(B.C. 94) under this Lex, could not have attempted to define Majestas. The expression of the Lex was general, "Majestatem minuere," and the question would always be, what acts were comprehended in this general expression. We are helped to the Roman notion of Majestas minuta by the terms of the Formula in which the Senate in times of need empowered the consuls to use force, "Ne quid Res publica detrimenti caperet," which means, that the integrity of the state must in no way be impaired. A "Majestatis minutio" was in fact any act which impaired the integrity of the commonwealth. Accordingly a man is said "majestatem minuere" who takes away any of those things which make the whole of the State; or in other words it is to impair the honour, the fulness, or the power of the Roman people, or of those to whom the people have delegated power; as for instance by opposing a magistrate in the execution of his office. The offence of "Majestas minuta" therefore, or

up

Majestas," as it was sometimes called, was more comprehensive than the modern term Treason, but under the Imperial system the notion of Majestas came near to that which our law names High Treason.

Caepio was prosecuted under the Lex Appuleia by a man named T. Betucius Barrus of Asculum, whom Cicero names the most eloquent man in Italy with the exception of the Roman orators. It is uncertain to which Asculum Barrus belonged. He must in some way, we suppose, have become a Roman citizen. His speech against Caepio was preserved, for Cicero calls it a famous oration. Caepio's defence was written by L. Aelius Stilo, as Cicero says. We must therefore conclude that Stilo wrote it before he left Rome to join Metellus in his exile. The defence of Caepio was founded on his interpretation of "Majestas minuta." He admitted the facts with which he was charged, but he said that a man impairs the integrity of the state by taking something from it, whereas so far from taking away something, he had saved the state from loss (detrimentum) by preventing the exhaustion of the treasury.

Saturninus was a candidate this year for a third tribunate,

and he was elected. The fellow Equitius turned up again, and was also a candidate for the tribunate, though he was not acknowledged as a Roman citizen. Marius put the man in prison, but the people broke open the doors and carried him out on their shoulders. Equitius thus secured his election. A name raised him to place and power, for many persons believed him to be a son of Ti. Gracchus, though others said that he was a runaway slave.

At the consular elections of this year (B.c. 100) for the next year, the distinguished orator M. Antonius was elected without opposition. The other candidates were C. Memmius who had been tribune in B.C. 111 (vol. i., p. 401) and Praetor in B.C. 104, and C. Servilius Glaucia who was now praetor and consequently not eligible. As Memmius had the better chance of being elected, Glaucia and Saturninus hired men with bludgeons to fall on Memmius while the voting was going on. The candidate for the consulship was murdered in the presence of all the people, and the election was stopped. All law, order, and decency were at an end. On the next day the people mustered in great force intending to get rid of Saturninus, though he was on the so-called popular side. But Saturninus was prepared. He summoned his partisans from the country, and together with Glaucia and a quaestor named Saufeius he seized the Capitol. It was now a civil war or a rebellion, and the Senate resolved to put down the turbulent tribune who had defied the law. The consuls Marius and Flaccus were empowered to act by a resolution in the form usual on such occasions with the assistance of such of the praetors and tribunes as they should think proper. All the tribunes except Saturninus, says Appian, and all the praetors except Glaucia joined the consuls: but we must except Equitius from the number of the tribunes who were on the side of order. Marius was not well pleased with this commission to attack his old friends, and he was slow in making preparation. He supplied his men with arms out of the temples and the public arsenals, in which arms were stored, for it appears from what happened on this and other occasions of arming the people that they did not possess arms

at home, and very probably were not allowed to keep them. In the mean time the pipes were cut which supplied with water the Capitol or the temple of Jupiter, as Cicero has it.

