ”

“ Ostorius, well aware that first events are those which produce alarm or confidence, by a rapid movement of his light cohorts, cut down all who opposed him, pursued those who fled, and lest they should rally, and so an unquiet and treacherous peace might allow no rest to the general and his troops, he prepared to disarm all whom he suspected, and to occupy with encampments the whole country to the Avon and Severn. The Iceni, a powerful tribe, which war had not weakened, as they had voluntarily joined our alliance, were the first to resist. ”

“ As soon as Sertorius quitted the right wing to relieve the other part of the army, Afranius [154] put to flight his opponents and drove them to their [Pg 119] camp, which, he entered with the captives, it being now dark, and began to plunder, knowing nothing of the defeat of Pompeius, and being unable to stop his soldiers from seizing the booty. In the mean time Sertorius returned, after defeating the enemy who were opposed to him, and falling on the soldiers of Afranius, who were all in disorder and consequently panic-stricken, he slaughtered many of them. ”

“ And when the strong man had given trouble enough to himself in vain, and sufficient diversion to the company, and had abandoned his attempt, whilst the weak, pitiful fellow in a short time and with little pains had left not a hair on the great horse's tail, Sertorius arose and said to his army, "You see, fellow-soldiers, that perseverance is more prevailing than violence, and that many things which cannot be overcome when they are together, yield readily when taken little by little. Assiduity and persistence are irresistible, and in time overthrow and destroy the greatest powers. ”

“ This action made Sertorius highly renowned throughout all Spain, and as soon as he returned to Rome he was appointed quaestor of Cisalpine Gaul, at a very seasonable moment for his country, the Marsian war being on the point of breaking out. Sertorius was ordered to raise soldiers and provide arms, which he performed with a diligence and alacrity, so contrasting with the feebleness and slothfulness of other officers of his age, that he got the repute of a man whose life would be one of action. ”

“ Through these defences the Roman general, though he had with him only the allied troops, without the strength of the legions, attempted to break, and having assigned their positions to his cohorts, he equipped even his cavalry for the work of infantry. Then at a given signal they forced the barrier, routing the enemy who were entangled in their own defences. The rebels, conscious of their guilt, and finding escape barred, performed many noble feats. In this battle, Marius Ostorius, the general's son, won the reward for saving a citizen's life. ”

“ Revolving in his mind the astounding information he had just received, Roger reëntered the sitting-room. The ghastly audacity of the idea that Sartorius had a moment ago been on the very point of introducing the germs of lock-jaw—tetanus to give it its proper name—into the wound on his hand seemed on the face of it beyond the bounds of possibility. Why, what man would dare to do such a thing? The risk of it! ... Yet was there so great a risk? Hadn't the doctor repeatedly warned him of the danger he was running? ”

“ But the lady, nothing daunted, went on: "Who has ever called Brutus a murderer? You are young—Life lies before you. To plunge a sword into the heart of this monster is a deed for which you are too good. But I know a hand that understands its work and would be ready to guide the steel. Call it out at the right moment and be its guide!"
"And that hand?" Apollinaris asked in anxious expectation.
"It is there," replied Berenike, pointing to Martialis, who entered the room at that moment. ”

“ After various changes of fortune the aristocrats were victorious, and then Sertorius found himself in a most difficult position. The democratic leaders had given him a command in Spain, as much to get rid of him, for he was too honourable to suit them, as for any other reason. By degrees he drifted into the position of an enemy. He opposed the march of a Consular army sent across the Pyrenees by the Roman government, crossed to Africa when he [Pg 283] could no longer remain in Spain, and came back again to take command of the Lusitanians when this tribe rebelled against Rome. ”

“ After Quintus Sertorius had learned by experience that he was by no means a match for the whole Roman army, in order to prove this to the barbarians also, who were rashly demanding battle, he brought into their presence two horses, one very strong, the other very feeble. Then he brought up two youths of corresponding physique, one robust, the other slight. The stronger youth was commanded to, pull out the entire tail of the feeble horse, while the slight youth was commanded to pull out the hairs of the strong horse one by one. ”

“ On the renewal of the conflict the generals met, the armies knocked their two heads together, when Pompey, being stunned by the blow, and having no one to advise him what to do, took to flight for the purpose of consulting his own safety.
Though apparently invincible by his enemies, Sertorius was not safe from his friends, for he was murdered at a dinner-party given to him by Perperna. The cloth had not been removed, when Sertorius was startled by a singular entrée, in the shape of a band of assassins, who set upon him and slew him. ”

“ And whilst he considered which way next to turn his arms, the Lusitanians sent ambassadors to desire him to be their general; for being terrified with the Roman power, and finding the necessity of having a commander of great authority and experience in war, being also sufficiently assured of his worth and valor by those who had formerly known him, they were desirous to commit themselves especially to his care. And in fact Sertorius is said to have been of a temper unassailable either by fear or pleasure, in adversity and dangers undaunted, and noways puffed up with prosperity. ”

