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Taglagallo Remarcafkus Directory 12
Page 10
In the evening, while we were sitting at dinner, there was a big bump. We had run aground somewhat heavily on a sand-dune. The captain rather frightened me as he said that on a previous occasion they had stuck on a sand-bank for several days before they could get off. As luck would have it that night, partly by the aid of a steel cable several hundred metres long, which had been fastened to a number of big trees on the shore, partly by her own power, we were able to back out and get her free. Only six hours were wasted. The tide, which reaches a long way up the Tapajoz River when the latter is low, helped us a great deal. At high tide the level of the water is raised more than one foot. It seemed amazing that the tide of the ocean could extend its influence by forcing the water back so far up the Amazon and its tributaries.
War was now inevitable; but the incapacity of Sp. Postumius Albinus, who arrived to conduct it (B.C. 110), and still more that of his brother Aulus, whom he left to command in his absence, when called away to hold the elections at Rome, proved as favorable to Jugurtha as the corruption of their predecessors. Aulus, having penetrated into the heart of Numidia, suffered himself to be surprised in his camp; great part of his army was cut to pieces, and the rest only escaped a similar fate by the ignominy of passing under the yoke. But Jugurtha had little reason to rejoice in this success, great as it might at first appear; for the disgrace at once roused all the spirit of the Roman people; the treaty concluded by Aulus was instantly annulled, immense exertions made to raise troops, and one of the Consuls for the new year (B.C. 109), Q. Caecilius Metellus, hastened to Numidia to retrieve the honor of the Roman arms. But this did not satisfy the people. The scandalous conduct of so many of the Nobles had given fresh life to the popular party; and the Tribune C. Mamilius carried a bill for the appointment of three Commissioners to inquire into the conduct of all of those who had received bribes from Jugurtha. Scaurus, though one of the most guilty, managed to be put upon the Commission. But he dared not shield his confederates. Many men of the highest rank were condemned, among whom were Bestia, Albinus, and Opimius. The last named was the Opimius who acted with such ferocity toward Caius Gracchus and his party. He died in exile at Dyrrhachium some years afterward, in great poverty.
The earlier history of the Roman constitution has been already related. We have seen how, after a long struggle, the Plebeians acquired complete political equality with the Patricians. In the Second Punic War, the antagonism between the two orders had almost disappeared, and the only mark of separation between them in political matters was the regulation that, of the two Consuls and two Censors, one must be a Patrician and the other a Plebeian. Even this fell into disuse upon the rise of the new Nobility, of which we shall speak in the next chapter. The Patricians gradually dwindled away, and it became the custom to elect both Consuls and Censors from the Plebeians.
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