But as in the case of an
athlete[204] who has obtained the first place among men and has
gloriously vanquished in every contest, his boyish victories are made
of no account and are not registered; so the deeds which Pompeius then
accomplished, though of themselves extraordinary, yet as they were
buried under the number and magnitude of his subsequent struggles and
wars, I have been afraid to disturb them, lest if we should dwell too
long on his first exploits, we should miss the acts and events which
are the most important and best show the character of the man.
IX.[205] Now when Sulla was master of Italy and was proclaimed
Dictator, he rewarded the other officers and generals by making them
rich and promoting them to magistracies and by granting them without
stint and with readiness what they asked for. But as he admired
Pompeius for his superior merit and thought that he would be a great
support to his own interests, he was anxious in some way to attach him
by family relations. Metella, the wife of Sulla, had also the same
wish, and they persuaded Pompeius to put away Antistia and to take to
wife Aemilia, the step-daughter of Sulla, the child of Metella by
Scaurus, who was then living with her husband and was pregnant. This
matter of the marriage was of a tyrannical character, and more suited
to the interests of Sulla than conformable to the character of
Pompeius, for Aemilia, who was pregnant, was taken from another to be
married to him, and Antistia was put away with dishonour and under
lamentable circumstances, inasmuch as she had just lost her father
also, and that, too, on her husband's account; for Antistius was
murdered in the Senate-house because he was considered to be an
adherent of Sulla for the sake of Pompeius; and the mother of Antistia
having witnessed all this put an end to her life, so that this
misfortune was added to the tragedy of the marriage; and in sooth
another besides, for Aemilia herself died immediately afterwards in
child-birth in the house of Pompeius.
Pages:
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313