Yet these
easy-going lovers of the picturesque have a truthfulness of their own.
easy-going lovers of the picturesque have a truthfulness of their own.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v16 - Lev to Mai
It was at the age of twenty-five
that Linnæus made the most notable of his many long, lonely botan-
ical excursions. He set out from Upsala and wandered afoot or on
horseback northward through endless pine and birch woods, tundras,
and meadows, and along the shores of countless lakes into Lapland,
beyond the Arctic Circle; now wading in spongy bogs, now crossing
broad glacier pavements and moraines and smooth ice-burnished
bosses of rock, fringed with heathworts and birch: a wonderful jour-
ney of forty-six hundred miles, full of exciting experiences and charm-
ing plants. He brought back hundreds of specimens new to science,
among which was a little fragrant evergreen that he liked the best
of all. Soon after his return he handed a specimen of it to his friend
Gronovius, pointed out its characters, and requested him to describe
it and name it for him; saying that somehow he felt that this lit-
tle plant was related to him and like him. So it was called Linnæa
borealis, and keeps his memory green and flowery and fragrant all
round the cool woods of the world.
Only last summer, when I was in the wildest part of the Rocky
Mountains, where glaciers still linger and waterfalls like ribbons hang
down the unscalable cliffs, I found Linnæa spreading and blooming
in glorious exuberance far and wide over mossy ground, beneath
spruce and pine, - the wildest and the gentlest, the most beautiful
and most loveful of all the inhabitants of the wilderness.
Wherever Linnæa dwells, you will find enchanting woods and
the dearest of the small plant-people, chiogenes, Clintonia, orchids,
heathworts, and hosts of bright mosses wearing golden crowns. No
breath of malaria comes near Linnæa. The air and the scenery are
always good enough for gods or men, and a divine charm pervades it
that no mortal can escape. In Linnæan woods I always feel willing
to encamp forever and forego even heaven. Never was man's mem-
ory more blessedly embalmed than is the memory of immortal Lin-
næus in this little flower. All around the cool ends of the world,
while wild beauty endures, the devout pilgrim will see-
"-beneath dim aisles in odorous beds,
The slight Linnæa hang its twin-born heads,
And bless the monument of the man of flowers,
Which breathes his sweet fame through the northern bowers. "
John Mins
## p. 9084 (#84) ############################################
9084
LINNEUS
LAPLAND OBSERVATIONS
From the Lachesis Lapponica '
JUN
UNE 11. -Being Sunday, and a day of continued rain, I re-
mained at Umœa.
June 12. I took my departure very early in the morn-
ing. The weather was so hazy I could not see the distance of
half a gunshot before me. I wandered along in a perpetual
mist, which made the grass as wet as if it had rained. The sun
appeared quite dim, wading as it were through the clouds. By
nine o'clock the mists began to disperse, and the sun shone forth.
The spruce fir (Pinus Abies), hitherto of a uniform dark green,
now began to put forth its lighter-colored buds, a welcome sign
of advancing summer.
---
Chamoedaphne of Buxbaum (Andromeda polifolia) was at this
time in its highest beauty, decorating the marshy grounds in a
most agreeable manner. The flowers are quite blood-red before
they expand, but when full-grown the corolla is of a flesh color.
Scarcely any painter's art can so happily imitate the beauty of a
fine female complexion; still less could any artificial color upon
the face itself bear a comparison with this lovely blossom. As
I contemplated it, I could not help thinking of Andromeda as
described by the poets; and the more I meditated upon their
descriptions, the more applicable they seemed to the little plant
before me,- so that if these writers had it in view, they could
scarcely have contrived a more apposite fable. Andromeda is
represented by them as a virgin of most exquisite and unrivaled
charms, but these charms remain in perfection only so long as
she retains her virgin purity; which is also applicable to the
plant, now preparing to celebrate its nuptials. This plant is
always fixed on some little turfy hillock in the midst of the
swamps, as Andromeda herself was chained to a rock in the sea,
which bathed her feet as the fresh water does the roots of the
plant. Dragons and venomous serpents surrounded her, as toads
and other reptiles frequent the abode of her vegetable prototype,
and when they pair in the spring, throw mud and water over
its leaves and branches. As the distressed virgin cast down her
blushing face through excessive affliction, so does the rosy-colored
flower hang its head, growing paler and paler till it withers away.
Hence, as this plant forms a new genus, I have chosen for it
the name of Andromeda.
## p. 9085 (#85) ############################################
LINNEUS
9085
Everywhere near the road grew the Mesomara or herbaceous
cornel (Cornus suecica, very minutely described in Fl. Lapp. , ed.
2, 39; see also English Botany, v. 5, t. 310).
All the little woods and copses by the roadside abounded with
butterflies of the Fritillary tribe, without silver spots. The great
dragon-fly with two flat lobes at its tail (Libellula forcipata), and
another species with blue wings (L. Virgo), were also common.
Various modes of rocking children in cradles are adopted in
different places. In Småland the cradle is suspended by an elas-
tic pole, on which it swings up and down perpendicularly. The
poorer Laplanders rock their infants on branches of trees, but
those of superior rank have cradles that commonly roll from side
to side. In the part of the country where I was now traveling,
the cradles rock vertically, or from head to foot.
Close to the road hung the under jaw of a horse, having six
fore teeth, much worn and blunted, two canine teeth, and at a
distance from the latter twelve grinders, six on each side. If I
knew how many teeth and of what peculiar form, as well as how
many udders, and where situated, each animal has, I should per-
haps be able to contrive a most natural methodical arrangement
of quadrupeds.
June 15-This day afforded me nothing much worthy of
notice. The sea in many places came very near the road, lash-
ing the stony crags with its formidable waves. In some parts it
gradually separated small islands here and there from the main-
land, and in others manured the sandy beach with mud. The
weather was fine.
In one marshy spot grew what is probably a variety of the
cranberry (Vaccinium Oxycoccus), differing only in having ex-
tremely narrow leaves, with smaller flowers and fruit than usual.
The common kind was intermixed with it, but the difference of
size was constant. The Pinguicula grew among them, sometimes
with round, sometimes with more oblong leaves.
The bilberry (Vaccinium Myrtillus) presented itself most com-
monly with red flowers, more rarely with flesh-colored ones.
Myrica Gale, which I had not before met with in West Bothnia,
grew sparingly in the marshes.
In the evening, a little before the sun went down, I was
assailed by such multitudes of gnats as surpass all imagination.
They seemed to occupy the whole atmosphere, especially when I
traveled through low or damp meadows. They filled my mouth,
## p. 9086 (#86) ############################################
9086
LINNEUS
nose, and eyes, for they took no pains to get out of my way.
Luckily they did not attack me with their bites or stings, though
they almost choked me. When I grasped at the cloud before me,
my hands were filled with myriads of these insects, all crushed
to pieces with a touch, and by far too minute for description.
The inhabitants call them Knort, or Knott (Culex reptans), by
mistake called C. pulicaris in Fl. Lapp. , ed. 2, 382.
Just at sunset I reached the town of Old Pitheå, having pre-
viously crossed a broad river in a ferry-boat. Near this spot
stood a gibbet, with a couple of wheels, on which lay the bodies
of two Finlanders without heads. These men had been executed
for highway robbery and murder. They were accompanied by
the quartered body of a Laplander who had murdered one of his
relations.
Immediately on entering the town I procured a lodging, but
had not been long in bed before I perceived a glare of light on
the wall of my chamber. I was alarmed with the idea of fire;
but on looking out of the window, saw the sun rising, perfectly
red, which I did not expect would take place so soon. The cock
crowed, the birds began to sing, and sleep was banished from my
eyelids.
Translation of James Edward Smith.
THE AUTHOR VISITS THE LAPLAND ALPS
From Lachesis Lapponica': Date July 6
M
Y COMPANION Was a Laplander, who served me both as serv-
ant and interpreter. In the latter capacity his assistance
was highly requisite, few persons being to be met with
on these alps who are acquainted with the Swedish language; nor
was I willing to trust myself alone among these wild people, who
were ignorant for what purpose I came. I had already suffered
much in the Lapland part of Umeå for want of knowing the
language. Nor was my companion wanted less to assist me in
carrying what was necessary; for I had sufficient incumbrances.
of my own, without being the bearer of our provisions into the
bargain.
On my first ascending these wild alps, I felt as if in a new
world. Here were no forests to be seen; nothing but mountains
upon mountains, larger and larger as I advance, all covered with
## p. 9087 (#87) ############################################
LINNEUS
9087
snow. No road, no tracks, nor any signs of inhabitants were vis-
ible. The verdure of summer seemed to shun this frozen region,
retiring into the deep valleys between the mountains. I saw
very few birds, except some ptarmigans, which the Laplanders call
Cheruna (Tetrao Lagopus), running with their young along the
vales. The delightful season of spring, whose cheering influence
on man and all living nature I had so lately experienced in the
beginning of my journey, seemed an alien here. The declining
sun never disappeared sufficiently to allow any cooling shade; and
by climbing to the more elevated parts of these lofty mountains
I could see it at midnight above the horizon. When I cast my
eyes over the grass and herbage, there were few objects I had
seen before, so that all nature was alike strange to me. I sat
down to collect and describe these vegetable rarities, while the
time passed unperceived away; and my interpreter was obliged to
remind me that we had still five or six miles to go to the nearest
Laplander, and that if we had a mind for any reindeer meat, we
ought to bestir ourselves quickly. We therefore proceeded up and
down the snowy hills; sometimes passing along their precipitous
sides, which was the most difficult traveling of all, and for many
a long way we walked over heaps of stones. About the evening
of the following day we reached the nearest spot where any Lap-
lander we met at that time settled. The man we met with gave
me a very good reception, and furnished me with a couple of
reindeer skins to sleep between. Immediately after my arrival,
the herd, consisting of seven or eight hundred head of reindeer,
came home. These were milked, and some of the milk was
boiled for my entertainment; but it proved rather too rich for
my stomach.
