Greece -- Biography -- Early works to 1800; Rome -- Biography -- Early works to 1800
IX.[205] Now when Sulla was master of Italy and was proclaimed
Dictator, he rewarded the other officers and generals by making them
rich and promoting them to magistracies and by granting them without
stint and with readiness what they asked for. But as he admired
Pompeius for his superior merit and thought that he would be a great
support to his own interests, he was anxious in some way to attach him
by family relations. Metella, the wife of Sulla, had also the same
wish, and they persuaded Pompeius to put away Antistia and to take to
wife Aemilia, the step-daughter of Sulla, the child of Metella by
Scaurus, who was then living with her husband and was pregnant. This
matter of the marriage was of a tyrannical character, and more suited
to the interests of Sulla than conformable to the character of
Pompeius, for Aemilia, who was pregnant, was taken from another to be
married to him, and Antistia was put away with dishonour and under
lamentable circumstances, inasmuch as she had just lost her father
also, and that, too, on her husband's account; for Antistius was
murdered in the Senate-house because he was considered to be an
adherent of Sulla for the sake of Pompeius; and the mother of Antistia
having witnessed all this put an end to her life, so that this
misfortune was added to the tragedy of the marriage; and in sooth
another besides, for Aemilia herself died immediately afterwards in
child-birth in the house of Pompeius.
X. After this, news arrived that Perpenna[206] was securing Sicily for
himself, and that the island was supplying to those who remained of
the opposite faction a point for concentrating their forces; for
Carbo[207] was afloat in those parts with a navy, and Domitius had
fallen upon Libya, and many other fugitives of note were crowding
there, who had escaped from the proscriptions. Against these Pompeius
was sent with a large force: and Perpenna immediately evacuated Sicily
upon his arrival. Pompeius relieved the cities which had been harshly
treated, and behaved kindly to them all except to the Mamertini in
Messene. For when the Mamertini protested against the tribunal and the
Roman administration of justice, on the ground that there was an old
Roman enactment which forbade their introduction, "Won't you stop,"
said he, "citing laws to us who have our swords by our sides?" It was
considered also that Pompeius triumphed over the misfortunes of Carbo
in an inhuman manner. For if it was necessary to put Carbo to death,
as perhaps it was, he ought to have been put to death as soon as he
was taken, and then the act might have been imputed to him who gave
the order. But Pompeius produced in chains a Roman who had three times
been Consul, and making him stand in front of the tribunal while he
was sitting, sat in judgment on him, to the annoyance and vexation of
those who were present; after which he ordered him to be removed and
put to death. They say that when Carbo had been dragged off, seeing
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