triumph. The soldiers followed his chariot, crowned with laurel, and decorated with the military ornaments, which their valour had merited. They appropriated to themselves the honours conferred on their commander; and this commander derived his sweetest reward from the praises of his soldiers, and still more from their coarse raillery, the surest mark of their frankness and esteem. During the first wars of the republic, while Rome contended against enemies in her neighbourhood, and unprovided with regular troops, the victorious consul brought back his legions to the capital, and the troops needed no other winter-quarters than their respective homes. I perceive that in ages the most observant of discipline, the senate granted triumphs for victories which decided the fortune of a campaign, without terminating the war. Fabius Rullianus was allowed to triumph over the Tuscans, Umbrians, Samnites, and Gauls. The senate well knew that the confederacy of those nations was conquered without being subdued; and that the victory of Fabius had given neither possessions nor peace to his country. In the war against Hannibal, the senate indeed varied its conduct, but its principles were unalterable. Rome was obliged to act on the defensive in all the provinces of Italy at once. Whenever a considerable victory allowed her to withdraw the army employed in one of those provinces, she granted a triumph to

* See the Oration of M. Servillius. Tit. Liv. xlv.

↑ T. Liv. x.

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its

its general, that he might not be separated from his troops. When the senate decreed a triumph to Livius Salinator,* his colleague Nero followed his car on horseback, and swelled the train of him whom he had enabled to conquer. One reason for this was, that the army of Livius had returned to Rome, and that the troops commanded by Nero could not be recalled because they then opposed Hannibal. When Rome attacked the great powers of Greece, the East, and Africa, her legions did not recross the sea until they had subdued the countries which they invaded. Triumphs in those wars were purchased only by conquests; and, in consequence of the excellence of those laws whose execution varies with the nature of things, rather than with the passions of men, the increasing majesty of the triumph kept pace with the growing greatness of the state. But from the time that Marius polluted the legions by a mixture of the vilest populace, war became a trade instead of a duty; the troops remained in the provinces; and, in disbanding or calling home the legions, the senate obeyed the maxims of policy rather than those of justice. It became the custom to crown generals, who, after once conquering an enemy, left it for their successors to subdue him, and who conducted back to Rome only a small band of officers and soldiers who were peculiarly attached to them, and who were best qualified to grace their triumph. I shall cite only the example of Lucul

* T. Liv. xxviii.

lus.

lus. He triumphed for his victories over the great Mithridates, so often conquered, yet always so formidable. A glance at Cicero's oration in favour of the Manilian law, will convince us that the Romans were far from thinking this war concluded.

These observations are sufficient to prove that there never existed a code of triumphal laws, such as the fancies of Appian of Alexandria and Onuphrius Panvinius have thought fit to compile. The Egyptian rhetorician and Augustine hermit, being alike unqualified for sounding the profound policy of the senate, have considered as general laws what were only particular examples. The spirit of this wise tribunal, which knew so well how to unite prudence with justice, formed to itself a living law, which comprehended all that variety of cases, concerning many of which the dead letter of written laws must ever be silent, imperfect, or contradictory. The senate compared the abilities of the general with the character of the enemy, the importance of the acquisition with the wisdom or good fortune with which it had been obtained, and the facility of the conquest with the means employed in effecting it. The aged senators, whose authority guided the votes of their assessors, had grown old in military command; and granted rewards whose value they could estimate, to generals whose worth they were capable of appreciating. I perceive also, that they were not less attentive to the safety of the citizens than to the glory of the state; and more than once refused triumphs to victorious consuls, who had purchased their advan

tages by an unnecessary or useless prodigality of Roman blood. They thought it their duty to repress the cruel ambition of leaders, by refusing to them a triumphant return into a city which their exploits had filled with mourning.

There was, as far as I can discover, but one precise condition always required by the senate, namely, the rank and quality of the enemy. The triumph would have been disgraced by granting it for victories over slaves or pirates; their blood too vile, and that of the citizens too precious, equally blasted the laurels of a victorious general.

It belongs to the civil magistrate, rather than to the military commander, to curb the audacity of malefactors, who set at defiance justice and the laws. When bands of robbers become so numerous that they must be opposed by a military force, such wars have always been regarded as more necessary than difficult, and more difficult than glorious. The weakness and tyranny of masters made the slaves in Sicily twice shake off the yoke. The Romans were ashamed to employ their legions against such ignoble adversaries; but their shame was greater to see those legions defeated; and when their generals finally succeeded in repressing the insurrection, the senate was sensible that it had often decreed a triumph for less meritorious exploits. Yet the name of slave was not to be got over; the senate feared lest the triumph should be profaned; to deny it seemed

* Tit. Liv. x.

not

not pregnant with very evil consequences. The victorious generals, therefore, were honoured only with an ovation; which gave to them crowns of myrtle, instead of those of laurel; and entitled them to be attended with a train of peaceful citizens, not by a military procession. The Romans reasonably expected that the dreadful discipline thenceforth established respecting slaves would in future prevent similar revolts. But, by a strange combination of circumstances, the republic was obliged in the same age to carry on two obstinate wars against pirates and gladiators; the one of which endangered the commerce and dignity of the empire, and the other threatened the destruction of the Roman name. Could the senate foresee such events, or uniformly decree the triumph according to rules previously established? But when Crassus had ruined the army of Spartacus, the wisdom of the senate perceived that the public disgrace would be commemorated rather than the glory of the general, by granting to him a triumph for terminating a servile war. The partisans of Pompey would naturally employ on this occasion the eloquence of Cicero; and would be themselves heard with pleasure by the people, when they ascribed to their favourite almost the whole merit of this exploit. Afterwards, when the same Pompey subdued the pirates, the pride of two triumphs, and the laurels which he expected to reap in the Mithridatic war, made him, disdain the honour of an ovation, which Crassus had accepted: and which hence