My host furnished me with his own spoon, which
he carried in his tobacco-bag. On my expressing a wish, through
my interpreter, to have the spoon washed, my Lapland friend
immediately complied, taking a mouthful of water and spitting it.
over the spoon.
After having satisfied my hunger and refreshed myself with
sleep, I steered my course directly southwest, towards the alps
of Pitheå, proceeding from thence to the lofty icy mountains or
main ridge of the country. A walk of scarcely above four or
five miles further brought me to the western edge of this ridge;
for I was desirous of examining that side of the mountains to see
how it agreed with the eastern part. I had no sooner arrived
at the icy mountains than a storm overtook me, accompanied by
## p. 9088 (#88) ############################################
9088
LINNÆUS
a shower of thin pieces of ice, which soon formed an icy crust
over my own clothes and those of my conductor. The severity
of the cold obliged me to borrow the gloves and lappmudd (coat
of reindeer skin) from the man who accompanied me. But the
weather proved more favorable as soon as we had crossed the
summit of the ridge. From hence the verdant appearance of
Norway, lying far beneath us, was very delightful. The whole
country was perfectly green, and notwithstanding its vast extent,
looked like a garden in miniature, for the tallest trees appeared
not above a span high. As we began to descend the alps, it
seemed as if we should soon arrive at the lower country; but our
calculations were very inadequate to what we found its actual
distance. At length, however, we reached the plains of which we
had enjoyed so stupendous a prospect. Nothing could be more
delightful to my feelings than this transition from all the severity.
of winter to the warmth and beauty of summer. The verdant
herbage, the sweet-scented clover, the tall grass reaching up to
my arms, the grateful flavor of the wild fruits, and the fine
weather which welcomed me to the foot of the alps, seemed to
refresh me both in mind and body.
Here I found myself close to the sea-coast.
I took up my
abode at the house of a shipmaster, with whom I made an agree-
ment to be taken in a boat, the following day, along the coast.
I much wished to approach the celebrated whirlpool called the
Maelstrom, but I could find nobody willing to venture near it.
We set sail the next morning according to appointment; but
the wind proved contrary, and the boatmen were after a while
exhausted with rowing. Meantime I amused myself in examining
various petrifactions, zoöphytes, and submarine plants of the
Fucus tribe, which occupied every part of the coast. In the
evening I arrived at the house of Mr. Rask, the pastor of Torf-
jorden, who gave me a kind reception.
Next day we proceeded further on our voyage; but the con-
trary wind exhausted our patience, and we veered about, soon
reaching the place from whence we had first set out, the wind
being directly in our favor for that purpose.
On the following morning I climbed one of the neighboring
mountains, with the intention of measuring its height. While I
was reposing in perfect tranquillity on the side of the hill, busied
only in loosening a stone which I wanted to examine, I heard
the report of a gun at a small distance below. I was too far off
## p. 9089 (#89) ############################################
LINNEUS
9089
to receive any hurt, however, so thanks to Providence I escaped;
but my alarm may be easily imagined. Perceiving the man who.
had fired the gun, I pursued him to a considerable distance to
prevent his charging his piece a second time; and I determined
never to go there again without some protection. I inquired who
it could be that had made this unprovoked attack, but found it
impossible to gain any information on the subject.
On the 15th of July we set out on our return; and that whole
day was employed in climbing the mountains again, to our no
small fatigue and exhaustion, the ground we had to pass over
being so extremely steep as well as lofty. When we reached the
cold snowy mountains, indeed, we had sufficient opportunity to
cool ourselves.
From hence we turned our course towards the alps of Tor-
neå, which were described to me as about forty miles distant.
What I endured in the course of this journey is hardly to be
described. How many weary steps was I obliged to take in order
to climb the precipices that came in my way, and how excessive
were my perspiration and fatigue! Nor were these the worst.
evils we had to encounter before we reached Caituma. Some-
times we were enveloped with clouds, so that we could not see
before us; sometimes rivers impeded our progress, and obliged
us either to choose a very circuitous path, or to wade naked
through the cold snow-water. This fresh snow-water, however,
proved a most welcome and salutary refreshment; for without it
we should never have been able to encounter the excessive heat
of the weather. Water was our only drink during this journey,
but it never proved so refreshing as when we sucked it out of
the melting snow.
Having nearly reached the Lapland village of Caituma,-
the inhabitants of which seemed perfectly wild, running away
from their huts as soon as they perceived us approaching from
a considerable distance,-I began to be tired of advancing fur-
ther up into this inhospitable country. We had not at this time
tasted bread for several days, the stock we had brought with
us being entirely exhausted. The rich milk of the reindeer was
too heavy to be eaten without bread.
I determined
therefore to return towards Quick jock, which was forty miles
from this spot. In the course of my journey thither, walking
rather carelessly over the snow, without noticing a hole which
the water had made, I fell through the icy crust into the deep.
XVI-569
―――――――――
## p. 9090 (#90) ############################################
LINNEUS
9090
snow. The interpreter and guide were totally unable to assist
me, the cavity in which I lay being very steep, and so hollowed
out by the water that it surrounded me like a wall. It was not
in their power to reach me without a rope, which they luckily
were able to procure to drag me out of the hole. I received
a blow on my thigh in the fall, the effects of which I felt for
a month afterwards. One of my guides had met with a similar
accident but a week before.
At length we arrived at Quickjock, after having been four.
weeks without tasting bread. Those who have not experienced
the want of this essential support of life can scarcely imagine
how hard it is to be deprived of it so long, even with a super-
fluity of all other kinds of food. I remained four days at Quick-
jock to recruit my strength, and afterwards descended the river
again to Luleå. There being no boat to be had north of Pur-
kijaur, we were obliged to construct a raft for ourselves. Our
voyage was very perilous, for the wind and current both com-
bined to overset us; so that it was not without the greatest
exertion we saved ourselves: and it being night, nobody heard
our cries for assistance.
The next day I was conducted to the river of Calatz, to see
the manner of fishing for pearls, and on the 30th of July arrived
at Luleå.
Translation of James Edward Smith.
## p. 9090 (#91) ############################################
## p. 9090 (#92) ############################################
ANGE
LIVY
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## p. 9090 (#93) ############################################
0591
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LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
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or ra* 1:1 For the dying rule of the old senatorial ansect.
for
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## p. 9090 (#94) ############################################
LIVY
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## p. 9091 (#95) ############################################
9091
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
(59 B. C. -17 A. D. )
BY WILLIAM CRANSTON LAWTON
"HISTORY" is to be held firmly to its original meaning,
investigation, Livy hardly deserves to be classed among his-
torians at all. Certainly we shall not wonder that Macaulay
condemns him, with his usual unsparing vigor; and we can but smile
at Dante's no less sweeping indorsement of "Livy, who erreth not! "
Nevertheless, fiction widely accepted is often infinitely more power-
ful in molding the minds of later men, than forgotten reality. The
obscure beginnings of Roman political life will never be adequately
illuminated; but the Æneid, and the romantic inventions of the an-
nalists, will probably never wholly fade from the imagination of
mankind so long as any record of earlier civilizations is preserved
and conned.
In this, and in many other respects, Livy is not un
unworthy of a
place beside Herodotus. Like his Greek predecessor and master,
the Roman author also may more fairly be described as an essay-
ist. Each treated a single theme of immense importance, with con-
summate charm in narration and description. Each was so successful
as to overshadow and outlive all rivals. Neither had any glimmer
of "modern methods of research. " Indeed, it is difficult to realize
that Herodotus was a contemporary of Thucydides; while Livy, it is
very probable, actually had Polybius's conscientious work among the
scanty volumes upon which he drew for his materials.
Yet these
easy-going lovers of the picturesque have a truthfulness of their own.
Through their books, as by no others, we come to realize how the
terrific pageant of Xerxes, the heroic march of the legions toward
world-wide dominion, impressed the imagination of contemporaries.
So it has come to pass, not unnaturally, that the favorite dream for
centuries of those who love best the antique life and literature has
been the recovery of Livy's lost volumes, the complete possession of
his hundred and forty-two books on the story of Rome.
Livy was born just before Cæsar's great campaigns in Gaul be-
gan; and was just too young to bear arms when Brutus, Cassius, and
Cicero flung their lives away in the last struggle for "freedom,».
or rather for the dying rule of the old senatorial aristocracy. The
-
## p. 9092 (#96) ############################################
9092
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
comparatively peaceful and settled conditions under Augustus's sway,
Livy accepted at best with the resignation of Horace, certainly not
with the enthusiastic subservience of Virgil. Like Catullus, Nepos,
and other gallant spirits of the age, Livy came from beyond the Po.
His native city Padua was famed, says Pliny, for purity of morals.
He evidently enjoyed all the advantages of wealth and good social
position. He early acquired some repute as a writer on philosophic
themes, and composed a manual of rhetoric, dedicated to his son, in
which the study of Demosthenes and Cicero was especially urged.
These are just the studies from which we would wish to know that
Livy approached his life task. A passage in the first book (§19, 3)
reveals that he is writing in 27 or 26 B. C. The account stopped at
the death of Drusus in 9 B. C. , as we learn from the scanty abstract
of the lost books. We are told-by the epitomator - that the last
two decades were composed after Augustus's death (14 A. D. ) This
is hardly credible, as Livy's own life closed at Padua only three
years later. Still, he may have been surprised by death in the midst
of a final rapid effort to complete the record for that most memora-
ble of reigns.