“ The landgrave hath made Orffyreus a very handsome present, to be let into the secret of the machine, under an engagement nevertheless not to discover, or to make any use of it before the inventor may procure a sufficient reward for making his discovery public.
I am very sensible, sir, that it is in England only the arts and sciences are so generally cultivated as to afford any prospect of the inventor's acquiring a reward adequate to this discovery. He requires nothing more than the assurance of having it paid him in case his machine is found to be really a perpetual motion ”

“ But when Marius was overpowered by Sulla and fled from Rome, and Sulla had set out to fight with Mithridates, and the consul Octavius adhered to the party of Sulla, while his colleague Cinna, who aimed at a revolution, revived the drooping faction of Marius, Sertorius attached himself to Cinna, especially as he saw that Octavius was deficient in activity, and he distrusted the friends of Marius. A great battle was fought in the Forum between the consuls, in which Octavius got the victory, and Cinna and Sertorius took to flight, having lost nearly ten thousand men. ”

“ Here it is: first, I travel around the country and collect a hundred names; the names of usurpers whose human shells have had more or less spectacular careers. Not those born to the purple, but those who've come up like rockets, self-made men who've climbed to posts of importance in politics, the law, and elsewhere. I've seen a number of big shots of that sort who are nothing really but robots moved by slimy misshapen blobs ... ”

“ Laverick said. “If you discharge that revolver, you haven’t a dog’s chance of getting clear of the building. My clerks would rush out after you into the street. You’d find yourself surrounded by a crowd of business men. You couldn’t make your way through anywhere. You’d be held up before you’d gone a dozen yards. Put down your revolver. We can perhaps settle this little matter without it.”
“The document!” the man ordered. “You’ve got it! You must have it! You took that pocket-book from a dead man, and in that pocket-book was the document. We must have it. We intend to have it.” ”

“ The country below is of a soil resembling a light clay, so loose as easily to break into powder, and is not firm enough to bear any one that treads upon it, and if you touch it in the least, it flies about like ashes or unslaked lime. In any danger of war, these people enter their caves, and carrying in their booty and prey along with them, stay quietly within, secure from every attack. And when Sertorius, leaving Metellus some distance off, had placed his camp near this hill, they slighted and despised him, imagining that he retired into these parts to escape being overthrown by the Romans. ”

“ It is the common characteristic of a moving spectacle to strike every one motionless; and the guards of Appius, when ordered to seize Virginius, found themselves fixed to the spot by so many stirring incidents. In vain did Appius call upon his clients and his lictors to do their duty. Among all his numerous attendants there was not a sole but shook in its shoe, while the tyrant trembled from head to foot with bootless anger. ”

“ Four armies were found insufficient to crush or even hurt Sertorius; and Pompey and Metellus, who never engaged an enemy without obtaining the victory, were driven with dishonour from the field. But the favourite of the Lusitanians was exposed to the dangers which usually attend greatness. Perpenna, one of his officers who was jealous of his fame and tired of a superior, conspired against him. At a banquet the conspirators began to open their intentions by speaking with freedom and licentiousness in the presence of Sertorius, whose age and character had hitherto claimed deference from others. ”

“ Sertorius, however, resolving to send speedy relief, ordered two thousand skins to be filled with water, naming a considerable sum of money for the carriage of every skin; and many Spaniards and Moors undertaking the work, he chose out those who were the strongest and swiftest of foot, and sent them through the mountains, with order that when they had delivered the water, they should convey away privately all those who would be least serviceable in the siege, that there might be water sufficient for the defendants. ”

“ Sertorius alone is said to have put no person to death to gratify his vengeance, nor to have abused his power; but he was much annoyed at the conduct of Marius, and he moderated Cinna by private interviews and entreaties. At last, the slaves whom Marius had used as allies in war, and kept as guards to protect his tyranny, becoming formidable and wealthy, partly from the grants of Marius and his direct permission ”

“ His whole association with the girl rose before him to assert her unimpeachable normality. And yet there was proof that Sartorius, a physician of standing, had cast doubts upon her sanity long before her attack upon him. The condition he had attributed to her could so easily account for her dramatic reappearance and her invention of a mad story of crime and persecution, as easily as it could explain the morphia injections, self-inflicted. His aunt had no doubt that the doctor was right in his belief; no one had any doubt except himself—and Chalmers. ”

“ A brush with the fiercest, the most hated, the most hating aristocrat that had been borne behind the fasces for many a year, would mean punishment with a heavy hand. The pressure was at once relieved, and though those in front saw no sign of consul or lictor—saw only Sergius who had descended from his litter and was leading his company in a vigorous attack—yet they were, for the most part, only too glad to escape from the glaring eyes of Titus Manlius and the broad sweep of his weapon. ”

“ Septimus has the Effinghams on the hip. He has them fast, and they will not escape. What tortures await them at home, in the Land of the Free, at the hands of the hideously affable Dodge, we do not care to disclose. What was the persecution of a haughty Lord or a marauding Baron or an inquisitorial Abbot compared to the persecution of a million Dodges? The proud Effinghams are like men buried naked to the chin in ant-heaps, to be bitten into extinction by a myriad ants. Stoically, as good democrats and idealists, they writhe and endure, without making too much moan. ”