Caesar, Julius; Rome -- History -- Republic, 265-30 B.C.
in its natural baseness, and thus on him rested the responsibility for
the color of justice in which it was disguised. That after all which
had passed he should be compelled to accept his pardon at Caesar's
hands was an indignity to which he could not submit, and before the
conqueror could reach Utica he fell upon his sword and died. _Ultimus
Romanorum_ has been the epitaph which posterity has written on the tomb
of Cato. Nobler Romans than he lived after him; and a genuine son of
the old Republic would never have consented to surrender an imperial
province to a barbarian prince. But at least he was an open enemy. He
would not, like his nephew Brutus, have pretended to be Caesar's
friend, that he might the more conveniently drive a dagger into his
side.
The rest of the party was broken up. Scipio sailed for Spain, but was
driven back by foul weather into Hippo, where he was taken and killed.
His correspondence was found and taken to Caesar, who burnt it unread,
as he had burnt Pompey's. The end of Juba and Petreius had a wild
splendor about it. They had fled together from Thapsus to Zama, Juba's
own principal city, and they were refused admission. Disdaining to be
taken prisoners, as they knew they inevitably would be, they went to a
country house in the neighborhood belonging to the king. There, after a
last sumptuous banquet, they agreed to die like warriors by each
other's hand. Juba killed Petreius, and then ran upon his own sword.
So the actors in the drama were passing away. Domitius, Pompey,
Lentulus, Ligarius, Metellus Scipio, Afranius, Cato, Petreius, had sunk
into bloody graves. Labienus had escaped clear from the battle; and
knowing that if Caesar himself would pardon him Caesar's army never
would, he made his way to Spain, where one last desperate hope
remained. The mutinous legions of Cassius Longinus had declared for the
Senate. Some remnants of Pompey's troops who had been dismissed after
Lerida had been collected again and joined them; and these, knowing, as
Labienus knew, that they had sinned beyond forgiveness, were prepared
to fight to the last and die at bay.
One memorable scene in the African campaign must not be forgotten.
While Caesar was in difficulty at Ruspinum, and was impatiently waiting
for his legions from Sicily, there arrived a general officer of the
10th, named Caius Avienus, who had occupied the whole of one of the
transports with his personal servants, horses, and other conveniences,
and had not brought with him a single soldier. Avienus had been already
privately noted by Caesar as having been connected with the mutiny in
Campania. His own habits in the field were simple in the extreme, and
he hated to see his officers self-indulgent. He used the opportunity to
make an example of him and of one or two others at the same time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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