We have preserved for us the first, third, and fourth decades
entire, half the fifth in a rather tattered condition, the epitome just
mentioned, and meagre bits cited by later authors,-notably the
famous passage on Cicero's lack of stoicism in disaster. There is
extant, then, about a fourth of the whole work; for which, entire,
Martial declares his own library had not room! The scale was not
colossal, however, considering the magnitude of the theme. Livy's
achievement coincided most exactly in length with Charles Knight's
"History of England,' which in general purpose and scope also, as in
the genial, truth-loving, yet warmly patriotic spirit of the author,
may perhaps deserve mention in the same breath.
The subdivision, already alluded to, into groups of five and ten
books each, was made by Livy himself, and helps to render the parts
still extant far less tantalizing and fragmentary than might be sup-
posed. Thus Books i. -v. carry the story down to the sack of Rome
by the Gauls, in 390 B. C. Book vi. opens with a fresh preface, con-
fessing that the scanty memorials which had ever existed from the
earlier time had nearly all perished at that crisis in the burning city.
We are now promised a clearer and more trustworthy account for
the later periods. This throws an amusing light backward upon the
graphic details, the copious speeches reported verbatim, etc. , already
provided for the regal and early republican times! We give below,
for instance, the passage upon which Macaulay's ballad of 'Horatius
at the Bridge' leans so heavily. The very existence of Tarquin, Lars
Porsena, and the rest, is debatable; and certainly Livy's account,
## p. 9093 (#97) ############################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9093
beginning like Virgil's with the destruction of Troy and Æneas's
flight to Italy, must be read in quite the same spirit as the great
patriotic epic itself. Both contain something far mightier than pain-
fully sought historic truth; namely, what the Romans taught their
children to believe concerning the remote past.
Books xxi. -xxx. , again, contain a complete account of the Hanni-
balic war. Here the historic element is altogether larger, and the
struggle between patriotic detestation of the Carthaginian, and chiv-
alric admiration for valor and good generalship, reveals Livy's own
pleasing nature with great clearness. All this may be supported
even by so brief a passage as the opening characterization of Hanni-
bal, here cited.
Livy is at his best in the speeches with which all his books were
thickly studded. These have usually little or no historical foundation,
but are revelations of the purpose and character of the chief actors,
as Livy saw them. His broad descriptions of battles, marches, etc. ,
are probably drawn with almost as free a hand. Certainly he did
not as a rule embarrass or limit himself by any accurate study of the
topography on the spot. These strictures apply less than usual to
his picture of the fight by Lake Trasimenus, where he was upon
ground familiar to him, as it is to many of his modern readers.
We get a little out of patience at times with Livy's assurances of
Roman magnanimity and Punic treachery. Curiously enough, how-
ever, after these have occurred in speeches, or even in Livy's own
introductory remarks, the clear stream of the narrative proper often
runs in quite another direction. Occasionally, again, we get a purely
humorous variation on the hackneyed theme; as when the school-
master of Falerii leads his princely boys into the besiegers' camp, and
the Romans equip the youths with long sticks, to flog the treacherous
pedagogue back into the beleaguered town! Again, Livy is too good
a rhetorician to make the alien speeches notably weaker than the
Roman pleas. When Rome repudiated the disgraceful peace which
released her army from the Caudine Forks, and offered up to Samnite
vengeance the consuls who had exceeded their powers, but refused
to send the army back into the trap, the gallant Samnite Pontius
cried out:-
-
"Will you always find a pretext for repudiating the pledges made
in defeat? You gave hostages to Porsena-and by stealth withdrew
them. With gold you redeemed your city from the Gauls: they were
cut down in the act of receiving it. You pledged us peace, to regain
your legions: that peace you now cancel. Always you cover deception
with some fair mask of justice. "
Our heaviest loss is doubtless in the later books. Livy seems to
have written with dignified frankness on the period of the civil wars.
## p. 9094 (#98) ############################################
9094
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
For instance, he expressed a doubt whether the life of the great
Julius had been on the whole a curse or a blessing; and his admira-
tion for the dictator's military rival caused Augustus to stigmatize
the historian good-humoredly as a "Pompeian. " Such a man must
have left a record, based largely upon his own memories, far more
connected and impartial than Cicero's letters, more trustworthy than
the late and inferior historians yet extant. Livy detested both ex-
tremes, tyranny and democracy. He took a pessimistic view of the
present and future of Rome; and indeed he counts it a sufficient
reward for his labor that "while reviewing in thought those earlier
days," he may "escape, at least for the time, from the many evils
which this generation has seen. "
Upon the whole, then, Livy can hardly be assigned a place at all
among scientific investigators of historical fact; since the chief mon-
uments and other data, even in Rome itself, rarely attracted his crit-
ical attention. He was a fair-minded, patriotic man, of wide culture
and exquisite taste, a master of rhetoric, a delightful story-teller,
with a fair respect for truth, but-endowed with a dangerously vivid
imagination. Many, perhaps most, of his best passages, are true only
as Landor's Imaginary Conversations' are: true to artistic taste,
and usually also to the larger historical outlines of the character
described.
The text of Livy is in very bad condition, and numberless heroic
emendations have been necessary. Here the bold methods of the
great Danish critic Madvig have found their most fitting field: a large
proportion of Livy's sentences have first become intelligible under
this surgeon's healing hand. Even of the extant books there is no
adequate annotated edition in English. That of Weissenborn, with
German notes, is indispensable to Latinists. The best recent piece
of translation is Books xxi. -xxv. , by Church and Brodribb (to whom
are especially indebted also for a complete English Tacitus. )
This volume, attractively printed by Macmillans in their Classical
Series, is the best introduction to Livy for the English student.
The Bohn, though oppressively literal, is not remarkably inaccurate.
we
The lost books of Livy are not likely to reappear. Indeed, abridg-
ments and epitomes displaced them largely even under the early
empire; and the very epigram of Martial, cited above, evidently
accompanied such a condensation :-
―
"Here into scanty parchment is monstrous Livy rolled;
He whom by no means when entire my library could hold! »
William Cranston Lawton.
## p. 9095 (#99) ############################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9095
HORATIUS COCLES AT THE SUBLICIAN BRIDGE
From the Second Book of the History of Rome'
THE
HE Sublician bridge well-nigh afforded a passage to the enemy,
had there not been one man, Horatius Cocles (that defense
the fortune of Rome had on that day), who, happening to
be posted on guard at the bridge, when he saw the Janiculum
taken by a sudden assault, and that the enemy were pouring
down from thence in full speed, and that his own party in terror
and nfusion were abandoning their arms and ranks,-laying
hold of them one by one, standing in their way, and appealing to
the faith of gods and men, he declared "That their flight would
avail them nothing if they deserted their post; if they passed the
bridge and left it behind them, there would soon be more of the
enemy in the Palatium and Capitol than in the Janiculum: for
that reason he advised and charged them to demolish the bridge,
by their sword, by fire, or by any means whatever; that he would
stand the shock of the enemy as far as could be done by one
man. "
He then advanced to the first entrance of the bridge, and
being easily distinguished among those who showed their backs
in retreating from the fight, facing about to engage the foe hand
to hand, by his surprising bravery he terrified the enemy. Two
indeed a sense of shame kept with him,-Spurius Lartius and
Titus Herminius; men eminent for their birth, and renowned for
their gallant exploits. With them he for a short time stood the
first storm of the danger, and the severest brunt of the battle.
But as they who demolished the bridge called upon them to
retire, he obliged them also to withdraw to a place of safety on a
small portion of the bridge still left. Then casting his stern eyes
round all the officers of the Etrurians in a threatening manner,
he sometimes challenged them singly, sometimes reproached them
all: "the slaves of haughty tyrants, who, regardless of their own
freedom, came to oppress the liberty of others. " They hesitated
for a considerable time, looking round one at the other, to com-
mence the fight: shame then put the army in motion, and a
shout being raised, they hurl their weapons from all sides on their
single adversary; and when they all stuck in the shield held.
before him, and he with no less obstinacy kept possession of the
bridge with firm step, they now endeavored to thrust him down
from it by one push, when at once the crash of the falling bridge,
## p. 9096 (#100) ###########################################
9096
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
at the same time a shout of the Romans raised for joy at having
completed their purpose, checked their ardor with sudden panic.
Then Cocles says, "Holy father Tiberinus, I pray that thou
wouldst receive these arms and this thy soldier in thy propitious
stream. " Armed as he was, he leaped into the Tiber, and amid
showers of darts hurled on him, swam across safe to his party,
having dared an act which is likely to obtain more fame than
belief with posterity. The State was grateful towards such valor:
a statue was erected to him in the Comitium, and as much land
was given to him as he plowed around in one day. The zeal of
private individuals also was conspicuous among the public honors.
For amid the great scarcity, each person contributed something
to him according to his supply at home, depriving himself of his
own support.
