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and was touched by its openness, however little it was tempered by prudence or reflection. As for this young man, he is said to have observed of him, I know not what he wills, but whatever he does will, he wills with energy.1

1 Cic. ad Att. xiv. 1: Plutarch, Brut. 6.

CHAPTER XVIII.

POMPEIUS SEEKS REFUGE IN EGYPT.-TREACHEROUS POLICY OF THE ADVISERS OF KING PTOLEMÆUS.-POMPEIUS IS ENTICED FROM HIS VESSEL AND MURDERED. -THE FUGITIVES FROM PHARSALIA REASSEMBLE AT DYRRHACHIUM AND CORCYRA. CICERO WITHDRAWS FROM THE CONTEST.-SCIPIO ASSUMES THE COMMAND.-CÆSAR FOLLOWS IN PURSUIT OF POMPEIUS: RECEIVES THE SUBMISSION OF C. CASSIUS: REACHES EGYPT, AND UNDERTAKES TO SETTLE THE AFFAIRS OF THAT KINGDOM.-FASCINATIONS OF CLEOPATRA.-DISCONTENT OF THE ALEXANDRIANS: THEY RISE AGAINST CESAR AND BLOCKADE HIM IN THE PALACE.THE ALEXANDRIAN WAR: INTRIGUES, DEFEAT AND DEATH OF PTOLEMÆUS.CESAR PLACES CLEOPATRA ON HIS THRONE.-PHARNACES ATTACKS THE ALLIES OF THE REPUBLIC, AND DEFEATS CALVINUS.-CÆSAR MARCHES AGAINST HIM HE IS ROUTED AT THE BATTLE OF ZELA AND SLAIN.-ARROGANCE OF THE Conqueror, a. u. 706, 707. B. c. 48, 47.

Pompeius

escapes to the sea-coast:

cost: he takes ship,

seeks his wife

HE remnant of the vast Pompeian host was scattered in various directions. No reserve had been provided on the battle field, nor had any place been assigned in the neighbourhood for rallying in the event of disaster. The fleet was far distant, and dispersed on various petty enterprizes. Yet the resources which remained to so great a party, even after its signal defeat, were abundant and manifold.' But Pompeius himself, mortified and bewildered, abandoned every thing, and sought only to save his own life. He fled through Larissa, declining the shelter of its walls, and, penetrating the defiles of Tempe, gained the Thessalian shore

1 Lucan, viii. 273. :

"Sparsit potius Pharsalia nostras Quam subvertit opes."

VOL. II.--16

and son at Les. bos, and finally asylum in Egypt.

demands an

at the mouth of the Peneus.' Here he fell in with a merchant vessel lying off the coast, the master of which recognized and generously offered to take him on board, together with Lentulus Spinther, Lentulus Crus the consul of the preceding year, Favonius, the Galatian chieftain Deiotarus, and a few more. Pompeius dismissed the slaves who had hitherto accompanied him, assuring them that they at least had nothing to fear from the conqueror: it was to the loyalty of Favonius that he owed the common offices of menial attendance. The master of the vessel undertook to carry him wherever he should appoint. Pompeius merely cast anchor off Amphipolis, in Macedonia, in order to provide himself with a sum of money, and then steered for Lesbos, where his wife Cornelia, and his younger son, Sextus, were also received on board. From thence, without a moment's delay, the fugitives proceeded to run along the Asiatic coast, and were joined in their progress by another vessel with a few more adherents of the ill-fated cause. Among these were some personages of rank: when at last they landed on the shores of Cilicia, a miniature senate was convened, and a mock deliberation held under the presidency of the late consul, to determine what course should finally be taken. We are assured, strange as it may appear, that the wish of Pompeius himself was to seek an asylum in Parthia. Whether he hoped to lead the murderers of Crassus against his detested rival, or only to watch in security the progress of events, nothing can show more strongly than such a project the state of abject humiliation to which he was reduced. Orodes had just inflicted another insult upon the majesty of the republic in throwing her ambassador, Hirrus, into chains, because Pompeius had refused to buy his alliance by the surrender of Syria. It was but too evident that his consent to receive Pompeius himself must be obtained by submitting to still greater sacrifices. But to these affronts Pompeius, it appears, could have submitted; the arguments which

