In the mean time Sulla had come up, and seeing how matters stood, he called out that the houses must be fired, and taking a flaming torch, he was the first to advance: he also ordered the bowmen to shoot firebrands, and to aim at the roofs; in which he acted without any rational consideration, giving way to passion, and surrendering the direction of his enterprize to revenge, for he saw before him only his enemies, and without thought or pity for his friends and kinsmen, would force his way into Rome with the help of flames, which know no distinction between the guilty and the innocent. While this was going on, Marius, who had been driven as far as the temple of Earth,[198] invited the slaves to join him by offering them their freedom, but being overpowered by his enemies who pressed on him, he left the city. X. Sulla assembled the Senate, who condemned[199] to death Marius and a few others, among whom was the tribune Sulpicius. Sulpicius was put to death, being betrayed by a slave, to whom Sulla gave his freedom, and then ordered him to be thrown down the Tarpeian rock: he set a price on the head of Marius, which was neither a generous nor a politic measure, as Marius had shortly before let Sulla off safe when Sulla put himself into his power by going to the house of Marius. Now if Marius had not let Sulla go, but had given him up to Sulpicius to be put to death, he might have secured the supreme power; but he spared Sulla; and yet a few days after, when Sulla had the same opportunity, Marius did not obtain from him a like return. The conduct of Sulla offended the Senate, though they durst not show it; but the dislike of the people and their dissatisfaction were made apparent to him by their acts. They contemptuously rejected Nonius, the son of Sulla's sister, and Servius, who were candidates for offices, and elected those whose elevation they thought would be most disagreeable to Sulla. But Sulla pretended to be pleased at this, and to view it as a proof that the people, by doing what they liked, were really indebted to him for their liberty; and for the purpose of diminishing his general unpopularity he managed the election of Lucius Cinna,[200] who was of the opposite faction, to the consulship, having first bound him by solemn imprecations and oaths to favour his measures. Cinna ascended the Capitol with a stone in his hand and took the oath; then pronouncing an imprecation on himself, that, if he did not keep faithful to Sulla, he might be cast out of the city as the stone from his hand, he hurled it to the ground in the presence of a large number of persons. But as soon as Cinna had received the consulship, he attempted to disturb the present settlement of affairs, and prepared to institute a process against Sulla, and induced Virginius, one of the tribunes, to be the accuser; but Sulla,[201] without caring for him or the court, set out with his army against Mithridates.