Porsena being repulsed in his first attempt, having changed
his plans from a siege to a blockade, after he had placed a gar-
rison in Janiculum, pitched his camp in the plain and on the
banks of the Tiber. Then sending for boats from all parts, both
to guard the river so as not to suffer any provision to be con-
veyed to Rome, and also to transport his soldiers across the river
to plunder different places as occasion required,-in a short time
he so harassed the entire country round Rome, that not only
everything else from the country, but even their cattle, was
driven into the city, and nobody durst venture thence without the
gates. This liberty of action was granted to the Etrurians, not
more through fear than from policy; for Valerius, intent on an
opportunity of falling unawares upon a number of them, and
when straggling, a remiss avenger in trifling matters, reserved the
weight of his vengeance for more important occasions. Where-
fore, to decoy the pillagers, he ordered his men to drive their
cattle the next day out at the Esquiline gate, which was farthest
from the enemy; presuming that they would get intelligence of
it, because during the blockade and famine some slaves would
turn traitors and desert. Accordingly they were informed of it
by a deserter; and parties more numerous than usual, in hopes
of seizing the entire body, crossed the river. Then Publius Va-
lerius commanded Titus Herminius with a small body of men to
lie concealed two miles from the city, on the Gabian road, and
Spurius Lartius with a party of light-armed troops to post himself
at the Colline gate, till the enemy should pass by, and then to
throw himself in their way so that there might be no return to
## p. 9097 (#101) ###########################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9097
the river. The other consul, Titus Lucretius, marched out of the
Nævian gate with some companies of soldiers; Valerius himself
led some chosen cohorts down from the Cœlian Mount, and they
were first descried by the enemy. Herminius, when he perceived
the alarm, rose out of ambush and fell upon the rear of the
Tuscans, who had charged Valerius. The shout was returned on
the right and left, from the Colline gate on the one hand and the
Nævian on the other. By this stratagem the plunderers were put
to the sword between both, they not being a match in strength.
for fighting, and all the ways being blocked up to prevent
escape: this put an end to the Etrurians strolling about in so
disorderly a manner.
Nevertheless the blockade continued, and there was a scarcity.
of corn, with a very high price. Porsena entertained a hope that
by continuing the siege he should take the city; when Caius
Mucius, a young nobleman, to whom it seemed a disgrace that the
Roman people, who when enslaved under kings had never been
confined within their walls, in any war nor by any enemy, should
now, when a free people, be blocked up by these very Etrurians
whose armies they had often routed,-thinking that such indig-
nity should be avenged by some great and daring effort, at first
designed of his own accord to penetrate into the enemy's camp.
Then, being afraid if he went without the permission of the
consuls, or the knowledge of any one, he might be seized by the
Roman guards and brought back as a deserter, the circumstances.
of the city at the time justifying the charge, he went to the
Senate: "Fathers," says he, "I intend to cross the Tiber, and
enter the enemy's camp, if I can; not as a plunderer, or as an
avenger in our turn of their devastations. A greater deed is in
my mind, if the gods assist. " The Senate approved his design.
He set out with a sword concealed under his garment. When
he came thither, he stationed himself among the thickest of the
crowd, near the King's tribunal. There, where the soldiers were
receiving their pay, the King's secretary, sitting beside him
dressed nearly in the same style, was busily engaged (and to
him they commonly addressed themselves); being afraid to ask
which of them was Porsena, lest by not knowing the King he
should discover himself, as fortune blindly directed the blow he
killed the secretary instead of the King. Then as he was going
off thence, where with his bloody dagger he had made his way
through the dismayed multitude, a concourse being attracted at
## p. 9098 (#102) ###########################################
9098
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
the noise, the King's guards immediately seized and brought him
back, standing alone before the King's tribunal; even then, amid
such menaces of fortune, more capable of inspiring dread than of
feeling it, "I am," says he, "a Roman citizen; my name is
Caius Mucius: an enemy, I wished to slay an enemy; nor have
I less of resolution to suffer death than I had to inflict it. Both
to act and to suffer with fortitude is a Roman's part. Nor have
I alone harbored such feelings towards you; there is after me a
long train of persons aspiring to the same honor. Therefore, if
you choose it, prepare yourself for this peril, to contend for your
life every hour; to have the sword and the enemy in the very
entrance of your pavilion: this is the war which we, the Roman
youth, declare against you; dread not an army in array, nor a
battle, the affair will be to yourself alone and with each of
us singly. "
When the King, highly incensed, and at the same time terri-
fied at the danger, in a menacing manner commanded fires to
be kindled about him, if he did not speedily explain the plots
which by his threats he had darkly insinuated against him, then
Mucius said, "Behold me, that you may be sensible of how little
account the body is to those who have great glory in view;"
and immediately he thrusts his right hand into the fire that was
lighted for the sacrifice. When he continued to broil it as if he
had been quite insensible, the King, astonished at this surprising
sight, after he had leaped from his throne and commanded the
young man to be removed from the altar, says, "Begone, having
acted more like an enemy towards thyself than me. I would en-
courage thee to persevere in thy valor, if that valor stood on the
side of my country. I now dismiss thee untouched and unhurt,
exempted from the right of war. " Then Mucius, as if making a
return for the kindness, says, "Since bravery is honored by you,
so that you have obtained by kindness that which you could not
by threats, three hundred of us, the chief of the Roman youth,
have conspired to attack you in this manner. It was my lot
first. The rest will follow, each in his turn, according as the lot
shall set him forward, unless fortune shall afford an opportunity
of slaying you. "
Mucius being dismissed,- to whom the cognomen of Scævola
was afterwards given, from the loss of his right hand,-ambas-
sadors from Porsena followed him to Rome.
attempt, from which nothing had saved him
The risk of the first
but the mistake of
## p. 9099 (#103) ###########################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9099
the assailant, and the risk to be encountered so often in propor-
tion to the number of conspirators, made so strong an impression.
upon him [Porsena], that of his own accord he made propositions
of peace to the Romans.
Translation of D. Spillan.
THE CHARACTER OF HANNIBAL
From the Twenty-first Book of the
History of Rome'
H
ANNIBAL was sent to Spain, and instantly on his arrival at-
tracted the admiration of the whole army. Young Hamil-
car was restored to them, thought the veterans, as they saw
in him the same animated look and penetrating eye, the same
expression, the same features. Soon he made them feel that his
father's memory was but a trifling aid to him in winning their
esteem. Never had man a temper that adapted itself better to
the widely diverse duties of obedience and command, till it was
hard to decide whether he was more beloved by the general or
the army.
There was no one whom Hasdrubal preferred to put
in command, whenever courage and persistency were specially
needed; no officer under whom the soldiers were more confident
and more daring. Bold in the extreme in incurring peril, he was
perfectly cool in its presence. No toil could weary his body or
conquer his spirit. Heat and cold he bore with equal endurance;
the cravings of nature, not the pleasure of the palate, determined
the measure of his food and drink. His waking and sleeping
hours were not regulated by day and night. Such time as busi-
ness left him, he gave to repose; but it was not on a soft couch
or in stillness that he sought it. Many a man often saw him
wrapped in his military cloak, lying on the ground amid the
sentries and pickets. His dress was not one whit superior to
that of his comrades, but his accoutrements and horses were con-
spicuously splendid. Among the cavalry or the infantry he was
by far the first soldier; the first in battle, the last to leave it
when once begun.
These great virtues in the man were equaled by monstrous
vices: inhuman cruelty, a worse than Punic perfidy. Absolutely
false and irreligious, he had no fear of God, no regard for an
oath, no scruples.
Translation of Church and Brodribb.
## p. 9100 (#104) ###########################################
9100
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
THE BATTLE OF LAKE TRASIMENE
H
From the Twenty-second Book of the History of Rome ›
ANNIBAL devastated with all the horrors of war the country
between Cortona and Lake Trasumennus, seeking to infuri-
ate the Romans into avenging the sufferings of their allies.
They had now reached a spot made for an ambuscade, where the
lake comes up close under the hills of Cortona. Between them
is nothing but a very narrow road, for which room seems to have
been purposely left. Further on is some comparatively broad
level ground. From this rise the hills, and here in the open
plain Hannibal pitched a camp for himself and his African and
Spanish troops only; his slingers and other light-armed troops he
marched to the rear of the hills; his cavalry he stationed at the
mouth of the defile, behind some rising ground which conven-
iently sheltered them. When the Romans had once entered the
pass and the cavalry had barred the way, all would be hemmed
in by the lake and the hills.
Flaminius had reached the lake at sunset the day before. On
the morrow, without reconnoitring and while the light was still
uncertain, he traversed the narrow pass. As his army began to
deploy into the widening plain, he could see only that part of
the enemy's force which was in front of him; he knew nothing
of the ambuscade in his rear and above his head. The Cartha-
ginian saw his wish accomplished. He had his enemy shut in
by the lake and the hills, and surrounded by his own troops.
He gave the signal for a general charge, and the attacking col-
umns flung themselves on the nearest points. To the Romans
the attack was all the more sudden and unexpected because the
mist from the lake lay thicker on the plains than on the heights,
while the hostile columns on the various hills had been quite
visible to each other and had therefore advanced in concert. As
for the Romans, with the shout of battle rising all round them,
before they could see plainly they found themselves surrounded;
and fighting began in their front and their flanks before they
could form in order, get ready their arms, or draw their swords.
Amidst universal panic the consul showed all the courage that
could be expected in circumstances so alarming. The broken
ranks, in which every one was turning to catch the discordant
shouts, he re-formed as well as time and place permitted; and as
## p. 9101 (#105) ###########################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9101
far as his presence or his voice could reach, bade his men stand
their ground and fight. "It is not by prayers," he cried, “or
entreaties to the gods, but by strength and courage that you must
win your way out. The sword cuts a path through the midst of
the battle; and the less fear, there for the most part the less
danger. " But such was the uproar and confusion, neither encour-
agements nor commands could be heard; so far were the men
from knowing their standards, their ranks, or their places, that
they had scarcely presence of mind to snatch up their arms and
address them to the fight, and some found them an overwhelm-
ing burden rather than a protection. So dense too was the mist,
that the ear was of more service than the eye. The groans of
the wounded, the sound of blows on body or armor, the mingled
shouts of triumph or panic, made them turn this way and that an
eager gaze. Some would rush in their flight on a dense knot of
combatants, and become entangled in the mass; others returning
to the battle would be carried away by the crowd of fugitives.