Orosius has some facts which are not in Appian. After the murder of Memmius, he says, Saturninus held a meeting in his house, where he was named King by some and Imperator by others; which is a most improbable story. But it is quite certain that the insurrection was not put down without bloodshed. Marius drew up his men in regular companies, planted his colleague with part of his forces on an eminence, and himself held the gates of the city. M. Antonius, consul designatus, was posted outside the city with an armed force, probably to prevent the country folks from coming to help their friend the tribune. All the illustrious nobles of Rome took up arms in defence of order. The aged M. Aemilius Scaurus, the chief of the senate, appeared in the Comitium in arms: he could hardly walk, but his feebleness, as he said, or is supposed to have said, would at least prevent him from running away. The augur Q. Mucius Scaevola, a decrepit old man, was there too, leaning on a spear, an evidence of his feebleness and his spirit at the same time. All the men who had filled the consulship, all the praetors, all the nobility old and young were in arms to support the consuls, as Cicero says on an occasion when it suited his purpose to show that every man of any note in Rome was opposed to the insurgents. Cicero was too young to have been present, but he was afterwards intimate with many of the men who took an active part in suppressing the insurrection. There was a fight in the Forum, in which the party of Saturninus was defeated, and he fled to the Capitol, the approach to which through some neglect or want of men had not been secured by Marius. All the rebels did not make their escape. Many were destroyed in their flight to the Capitol; and as the water supply was cut off, the insurgents who were shut up on the hill suffered from thirst. Saufeius recommended the burning of the Capitol, which would certainly have given some lustre to this ignoble quarrel; but Saturninus and Glaucia, who trusted in their old friend Marius,

surrendered, and Saufeius followed their example. The termination of the affair is told somewhat differently by the authorities. Marius was urged to put the men to death, but he shut them up in the Curia Hostilia, intending to proceed against them in legal form. Their enemies thinking that this was only a trick to save the men, took off the tiles of the roof and pelted them with stones till they were all killed, a quaestor, and a tribune, and a praetor with the insignia of their office on them. They got what they well deserved, and their old friend and fellow-conspirator, now a consul for the sixth time, let them perish. The authorities of Orosius reported that the doors of the Curia were broken open, and the men were pulled out by Roman Equites and murdered. Glaucia, according to this story, had escaped into a house, but he was dragged out and killed. Many others perished in this quarrel, and the tribune Equitius too. He was tribune for the first time on the day in which he lost his life. As the tribunes entered on office on the tenth of December, the day on which the turbulent Saturninus ended his career was the tenth of December B.c. 100.

Appian, who shows good sense in his judgments, thus concludes: "There was now nothing to look to for protection, neither liberty nor democracy nor the law nor rank nor office, when even the tribunes, whose office was instituted for the prevention of crimes and the protection of the people, and whose authority was sacred and inviolate, committed such crimes and suffered such a penalty."

The year B.C. 100 was memorable for the birth of C. Julius Caesar. In this year also was settled the colony of Eporedia (Ivrea) in Cisalpine Gallia, on the river Duria (Dora Baltea), at the point where the Val d'Aosta commences. It is uncer

tain whether it was a Roman or a Latin colony. The object of this settlement, as Strabo says, was to protect the country against the Salassi who occupied the Val d'Aosta (vol. i., p. 55); but the colonists of Eporedia had no security against these people till the nation was annihilated.

CHAPTER XI.

FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC EVENTS.

B.C. 99-93.

AFTER the murder of Saturninus the Senate and their partisans called out for the return of Metellus. P. Furius, one of the tribunes, and the son of a freedman, opposed the measure, nor would he yield to the tears and entreaties of the son of Metellus, who by his earnestness in his father's cause gained the name of Pius or the dutiful. In the next year, when Furius was out of office, another tribune C. Canuleius brought him to account for his conduct in the affair of Metellus. Furius had not acted illegally, if he merely opposed a bill for the restoration of Metellus. He was however brought before the popular assembly or obtained permission to address them, but the people would not listen to him, and he was torn in pieces' by a mad rabble. This is Appian's expression, but tearing to pieces is a figure of speech, and may mean no more than a brutal and savage murder, which had now become a common thing in Rome. A bill was proposed for the restoration of Metellus by a tribune A. Calidius. The bill was carried, and Metellus returned from exile. He was met at the gates of Rome by thousands, and the day was not long enough for him to receive the congratulations of all his friends. It was the year B.C. 99. We may wonder what Marius was doing all this time. Plutarch is the only writer who has said any thing on the matter. Marius did all that he could to prevent the return of Metellus, but finding that his influence was gone, he left Rome for Cappadocia and Galatia. He pretended that he went to pay a vow to the Great Mother, but he had another object. He