1 Plut. Pomp. 73.

2 Dion (xlii. 2.) cannot believe it possible that Pompeius contemplated taking refuge in Parthia,

induced him to renounce such a plan were drawn from the danger it seemed to threaten to his own person, or at least to the honour of his handsome wife.' The next alternative which suggested itself was to retire into Africa, where the king of Numidia had proved his devotion to the benefactor to whom he owed his sceptre, by his signal service in the destruction of Curio. In Africa two legions awaited their general's arrival, flushed with victory and devoted to his party. The resources of the province were immense: it offered its harbours for the reception of his magnificent fleets; while, separated from Europe by the breadth of the Mediterranean, it might defy Cæsar for months even to approach it. The fatuity of Pompeius in deciding against the course which held out so flattering a prospect seems indeed inconceivable. But it would appear that he still looked fondly to the East as the quarter of the world associated with his greatest triumphs, and where the prestige of his name had taken, as he ima gined, the deepest root. Perhaps he wished to make himself at all events independent of the succour of his own country

men.

State of Egypt.

Quarrel bemæus and Cleo

tween Ptole

patra.

The king whom the Roman government had imposed upon the Egyptian people had died three years previously. He had requited the favour of the republic by a will' in which he had placed his kingdom under the guardianship of Rome, while he nominated his son Dionysius, or, as he was afterwards called, Ptolemæus the Twelfth, and his daughter Cleopatra, both under age, as joint successors to his throne. In accordance with the national usages, this joint authority had been consolidated by the marriage of the brother and sister, the former of whom was seventeen years of age, and the latter about two years his senior. The senate had appointed Pompeius guardian of the kingdom, and possibly the authority this appointment gave him, and the influence he already exercised through it, assisted in determining his choice of a place of

1 Plut. Pomp. 76.; Lucan, viii. 412.; Appian, B. C. ii. 83. Cæs. B. C. iii. 108.

refuge. But, at the moment of his arrival off the shores of Egypt, the existing government was less than ever competent to extend its protection to so dangerous a suppliant. The throne had become an object of contention between the brother and sister. Cleopatra had been driven from Alexandria by a popular insurrection, and the ministers of her youthful consort, who had apparently instigated the tumult, took advantage of its success to exclude her from her share in the sovereignty. The royal child was directed in all his counsels by a junta consisting of Pothinus, a Greek eunuch of the court, Theodotus, a rhetorician, who held the ostensible office of preceptor to the sovereign, and Achillas, an officer of the Egyptian army.' These men had acquired a complete ascendency over their tender charge, and they used their influence unscrupulously for the furtherance of their private schemes. They had stationed Ptolemæus at the head of his troops in the neighbourhood of Pelusium, to await on the frontiers of the kingdom the invasion of Cleopatra, who had found means to raise a military force for the assertion of her rights. The hostile armies were arrayed almost in sight of each other at the foot of the Casian hills, when Pompeius appeared off the coast with a slender flotilla bearing about two thousand soldiers, whom he had collected in his flight. The royal ministers hoped to exclude the republic, in the state of anarchy into which it appeared to have fallen, from the interference it had so long exercised in the affairs of Egypt; they might also apprehend that the new comer, if admitted within their confines, would rather assist the injured sister than confirm the usurpation of the brother. Pompeius Pompeius re- sent a message to the young king requesting the lum at Alexan- favour of a hospitable reception. His application dria. Crafty gave rise to anxious discussion in the royal counking's advisers. cil. If any of the king's ministers was honest and bold enough to insist on the obligations of good faith and gratitude, his counsels were speedily overruled by the arguments of a subtler policy. It was dangerous to expose the

quests an asy

policy of the

1

1 Plut. Pomp. 77.

Cæs. B. C. iii. 103.

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