tanus, says Cicero, was an accomplished man, of refined taste, and he was a good speaker. His elevation to the consulship made him a soldier perhaps in spite of his inclination, for, as we have seen, he only went to the Illyrian war to escape from a troublesome business at Rome. Dionysius mentions him with Cato the Censor as one of the most learned of the Roman historical writers. He wrote on early Roman and Italian history, probably in Latin. It is not said how far he brought his history, but a passage of Gellius proves that it contained at least the first Punic war. He also wrote a treatise on the Roman magistrates.

CHAPTER XVII.

CAIUS GRACCHUS.

B.C. 129-123.

THE moveables of King Attalus were sold by auction at Rome, and the proceeds of the sale came of course into the Roman treasury. The kings of Pergamum were men of taste, and the rich people in Rome had the opportunity of filling their houses with the finest works of Grecian art.

After the capture of Aristonicus the Roman Senate determined to destroy the antient town of Phocaea in the kingdom of Pergamum, because the Phocaeans were their enemies in the war with Aristonicus, and they had also sided with King Antiochus against the Romans. The history of the war with Aristonicus is lost; but we learn from this fact, recorded by Justin, that all the cities of the kingdom of Pergamum were not disposed to submit to the claim of the Romans. Phocaea was saved by the intercession of the people of Massilia (Marseille), a city which was founded by the Phocaeans. The colony now acted the part of a grateful and dutiful child by interceding for its aged parent. Massilia had been in alliance with Rome from a very early time. The alliance was maintained by mutual interest, for Massilia was a maritime rival of Carthage, and had once disputed with the Carthaginians the supremacy of the seas in the northern waters of the Mediterranean. After the capture of Rome by the Galli the Massaliots showed their sympathy by a public mourning, and it is said sent the Romans money. The Romans replied by honourable testimonials to the Massaliots, and a treaty was made as between one independent

power and another. The Roman Senate, we may conjecture, had seen that they would ultimately obtain a footing in Gallia through the alliance with Massilia, and so the prayer of the Massaliots in favour of their metropolis or parent city may have been granted out of considerations of policy.

In the year B.c. 126, in the consulship of M. Aemilius Lepidus and L. Aurelius Orestes, Caius Gracchus was elected a quaestor. Though still a young man he had seven years before been elected one of the commissioners under his brother's Agrarian Law. The province, as the Romans called it, or duty of the quaestors, of whom at this time eight were annually elected, was determined by lot, and Gracchus went with the consul Orestes to Sardinia, where the people were in rebellion against Rome. Sardinia had been a Roman province since B.C. 235. The Senate and the nobles were pleased to be rid for a time of a young man whose abilities and character they feared. After the fray in which Tiberius lost his life, Caius kept quiet, as we are told, and we must suppose that he only attended to his business as a commissioner for executing the law about the Public Land as long as he was in office. Whether the commissioners ever resumed their activity, after the hearing of suits about the Public Land was transferred to the consul Tuditanus, we cannot tell, for our authorities are silent on this matter. It was a tradition that Caius intended to keep aloof from public affairs, but though this may have been said, it does not seem probable. He lived a sober, frugal, industrious life, but he was preparing himself for his future career by diligent study and practice in speaking. The first occasion on which he showed his great powers was the case of his friend Vettius, who was prosecuted on some charge, we know not what, and Caius undertook his defence. The time when he delivered this his first speech is not known, but it was before he was quaestor. The people were wild and frantic with delight when they heard the young orator defend his friend. All the rest of the orators seemed to them mere children compared with Gracchus. His oration in favour of the Lex Papiria, which proposed to make the tribunes re-eligible, was delivered in B.c. 131. In B.C. 126 before leaving Rome for Sardinia, Caius spoke against

the law of the tribune M. Junius Pennus. The object of the law of Pennus was to prevent Peregrini from either visiting Rome or living in the city. Before the Social or Marsic war (B.C. 90) there were only two classes within the Roman dominions who were designated by a political name, Cives Romani or Roman citizens, and Peregrini, a term which comprehended the Latini, the Socii, and the Provinciales, such as the inhabitants of Sicily. The Cives Romani were the citizens of Rome, the citizens of Roman colonies, and the inhabitants of the Municipia which had received the Roman citizenship. The Italian Peregrini used to flock to Rome at the times of the elections and when there was any matter on hand which caused great excitement, and mingling with the people in the assemblies they made disturbance and riot. Among them there might be some of the men whom Scipio had roughly rebuked, when he told them that Italy was their step-mother. It was necessary to clear Rome of these disturbers of the peace. The fact of Caius speaking against the law of Pennus is evidence that he had not abandoned the principles of his brother, for though he might have justly complained of the way in which Pennus proposed to stop the rioting that was now becoming common in Rome, his future conduct makes it very probable that he looked on the Peregrini as men who might be useful allies in political agitation. The law of Pennus was carried.

The first alien law that is mentioned belongs to the year B.C. 177. It enacted that the allies (Socii) and the Latini, who came within the particular description in the Lex, should return to their several towns before the first of November. One of the praetors was commissioned to inquire about those who did not obey the law. Livy explains the reason of the enactment to be this: the Socii and Latini complained that their citizens were entered on the Roman census and migrated to Rome, and that if this was allowed, it would happen in the course of very few Lustra that their towns and lands would be deserted and would not be able to supply Rome with soldiers. It is difficult to determine whether this practice of admitting Peregrini on the lists of the Roman censors, and thus indirectly making them Roman citizens, was merely a fraud by which

some Peregrini contrived to obtain the Roman citizenship, or whether the censors in some cases allowed it to favour particular persons who were willing to settle at Rome. However, the complaint in this case came from the Peregrini, and not from the Romans. The law of Pennus was enacted in the interest of Rome only, and, so far as we know, was not directed against the irregular entry of Peregrini on the lists of citizens. The purpose was to keep Peregrini out of the city altogether. This law too, if it was executed, must have required the attention of some magistrate, and many persons who were settled at Rome would be disturbed and compelled to leave. With such poor materials as we possess for the history of this period we must imagine, for we cannot know, what was the operation of such an enactment. There is however in Valerius Maximus an anecdote told badly, as his anecdotes are often told, but it is worth a short notice; though I doubt if Valerius understood well what he was writing, and some modern writers who have repeated the story certainly have had no idea of the meaning of it. The story of Valerius is this: M. Perperna, he who defeated Aristonicus, was consul before he was a citizen. After Perperna's death his father, who claimed the Roman citizenship and was a defendant in some legal proceedings (about his citizenship, we must suppose), was compelled by the Sabelli to return to his original residence.-If M. Perperna was consul before he was a citizen, he never was a citizen, for he died in Asia in his consulship. The only meaning that can be put on the story is, that M. Perperna's father passed for a Roman citizen and was not one; and that after the death of his son, the father was compelled to leave Rome by force of the law of Pennus. In Valerius the law is named the Lex Papia; but the Lex Papia is of much later date, and therefore we must either assume, as some do, that there was an earlier Lex Papia, of the same time or nearly the same time. as the Lex of Pennus, or that either Valerius or his copyists have made a mistake in the name of the Lex, a conclusion which I hold to be certain.

There is an old story, that Caius was diverted from his intention to live a quiet life by a dream which he had when he was