But after awhile, when charges had been vainly tried in every
direction, when it was seen that the hills and the lake shut them
in on either side, and the hostile lines in front and rear, when it
was manifest that the only hope of safety lay in their own right
hands and swords, then every man began to look to himself
for guidance and for encouragement, and there began afresh what
was indeed a new battle. No battle was it with its three ranks
of combatants, its vanguard before the standards and its second
line fighting behind them, with every soldier in his own legion,
cohort, or company: chance massed them together, and each
man's impulse assigned him his post, whether in the van or rear.
So fierce was their excitement, so intent were they on the battle,
that not one of the combatants felt the earthquake which laid
whole quarters of many Italian cities in ruins, changed the
channels of rapid streams, drove the sea far up into rivers, and
brought down enormous landslips from the hills.
For nearly three hours they fought, fiercely everywhere, but
with especial rage and fury round the consul. It was to him
that the flower of the army attached themselves. He, wherever
he found his troops hard pressed or distressed, was indefatigable
in giving help; conspicuous in his splendid arms, the enemy
assailed and his fellow Romans defended him with all their
might. At last an Insubrian trooper (his name was Ducarius),
recognizing him also by his face, cried to his comrades, "See!
-
## p. 9102 (#106) ###########################################
9102
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
this is the man who slaughtered our legions, and laid waste our
fields and our city: I will offer him as a sacrifice to the shades
of my countrymen whom he so foully slew. " Putting spurs to
his horse, he charged through the thickest of the enemy, struck
down the armor-bearer who threw himself in the way of his
furious advance, and ran the consul through with his lance.
When he would have stripped the body, some veterans thrust
their shields between and hindered him.
Then began the flight of a great part of the army. And now
neither lake nor mountain checked their rush of panic; by every
defile and height they sought blindly to escape, and arms and
men were heaped upon each other. Many, finding no possibility
of flight, waded into the shallows at the edge of the lake, ad-
vanced until they had only head and shoulders above the water,
and at last drowned themselves. Some in the frenzy of panic
endeavored to escape by swimming; but the endeavor was end-
less and hopeless, and they either sunk in the depths when their
courage failed them, or they wearied themselves in vain till they
could hardly struggle back to the shallows, where they were
slaughtered in crowds by the enemy's cavalry which had now
entered the water. Nearly six thousand men of the vanguard
made a determined rush through the enemy, and got clear out
of the defile, knowing nothing of what was happening behind
Halting on some high ground, they could only hear the
shouts of men and clashing of arms, but could not learn or see
for the mist how the day was going. It was when the battle
was decided, that the increasing heat of the sun scattered the
mist and cleared the sky. The bright light that now rested
on hill and plain showed a ruinous defeat and a Roman army
shamefully routed. Fearing that they might be seen in the dis-
tance and that the cavalry might be sent against them, they took
up their standards and hurried away with all the speed they
could. The next day, finding their situation generally desperate,
and starvation also imminent, they capitulated to Hannibal, who
had overtaken them with the whole of his cavalry, and who
pledged his word that if they would surrender their arms, they
should go free, each man having a single garment. The promise
was kept with Punic faith by Hannibal, who put them all in
chains.
Such was the famous fight at Trasumennus, memorable as
few other disasters of the Roman people have been. Fifteen
## p. 9103 (#107) ###########################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9103
thousand men fell in the battle; ten thousand, flying in all direc-
tions over Etruria, made by different roads for Rome. Of the
enemy two thousand five hundred fell in the battle.
that Linnæus made the most notable of his many long, lonely botan-
ical excursions. He set out from Upsala and wandered afoot or on
horseback northward through endless pine and birch woods, tundras,
and meadows, and along the shores of countless lakes into Lapland,
beyond the Arctic Circle; now wading in spongy bogs, now crossing
broad glacier pavements and moraines and smooth ice-burnished
bosses of rock, fringed with heathworts and birch: a wonderful jour-
ney of forty-six hundred miles, full of exciting experiences and charm-
ing plants. He brought back hundreds of specimens new to science,
among which was a little fragrant evergreen that he liked the best
of all. Soon after his return he handed a specimen of it to his friend
Gronovius, pointed out its characters, and requested him to describe
it and name it for him; saying that somehow he felt that this lit-
tle plant was related to him and like him. So it was called Linnæa
borealis, and keeps his memory green and flowery and fragrant all
round the cool woods of the world.
Only last summer, when I was in the wildest part of the Rocky
Mountains, where glaciers still linger and waterfalls like ribbons hang
down the unscalable cliffs, I found Linnæa spreading and blooming
in glorious exuberance far and wide over mossy ground, beneath
spruce and pine, - the wildest and the gentlest, the most beautiful
and most loveful of all the inhabitants of the wilderness.
Wherever Linnæa dwells, you will find enchanting woods and
the dearest of the small plant-people, chiogenes, Clintonia, orchids,
heathworts, and hosts of bright mosses wearing golden crowns. No
breath of malaria comes near Linnæa. The air and the scenery are
always good enough for gods or men, and a divine charm pervades it
that no mortal can escape. In Linnæan woods I always feel willing
to encamp forever and forego even heaven. Never was man's mem-
ory more blessedly embalmed than is the memory of immortal Lin-
næus in this little flower. All around the cool ends of the world,
while wild beauty endures, the devout pilgrim will see-
"-beneath dim aisles in odorous beds,
The slight Linnæa hang its twin-born heads,
And bless the monument of the man of flowers,
Which breathes his sweet fame through the northern bowers. "
John Mins
## p. 9084 (#84) ############################################
9084
LINNEUS
LAPLAND OBSERVATIONS
From the Lachesis Lapponica '
JUN
UNE 11. -Being Sunday, and a day of continued rain, I re-
mained at Umœa.
June 12. I took my departure very early in the morn-
ing. The weather was so hazy I could not see the distance of
half a gunshot before me. I wandered along in a perpetual
mist, which made the grass as wet as if it had rained. The sun
appeared quite dim, wading as it were through the clouds. By
nine o'clock the mists began to disperse, and the sun shone forth.
The spruce fir (Pinus Abies), hitherto of a uniform dark green,
now began to put forth its lighter-colored buds, a welcome sign
of advancing summer.
---
Chamoedaphne of Buxbaum (Andromeda polifolia) was at this
time in its highest beauty, decorating the marshy grounds in a
most agreeable manner. The flowers are quite blood-red before
they expand, but when full-grown the corolla is of a flesh color.
Scarcely any painter's art can so happily imitate the beauty of a
fine female complexion; still less could any artificial color upon
the face itself bear a comparison with this lovely blossom. As
I contemplated it, I could not help thinking of Andromeda as
described by the poets; and the more I meditated upon their
descriptions, the more applicable they seemed to the little plant
before me,- so that if these writers had it in view, they could
scarcely have contrived a more apposite fable. Andromeda is
represented by them as a virgin of most exquisite and unrivaled
charms, but these charms remain in perfection only so long as
she retains her virgin purity; which is also applicable to the
plant, now preparing to celebrate its nuptials. This plant is
always fixed on some little turfy hillock in the midst of the
swamps, as Andromeda herself was chained to a rock in the sea,
which bathed her feet as the fresh water does the roots of the
plant. Dragons and venomous serpents surrounded her, as toads
and other reptiles frequent the abode of her vegetable prototype,
and when they pair in the spring, throw mud and water over
its leaves and branches. As the distressed virgin cast down her
blushing face through excessive affliction, so does the rosy-colored
flower hang its head, growing paler and paler till it withers away.
Hence, as this plant forms a new genus, I have chosen for it
the name of Andromeda.
## p. 9085 (#85) ############################################
LINNEUS
9085
Everywhere near the road grew the Mesomara or herbaceous
cornel (Cornus suecica, very minutely described in Fl. Lapp. , ed.
2, 39; see also English Botany, v. 5, t. 310).
All the little woods and copses by the roadside abounded with
butterflies of the Fritillary tribe, without silver spots. The great
dragon-fly with two flat lobes at its tail (Libellula forcipata), and
another species with blue wings (L. Virgo), were also common.
Various modes of rocking children in cradles are adopted in
different places. In Småland the cradle is suspended by an elas-
tic pole, on which it swings up and down perpendicularly. The
poorer Laplanders rock their infants on branches of trees, but
those of superior rank have cradles that commonly roll from side
to side. In the part of the country where I was now traveling,
the cradles rock vertically, or from head to foot.
Close to the road hung the under jaw of a horse, having six
fore teeth, much worn and blunted, two canine teeth, and at a
distance from the latter twelve grinders, six on each side. If I
knew how many teeth and of what peculiar form, as well as how
many udders, and where situated, each animal has, I should per-
haps be able to contrive a most natural methodical arrangement
of quadrupeds.
June 15-This day afforded me nothing much worthy of
notice. The sea in many places came very near the road, lash-
ing the stony crags with its formidable waves. In some parts it
gradually separated small islands here and there from the main-
land, and in others manured the sandy beach with mud. The
weather was fine.
In one marshy spot grew what is probably a variety of the
cranberry (Vaccinium Oxycoccus), differing only in having ex-
tremely narrow leaves, with smaller flowers and fruit than usual.
The common kind was intermixed with it, but the difference of
size was constant. The Pinguicula grew among them, sometimes
with round, sometimes with more oblong leaves.
The bilberry (Vaccinium Myrtillus) presented itself most com-
monly with red flowers, more rarely with flesh-colored ones.
Myrica Gale, which I had not before met with in West Bothnia,
grew sparingly in the marshes.
In the evening, a little before the sun went down, I was
assailed by such multitudes of gnats as surpass all imagination.
They seemed to occupy the whole atmosphere, especially when I
traveled through low or damp meadows. They filled my mouth,
## p. 9086 (#86) ############################################
9086
LINNEUS
nose, and eyes, for they took no pains to get out of my way.
