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Y.R.

B.C.

706 most trustworthy writers say that 70,000 Italian soldiers 48 were engaged in this battle. Others give the smaller number, 60,000. Still others, grossly exaggerating, say 400,000.1 Of the whole number some say Pompey's forces were to those of Cæsar as one-and-a-half to one, others say that he had two parts out of three. So much doubt is there as to the exact truth. However that may be, each of them placed his chief reliance on his Italian troops. In the way

of allied forces Cæsar had cavalry from both Cisalpine and Transalpine Gaul, besides some light-armed Greeks, consisting of Dolopians, Acarnanians, and Ætolians. Such were Cæsar's allies. Pompey had a great number from all the eastern nations, part horse, part foot. From Greece he had Lacedemonians marshalled by their own kings, and others from Peloponnesus and Boeotians with them. The Athenians marched to his aid also, although proclamation had been made on both sides that no harm should be done to them by the soldiers, since they were the priests of the Thesmophora. Nevertheless, they wished to share in the glory of the war because this was a contest for the Roman leadership.

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71. Besides the Greeks almost all the nations that one meets in making the circuit of the eastern sea sent aid to Pompey: Thracians, Hellespontines, Bithynians, Phrygians, Ionians, Lydians, Pamphylians, Pisidians, Paphlagonians, Cilicians, Syrians, Phoenicians, Hebrews, and their neighbors the Arabs, Cyprians, Rhodians, Cretan slingers, and other islanders. Kings and princes were there leading their own troops: Deïotarus, the tetrarch of Galatia in the East, and Ariarthes, king of Cappadocia. Taxiles com

1 One of the grossly exaggerating writers is Florus, who says: "Never did fortune behold so large a force of the Roman people or so much of their dignity collected in one place. More than 300,000 men were assembled on one side and the other, in addition to the auxiliaries of kings and nations."

2 The Thesmophora (law-bringers) were Ceres and Proserpine. They were worshipped together as the goddesses of tillage and civilized life. The Thesmophoria was an annual religious festival at Athens.

3 Schweighäuser says that the meaning of this passage is not quite clear to him. Combes-Dounous renders it intelligibly: "They came to take part in this war merely to have the glory of fighting in a contest where the empire of the Roman people was at stake."

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706 manded the Armenians from the hither side of the Euphra- 48 Those from the other side were led by Megabates, the lieutenant of King Artabazes. Some other small princes took part with Pompey in the work. It was said that sixty ships from Egypt were contributed to him by the sovereigns of that country, Cleopatra and her brother, who was still a boy. But these did not take part in the battle, nor did any other naval force. They remained idle at Corcyra. Pompey seems to have acted very foolishly in this respect in disregarding the fleet, in which he excelled so greatly that he could have deprived the enemy of all the supplies brought to them from abroad, and in risking a battle on land with men who boasted that they were inured to every kind of toil and who were ferocious fighters. Although he had been on his guard against them at Dyrrachium, a certain spell seems to have come over him at a time when it would inure most to Cæsar's advantage. Under this spell also Pompey's army was most nonsensically puffed up, and rendered insubordinate to its own commander, and hurried into action without previous experience in war. But this was the ordering of divine Providence to bring in the imperial power which now embraces everything.

CHAPTER XI

Speeches of the Commanders

Preparations for Battle - Battle of Pharsalus - Total defeat of the Pompeians-Flight of Pompey Losses on both sides

72. Then each of the commanders assembled his soldiers and made an appeal to them. Pompey spoke as follows: "You, my fellow soldiers, are the leaders in this task rather than the led, for while I was still desirous of wearing Cæsar out by hunger you urged on this engagement. Since, therefore, you are the arbiters of the battle, conduct yourselves like those who are greatly superior in numbers. Despise the enemy as victors do the vanquished, as young men do the old, as fresh troops do those who are wearied with many toils. Fight like those who have the power and the means, and the consciousness of a good cause. We are contending

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706 for liberty and country. On our side are the laws and 48 honorable fame, and this great number of senators and knights, against one man who has seized the government by robbery.1 Go forward then, as you have determined to do, with good hope, keeping in vision the flight of the enemy at Dyrrachium, and the great number of their standards that we captured in one day when we defeated them there." Such was Pompey's speech.

73. Cæsar addressed his men as follows: "My friends, we have already overcome our most formidable enemies, and are now about to encounter not hunger and want, but men. This day will decide everything. Remember what you promised me at Dyrrachium. Remember how you swore to each other in my presence that you would never leave the field except as conquerors. These men, fellowsoldiers, are the same that we met at the Pillars of Hercules, the same that we drove out of Italy. They are the same who sought to disband us without honors, without a triumph, without rewards, after the toils and struggles of ten years, after we had finished those great wars, after innumerable victories, and after we had added 400 nations in Spain, Gaul, and Britain to our country's sway. I have not been able to prevail upon them by offering fair terms, nor to win them by benefits. You know that I dismissed them unharmed, hoping that we should obtain justice from them. Recall all these facts to your minds to-day, and if you have had any experience of me recall also my care for you, my good faith, and the generosity of my gifts to you.

74. "Nor is it difficult for hardy and veteran soldiers to overcome new recruits who are without experience in war, and who, moreover, like boys, spurn the rules of discipline and of obedience to their commander. I learn that he was afraid and unwilling to come to an engagement. His star has already passed its zenith; he has become slow and hesitating in all his acts, and no longer commands, but obeys the orders of others. I say these things of his Italian forces only. As for his allies, do not think about

1 Πρὸς ἄνδρα ἕνα λῃστεύοντα τὴν ἡγεμονίαν. This might be translated in the words of Hamlet: "The cutpurse of the empire and the rule."

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