PREFACE IF Caesar is to be read with profit in schools, one thing at least is certain—the school edition should be as simple and elementary as it can be made. In the introduction, notes, and vocabulary of this volume I have tried to avoid all matter that is not strictly relevant at the stage of development which we may expect to find in the schoolboy at about fourteen years of age. I have not greatly emphasized the matter of indirect discourse, for if the boy is to regard that as anything else than an inscrutable mystery, the result will depend chiefly upon the intelligence of his teacher. On the other hand, I have in the notes to the earlier books laid great stress upon the ordinary noun and verb constructions, emphasizing them by frequent repetition of explanation and grammar reference, for I am oldfashioned enough to believe a good deal in the method of “ line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little,” inculcated in a certain ancient book. In general I have tried to keep before the reader's mind the fact that the text is not merely an exercise in Latin, but an historical narrative of great events. This explains the large number of cross-references backward and forward in the story. The introduction aims to present Caesar as the 291788 iii greatest political person of antiquity, and to show his immense significance as the principal founder of modern civilization; and also to furnish enough information about the Roman military organization and operations to make the narrative intelligible. The text is that of Meusel, without changes, except some orthographic ones in conformity with ideas now prevalent in regard to the proper spelling of Latin in elementary text-books. J. H. W PRINCETON, N. J. LIST OF FULL-PAGE MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS FACING PAGE Gaul in the time of Caesar (colored map) The bust of Caesar in the museum at Naples The Rhone from Geneva to Pas de l'Écluse (colored map). The campaign of 58 B. C. (colored map) Defeat of the Helvetii (colored map) Besançon, the ancient Vesontio The battle with Ariovistus (colored map) The battle on the Aisne (colored map) The battle with the Nervii (colored map) The vicinity of Octodurus (colored map) Campaign against the Veneti, 56 B. C. (colored map) . Campaigns of 55 and 54 B. C. (colored Pons a Caesare in Rheno factus . The Rhine from Koblenz to Andernach (colored map) The siege of Avaricum (colored map). View of Gergovia from the south The siege of Gergovia (colored map) . The campaign of Labienus against the Parisii (colored map) Views of Mont Auxois, the site of Alesia AFTER CONSTRUING LORD CÆSAR, when you sternly wrote The story of your grim campaigns, Above the burning plains, Amid the impenetrable wood, Amid the camp's incessant hum, In high Avaricum, When shrilled your shattering trumpet's noise Your frigid sections would be read By bright-eyed English boys. Ah me! who penetrates to-day The secret of your deep designs ? Amid the sleeping lines ? From century to century And can not bear to die. But you are silent, secret, proud, No smile upon your haggard face, Beside the statue's base. I marvel : that Titanic heart Beats strongly through the arid page, In this bewildering age, Upon the pure and peaceful night, As swims across our sight The ray of that sequestered sun, Far in the illimitable blue- A. C. BENSON. vi INTRODUCTION A BOY was once asked who Cæsar was. He answered that he was a man who wrote a school-book for boys in Latin. I should like to make some American boys realize that writing the Commentaries was one of the least things done by one of the greatest men that ever worked in this world-a man who had a great share in making history. Yet this little book that he wrote, telling about one of his wars, is one of the world's great books—a book which has deeply interested most of the able and active men of the last two thousand years. CHAPTER I CÆSAR i. ROME IN THE TIME OF. CÆSAR IN Cæsar's time the Roman republic had in fact been dead for years. The real governing power had long before passed out of the hands of the body of the citiCondition zens. Periods of anarchy alternated with peof Rome riods of despotism, when all actual authority 100 B. C. was exercised either by a demagogue who had gained influence over the minds of the rabble in the capital, or by a military hero returning from foreign wars at the head of victorious legions. Rome's prime had been in the early days when she was straining every nerve in the ceaseless struggle for suprem |