Luckily they did not attack me with their bites or stings, though
they almost choked me. When I grasped at the cloud before me,
my hands were filled with myriads of these insects, all crushed
to pieces with a touch, and by far too minute for description.
The inhabitants call them Knort, or Knott (Culex reptans), by
mistake called C. pulicaris in Fl. Lapp. , ed. 2, 382.
Just at sunset I reached the town of Old Pitheå, having pre-
viously crossed a broad river in a ferry-boat. Near this spot
stood a gibbet, with a couple of wheels, on which lay the bodies
of two Finlanders without heads. These men had been executed
for highway robbery and murder. They were accompanied by
the quartered body of a Laplander who had murdered one of his
relations.
Immediately on entering the town I procured a lodging, but
had not been long in bed before I perceived a glare of light on
the wall of my chamber. I was alarmed with the idea of fire;
but on looking out of the window, saw the sun rising, perfectly
red, which I did not expect would take place so soon. The cock
crowed, the birds began to sing, and sleep was banished from my
eyelids.
Translation of James Edward Smith.
THE AUTHOR VISITS THE LAPLAND ALPS
From Lachesis Lapponica': Date July 6
M
Y COMPANION Was a Laplander, who served me both as serv-
ant and interpreter. In the latter capacity his assistance
was highly requisite, few persons being to be met with
on these alps who are acquainted with the Swedish language; nor
was I willing to trust myself alone among these wild people, who
were ignorant for what purpose I came. I had already suffered
much in the Lapland part of Umeå for want of knowing the
language. Nor was my companion wanted less to assist me in
carrying what was necessary; for I had sufficient incumbrances.
of my own, without being the bearer of our provisions into the
bargain.
On my first ascending these wild alps, I felt as if in a new
world. Here were no forests to be seen; nothing but mountains
upon mountains, larger and larger as I advance, all covered with
## p. 9087 (#87) ############################################
LINNEUS
9087
snow. No road, no tracks, nor any signs of inhabitants were vis-
ible. The verdure of summer seemed to shun this frozen region,
retiring into the deep valleys between the mountains. I saw
very few birds, except some ptarmigans, which the Laplanders call
Cheruna (Tetrao Lagopus), running with their young along the
vales. The delightful season of spring, whose cheering influence
on man and all living nature I had so lately experienced in the
beginning of my journey, seemed an alien here. The declining
sun never disappeared sufficiently to allow any cooling shade; and
by climbing to the more elevated parts of these lofty mountains
I could see it at midnight above the horizon. When I cast my
eyes over the grass and herbage, there were few objects I had
seen before, so that all nature was alike strange to me. I sat
down to collect and describe these vegetable rarities, while the
time passed unperceived away; and my interpreter was obliged to
remind me that we had still five or six miles to go to the nearest
Laplander, and that if we had a mind for any reindeer meat, we
ought to bestir ourselves quickly. We therefore proceeded up and
down the snowy hills; sometimes passing along their precipitous
sides, which was the most difficult traveling of all, and for many
a long way we walked over heaps of stones. About the evening
of the following day we reached the nearest spot where any Lap-
lander we met at that time settled. The man we met with gave
me a very good reception, and furnished me with a couple of
reindeer skins to sleep between. Immediately after my arrival,
the herd, consisting of seven or eight hundred head of reindeer,
came home. These were milked, and some of the milk was
boiled for my entertainment; but it proved rather too rich for
my stomach.
My host furnished me with his own spoon, which
he carried in his tobacco-bag. On my expressing a wish, through
my interpreter, to have the spoon washed, my Lapland friend
immediately complied, taking a mouthful of water and spitting it.
over the spoon.
After having satisfied my hunger and refreshed myself with
sleep, I steered my course directly southwest, towards the alps
of Pitheå, proceeding from thence to the lofty icy mountains or
main ridge of the country. A walk of scarcely above four or
five miles further brought me to the western edge of this ridge;
for I was desirous of examining that side of the mountains to see
how it agreed with the eastern part. I had no sooner arrived
at the icy mountains than a storm overtook me, accompanied by
## p. 9088 (#88) ############################################
9088
LINNÆUS
a shower of thin pieces of ice, which soon formed an icy crust
over my own clothes and those of my conductor. The severity
of the cold obliged me to borrow the gloves and lappmudd (coat
of reindeer skin) from the man who accompanied me. But the
weather proved more favorable as soon as we had crossed the
summit of the ridge. From hence the verdant appearance of
Norway, lying far beneath us, was very delightful. The whole
country was perfectly green, and notwithstanding its vast extent,
looked like a garden in miniature, for the tallest trees appeared
not above a span high. As we began to descend the alps, it
seemed as if we should soon arrive at the lower country; but our
calculations were very inadequate to what we found its actual
distance. At length, however, we reached the plains of which we
had enjoyed so stupendous a prospect. Nothing could be more
delightful to my feelings than this transition from all the severity.
of winter to the warmth and beauty of summer. The verdant
herbage, the sweet-scented clover, the tall grass reaching up to
my arms, the grateful flavor of the wild fruits, and the fine
weather which welcomed me to the foot of the alps, seemed to
refresh me both in mind and body.
Here I found myself close to the sea-coast.
I took up my
abode at the house of a shipmaster, with whom I made an agree-
ment to be taken in a boat, the following day, along the coast.
I much wished to approach the celebrated whirlpool called the
Maelstrom, but I could find nobody willing to venture near it.
We set sail the next morning according to appointment; but
the wind proved contrary, and the boatmen were after a while
exhausted with rowing. Meantime I amused myself in examining
various petrifactions, zoöphytes, and submarine plants of the
Fucus tribe, which occupied every part of the coast. In the
evening I arrived at the house of Mr. Rask, the pastor of Torf-
jorden, who gave me a kind reception.
Next day we proceeded further on our voyage; but the con-
trary wind exhausted our patience, and we veered about, soon
reaching the place from whence we had first set out, the wind
being directly in our favor for that purpose.
On the following morning I climbed one of the neighboring
mountains, with the intention of measuring its height. While I
was reposing in perfect tranquillity on the side of the hill, busied
only in loosening a stone which I wanted to examine, I heard
the report of a gun at a small distance below. I was too far off
## p. 9089 (#89) ############################################
LINNEUS
9089
to receive any hurt, however, so thanks to Providence I escaped;
but my alarm may be easily imagined. Perceiving the man who.
had fired the gun, I pursued him to a considerable distance to
prevent his charging his piece a second time; and I determined
never to go there again without some protection. I inquired who
it could be that had made this unprovoked attack, but found it
impossible to gain any information on the subject.
On the 15th of July we set out on our return; and that whole
day was employed in climbing the mountains again, to our no
small fatigue and exhaustion, the ground we had to pass over
being so extremely steep as well as lofty. When we reached the
cold snowy mountains, indeed, we had sufficient opportunity to
cool ourselves.
From hence we turned our course towards the alps of Tor-
neå, which were described to me as about forty miles distant.
What I endured in the course of this journey is hardly to be
described. How many weary steps was I obliged to take in order
to climb the precipices that came in my way, and how excessive
were my perspiration and fatigue! Nor were these the worst.
evils we had to encounter before we reached Caituma. Some-
times we were enveloped with clouds, so that we could not see
before us; sometimes rivers impeded our progress, and obliged
us either to choose a very circuitous path, or to wade naked
through the cold snow-water. This fresh snow-water, however,
proved a most welcome and salutary refreshment; for without it
we should never have been able to encounter the excessive heat
of the weather. Water was our only drink during this journey,
but it never proved so refreshing as when we sucked it out of
the melting snow.
Having nearly reached the Lapland village of Caituma,-
the inhabitants of which seemed perfectly wild, running away
from their huts as soon as they perceived us approaching from
a considerable distance,-I began to be tired of advancing fur-
ther up into this inhospitable country. We had not at this time
tasted bread for several days, the stock we had brought with
us being entirely exhausted. The rich milk of the reindeer was
too heavy to be eaten without bread.
I determined
therefore to return towards Quick jock, which was forty miles
from this spot. In the course of my journey thither, walking
rather carelessly over the snow, without noticing a hole which
the water had made, I fell through the icy crust into the deep.
XVI-569
―――――――――
## p. 9090 (#90) ############################################
LINNEUS
9090
snow. The interpreter and guide were totally unable to assist
me, the cavity in which I lay being very steep, and so hollowed
out by the water that it surrounded me like a wall. It was not
in their power to reach me without a rope, which they luckily
were able to procure to drag me out of the hole. I received
a blow on my thigh in the fall, the effects of which I felt for
a month afterwards. One of my guides had met with a similar
accident but a week before.
At length we arrived at Quickjock, after having been four.
weeks without tasting bread. Those who have not experienced
the want of this essential support of life can scarcely imagine
how hard it is to be deprived of it so long, even with a super-
fluity of all other kinds of food. I remained four days at Quick-
jock to recruit my strength, and afterwards descended the river
again to Luleå. There being no boat to be had north of Pur-
kijaur, we were obliged to construct a raft for ourselves. Our
voyage was very perilous, for the wind and current both com-
bined to overset us; so that it was not without the greatest
exertion we saved ourselves: and it being night, nobody heard
our cries for assistance.
The next day I was conducted to the river of Calatz, to see
the manner of fishing for pearls, and on the 30th of July arrived
at Luleå.
Translation of James Edward Smith.
## p. 9090 (#91) ############################################
## p. 9090 (#92) ############################################
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LIVY
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## p. 9090 (#93) ############################################
0591
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## p. 9090 (#94) ############################################
LIVY
8000030
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## p. 9091 (#95) ############################################
9091
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
(59 B. C. -17 A. D. )
BY WILLIAM CRANSTON LAWTON
"HISTORY" is to be held firmly to its original meaning,
investigation, Livy hardly deserves to be classed among his-
torians at all. Certainly we shall not wonder that Macaulay
condemns him, with his usual unsparing vigor; and we can but smile
at Dante's no less sweeping indorsement of "Livy, who erreth not! "
Nevertheless, fiction widely accepted is often infinitely more power-
ful in molding the minds of later men, than forgotten reality. The
obscure beginnings of Roman political life will never be adequately
illuminated; but the Æneid, and the romantic inventions of the an-
nalists, will probably never wholly fade from the imagination of
mankind so long as any record of earlier civilizations is preserved
and conned.
In this, and in many other respects, Livy is not un
unworthy of a
place beside Herodotus. Like his Greek predecessor and master,
the Roman author also may more fairly be described as an essay-
ist. Each treated a single theme of immense importance, with con-
summate charm in narration and description. Each was so successful
as to overshadow and outlive all rivals. Neither had any glimmer
of "modern methods of research. " Indeed, it is difficult to realize
that Herodotus was a contemporary of Thucydides; while Livy, it is
very probable, actually had Polybius's conscientious work among the
scanty volumes upon which he drew for his materials.
Yet these
easy-going lovers of the picturesque have a truthfulness of their own.
Through their books, as by no others, we come to realize how the
terrific pageant of Xerxes, the heroic march of the legions toward
world-wide dominion, impressed the imagination of contemporaries.
So it has come to pass, not unnaturally, that the favorite dream for
centuries of those who love best the antique life and literature has
been the recovery of Livy's lost volumes, the complete possession of
his hundred and forty-two books on the story of Rome.
Livy was born just before Cæsar's great campaigns in Gaul be-
gan; and was just too young to bear arms when Brutus, Cassius, and
Cicero flung their lives away in the last struggle for "freedom,».
or rather for the dying rule of the old senatorial aristocracy. The
-
## p. 9092 (#96) ############################################
9092
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
comparatively peaceful and settled conditions under Augustus's sway,
Livy accepted at best with the resignation of Horace, certainly not
with the enthusiastic subservience of Virgil. Like Catullus, Nepos,
and other gallant spirits of the age, Livy came from beyond the Po.
His native city Padua was famed, says Pliny, for purity of morals.
He evidently enjoyed all the advantages of wealth and good social
position. He early acquired some repute as a writer on philosophic
themes, and composed a manual of rhetoric, dedicated to his son, in
which the study of Demosthenes and Cicero was especially urged.
These are just the studies from which we would wish to know that
Livy approached his life task. A passage in the first book (§19, 3)
reveals that he is writing in 27 or 26 B. C. The account stopped at
the death of Drusus in 9 B. C. , as we learn from the scanty abstract
of the lost books. We are told-by the epitomator - that the last
two decades were composed after Augustus's death (14 A. D. ) This
is hardly credible, as Livy's own life closed at Padua only three
years later. Still, he may have been surprised by death in the midst
of a final rapid effort to complete the record for that most memora-
ble of reigns.
We have preserved for us the first, third, and fourth decades
entire, half the fifth in a rather tattered condition, the epitome just
mentioned, and meagre bits cited by later authors,-notably the
famous passage on Cicero's lack of stoicism in disaster. There is
extant, then, about a fourth of the whole work; for which, entire,
Martial declares his own library had not room! The scale was not
colossal, however, considering the magnitude of the theme. Livy's
achievement coincided most exactly in length with Charles Knight's
"History of England,' which in general purpose and scope also, as in
the genial, truth-loving, yet warmly patriotic spirit of the author,
may perhaps deserve mention in the same breath.
The subdivision, already alluded to, into groups of five and ten
books each, was made by Livy himself, and helps to render the parts
still extant far less tantalizing and fragmentary than might be sup-
posed. Thus Books i. -v. carry the story down to the sack of Rome
by the Gauls, in 390 B. C. Book vi. opens with a fresh preface, con-
fessing that the scanty memorials which had ever existed from the
earlier time had nearly all perished at that crisis in the burning city.
We are now promised a clearer and more trustworthy account for
the later periods. This throws an amusing light backward upon the
graphic details, the copious speeches reported verbatim, etc. , already
provided for the regal and early republican times! We give below,
for instance, the passage upon which Macaulay's ballad of 'Horatius
at the Bridge' leans so heavily. The very existence of Tarquin, Lars
Porsena, and the rest, is debatable; and certainly Livy's account,
## p. 9093 (#97) ############################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9093
beginning like Virgil's with the destruction of Troy and Æneas's
flight to Italy, must be read in quite the same spirit as the great
patriotic epic itself. Both contain something far mightier than pain-
fully sought historic truth; namely, what the Romans taught their
children to believe concerning the remote past.
Books xxi. -xxx. , again, contain a complete account of the Hanni-
balic war. Here the historic element is altogether larger, and the
struggle between patriotic detestation of the Carthaginian, and chiv-
alric admiration for valor and good generalship, reveals Livy's own
pleasing nature with great clearness. All this may be supported
even by so brief a passage as the opening characterization of Hanni-
bal, here cited.
Livy is at his best in the speeches with which all his books were
thickly studded. These have usually little or no historical foundation,
but are revelations of the purpose and character of the chief actors,
as Livy saw them. His broad descriptions of battles, marches, etc. ,
are probably drawn with almost as free a hand. Certainly he did
not as a rule embarrass or limit himself by any accurate study of the
topography on the spot. These strictures apply less than usual to
his picture of the fight by Lake Trasimenus, where he was upon
ground familiar to him, as it is to many of his modern readers.
We get a little out of patience at times with Livy's assurances of
Roman magnanimity and Punic treachery. Curiously enough, how-
ever, after these have occurred in speeches, or even in Livy's own
introductory remarks, the clear stream of the narrative proper often
runs in quite another direction. Occasionally, again, we get a purely
humorous variation on the hackneyed theme; as when the school-
master of Falerii leads his princely boys into the besiegers' camp, and
the Romans equip the youths with long sticks, to flog the treacherous
pedagogue back into the beleaguered town! Again, Livy is too good
a rhetorician to make the alien speeches notably weaker than the
Roman pleas. When Rome repudiated the disgraceful peace which
released her army from the Caudine Forks, and offered up to Samnite
vengeance the consuls who had exceeded their powers, but refused
to send the army back into the trap, the gallant Samnite Pontius
cried out:-
-
"Will you always find a pretext for repudiating the pledges made
in defeat? You gave hostages to Porsena-and by stealth withdrew
them. With gold you redeemed your city from the Gauls: they were
cut down in the act of receiving it. You pledged us peace, to regain
your legions: that peace you now cancel. Always you cover deception
with some fair mask of justice. "
Our heaviest loss is doubtless in the later books. Livy seems to
have written with dignified frankness on the period of the civil wars.
## p. 9094 (#98) ############################################
9094
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
For instance, he expressed a doubt whether the life of the great
Julius had been on the whole a curse or a blessing; and his admira-
tion for the dictator's military rival caused Augustus to stigmatize
the historian good-humoredly as a "Pompeian. " Such a man must
have left a record, based largely upon his own memories, far more
connected and impartial than Cicero's letters, more trustworthy than
the late and inferior historians yet extant. Livy detested both ex-
tremes, tyranny and democracy. He took a pessimistic view of the
present and future of Rome; and indeed he counts it a sufficient
reward for his labor that "while reviewing in thought those earlier
days," he may "escape, at least for the time, from the many evils
which this generation has seen. "
Upon the whole, then, Livy can hardly be assigned a place at all
among scientific investigators of historical fact; since the chief mon-
uments and other data, even in Rome itself, rarely attracted his crit-
ical attention. He was a fair-minded, patriotic man, of wide culture
and exquisite taste, a master of rhetoric, a delightful story-teller,
with a fair respect for truth, but-endowed with a dangerously vivid
imagination. Many, perhaps most, of his best passages, are true only
as Landor's Imaginary Conversations' are: true to artistic taste,
and usually also to the larger historical outlines of the character
described.
The text of Livy is in very bad condition, and numberless heroic
emendations have been necessary. Here the bold methods of the
great Danish critic Madvig have found their most fitting field: a large
proportion of Livy's sentences have first become intelligible under
this surgeon's healing hand. Even of the extant books there is no
adequate annotated edition in English. That of Weissenborn, with
German notes, is indispensable to Latinists. The best recent piece
of translation is Books xxi. -xxv. , by Church and Brodribb (to whom
are especially indebted also for a complete English Tacitus. )
This volume, attractively printed by Macmillans in their Classical
Series, is the best introduction to Livy for the English student.
The Bohn, though oppressively literal, is not remarkably inaccurate.
we
The lost books of Livy are not likely to reappear. Indeed, abridg-
ments and epitomes displaced them largely even under the early
empire; and the very epigram of Martial, cited above, evidently
accompanied such a condensation :-
―
"Here into scanty parchment is monstrous Livy rolled;
He whom by no means when entire my library could hold! »
William Cranston Lawton.
## p. 9095 (#99) ############################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9095
HORATIUS COCLES AT THE SUBLICIAN BRIDGE
From the Second Book of the History of Rome'
THE
HE Sublician bridge well-nigh afforded a passage to the enemy,
had there not been one man, Horatius Cocles (that defense
the fortune of Rome had on that day), who, happening to
be posted on guard at the bridge, when he saw the Janiculum
taken by a sudden assault, and that the enemy were pouring
down from thence in full speed, and that his own party in terror
and nfusion were abandoning their arms and ranks,-laying
hold of them one by one, standing in their way, and appealing to
the faith of gods and men, he declared "That their flight would
avail them nothing if they deserted their post; if they passed the
bridge and left it behind them, there would soon be more of the
enemy in the Palatium and Capitol than in the Janiculum: for
that reason he advised and charged them to demolish the bridge,
by their sword, by fire, or by any means whatever; that he would
stand the shock of the enemy as far as could be done by one
man. "
He then advanced to the first entrance of the bridge, and
being easily distinguished among those who showed their backs
in retreating from the fight, facing about to engage the foe hand
to hand, by his surprising bravery he terrified the enemy. Two
indeed a sense of shame kept with him,-Spurius Lartius and
Titus Herminius; men eminent for their birth, and renowned for
their gallant exploits. With them he for a short time stood the
first storm of the danger, and the severest brunt of the battle.
But as they who demolished the bridge called upon them to
retire, he obliged them also to withdraw to a place of safety on a
small portion of the bridge still left. Then casting his stern eyes
round all the officers of the Etrurians in a threatening manner,
he sometimes challenged them singly, sometimes reproached them
all: "the slaves of haughty tyrants, who, regardless of their own
freedom, came to oppress the liberty of others. " They hesitated
for a considerable time, looking round one at the other, to com-
mence the fight: shame then put the army in motion, and a
shout being raised, they hurl their weapons from all sides on their
single adversary; and when they all stuck in the shield held.
before him, and he with no less obstinacy kept possession of the
bridge with firm step, they now endeavored to thrust him down
from it by one push, when at once the crash of the falling bridge,
## p. 9096 (#100) ###########################################
9096
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
at the same time a shout of the Romans raised for joy at having
completed their purpose, checked their ardor with sudden panic.
Then Cocles says, "Holy father Tiberinus, I pray that thou
wouldst receive these arms and this thy soldier in thy propitious
stream. " Armed as he was, he leaped into the Tiber, and amid
showers of darts hurled on him, swam across safe to his party,
having dared an act which is likely to obtain more fame than
belief with posterity. The State was grateful towards such valor:
a statue was erected to him in the Comitium, and as much land
was given to him as he plowed around in one day. The zeal of
private individuals also was conspicuous among the public honors.
For amid the great scarcity, each person contributed something
to him according to his supply at home, depriving himself of his
own support.
Porsena being repulsed in his first attempt, having changed
his plans from a siege to a blockade, after he had placed a gar-
rison in Janiculum, pitched his camp in the plain and on the
banks of the Tiber. Then sending for boats from all parts, both
to guard the river so as not to suffer any provision to be con-
veyed to Rome, and also to transport his soldiers across the river
to plunder different places as occasion required,-in a short time
he so harassed the entire country round Rome, that not only
everything else from the country, but even their cattle, was
driven into the city, and nobody durst venture thence without the
gates. This liberty of action was granted to the Etrurians, not
more through fear than from policy; for Valerius, intent on an
opportunity of falling unawares upon a number of them, and
when straggling, a remiss avenger in trifling matters, reserved the
weight of his vengeance for more important occasions. Where-
fore, to decoy the pillagers, he ordered his men to drive their
cattle the next day out at the Esquiline gate, which was farthest
from the enemy; presuming that they would get intelligence of
it, because during the blockade and famine some slaves would
turn traitors and desert. Accordingly they were informed of it
by a deserter; and parties more numerous than usual, in hopes
of seizing the entire body, crossed the river. Then Publius Va-
lerius commanded Titus Herminius with a small body of men to
lie concealed two miles from the city, on the Gabian road, and
Spurius Lartius with a party of light-armed troops to post himself
at the Colline gate, till the enemy should pass by, and then to
throw himself in their way so that there might be no return to
## p. 9097 (#101) ###########################################
LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
9097
the river. The other consul, Titus Lucretius, marched out of the
Nævian gate with some companies of soldiers; Valerius himself
led some chosen cohorts down from the Cœlian Mount, and they
were first descried by the enemy. Herminius, when he perceived
the alarm, rose out of ambush and fell upon the rear of the
Tuscans, who had charged Valerius. The shout was returned on
the right and left, from the Colline gate on the one hand and the
Nævian on the other. By this stratagem the plunderers were put
to the sword between both, they not being a match in strength.
for fighting, and all the ways being blocked up to prevent
escape: this put an end to the Etrurians strolling about in so
disorderly a manner.
Nevertheless the blockade continued, and there was a scarcity.
of corn, with a very high price. Porsena entertained a hope that
by continuing the siege he should take the city; when Caius
Mucius, a young nobleman, to whom it seemed a disgrace that the
Roman people, who when enslaved under kings had never been
confined within their walls, in any war nor by any enemy, should
now, when a free people, be blocked up by these very Etrurians
whose armies they had often routed,-thinking that such indig-
nity should be avenged by some great and daring effort, at first
designed of his own accord to penetrate into the enemy's camp.
Then, being afraid if he went without the permission of the
consuls, or the knowledge of any one, he might be seized by the
Roman guards and brought back as a deserter, the circumstances.
of the city at the time justifying the charge, he went to the
Senate: "Fathers," says he, "I intend to cross the Tiber, and
enter the enemy's camp, if I can; not as a plunderer, or as an
avenger in our turn of their devastations. A greater deed is in
my mind, if the gods assist. " The Senate approved his design.
He set out with a sword concealed under his garment. When
he came thither, he stationed himself among the thickest of the
crowd, near the King's tribunal. There, where the soldiers were
receiving their pay, the King's secretary, sitting beside him
dressed nearly in the same style, was busily engaged (and to
him they commonly addressed themselves); being afraid to ask
which of them was Porsena, lest by not knowing the King he
should discover himself, as fortune blindly directed the blow he
killed the secretary instead of the King. Then as he was going
off thence, where with his bloody dagger he had made his way
through the dismayed multitude, a concourse being attracted at
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LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
the noise, the King's guards immediately seized and brought him
back, standing alone before the King's tribunal; even then, amid
such menaces of fortune, more capable of inspiring dread than of
feeling it, "I am," says he, "a Roman citizen; my name is
Caius Mucius: an enemy, I wished to slay an enemy; nor have
I less of resolution to suffer death than I had to inflict it. Both
to act and to suffer with fortitude is a Roman's part. Nor have
I alone harbored such feelings towards you; there is after me a
long train of persons aspiring to the same honor. Therefore, if
you choose it, prepare yourself for this peril, to contend for your
life every hour; to have the sword and the enemy in the very
entrance of your pavilion: this is the war which we, the Roman
youth, declare against you; dread not an army in array, nor a
battle, the affair will be to yourself alone and with each of
us singly. "
When the King, highly incensed, and at the same time terri-
fied at the danger, in a menacing manner commanded fires to
be kindled about him, if he did not speedily explain the plots
which by his threats he had darkly insinuated against him, then
Mucius said, "Behold me, that you may be sensible of how little
account the body is to those who have great glory in view;"
and immediately he thrusts his right hand into the fire that was
lighted for the sacrifice. When he continued to broil it as if he
had been quite insensible, the King, astonished at this surprising
sight, after he had leaped from his throne and commanded the
young man to be removed from the altar, says, "Begone, having
acted more like an enemy towards thyself than me. I would en-
courage thee to persevere in thy valor, if that valor stood on the
side of my country. I now dismiss thee untouched and unhurt,
exempted from the right of war. " Then Mucius, as if making a
return for the kindness, says, "Since bravery is honored by you,
so that you have obtained by kindness that which you could not
by threats, three hundred of us, the chief of the Roman youth,
have conspired to attack you in this manner. It was my lot
first. The rest will follow, each in his turn, according as the lot
shall set him forward, unless fortune shall afford an opportunity
of slaying you. "
Mucius being dismissed,- to whom the cognomen of Scævola
was afterwards given, from the loss of his right hand,-ambas-
sadors from Porsena followed him to Rome.
attempt, from which nothing had saved him
The risk of the first
but the mistake of
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9099
the assailant, and the risk to be encountered so often in propor-
tion to the number of conspirators, made so strong an impression.
upon him [Porsena], that of his own accord he made propositions
of peace to the Romans.
Translation of D. Spillan.
THE CHARACTER OF HANNIBAL
From the Twenty-first Book of the
History of Rome'
H
ANNIBAL was sent to Spain, and instantly on his arrival at-
tracted the admiration of the whole army. Young Hamil-
car was restored to them, thought the veterans, as they saw
in him the same animated look and penetrating eye, the same
expression, the same features. Soon he made them feel that his
father's memory was but a trifling aid to him in winning their
esteem. Never had man a temper that adapted itself better to
the widely diverse duties of obedience and command, till it was
hard to decide whether he was more beloved by the general or
the army.
There was no one whom Hasdrubal preferred to put
in command, whenever courage and persistency were specially
needed; no officer under whom the soldiers were more confident
and more daring. Bold in the extreme in incurring peril, he was
perfectly cool in its presence. No toil could weary his body or
conquer his spirit. Heat and cold he bore with equal endurance;
the cravings of nature, not the pleasure of the palate, determined
the measure of his food and drink. His waking and sleeping
hours were not regulated by day and night. Such time as busi-
ness left him, he gave to repose; but it was not on a soft couch
or in stillness that he sought it. Many a man often saw him
wrapped in his military cloak, lying on the ground amid the
sentries and pickets. His dress was not one whit superior to
that of his comrades, but his accoutrements and horses were con-
spicuously splendid. Among the cavalry or the infantry he was
by far the first soldier; the first in battle, the last to leave it
when once begun.
These great virtues in the man were equaled by monstrous
vices: inhuman cruelty, a worse than Punic perfidy. Absolutely
false and irreligious, he had no fear of God, no regard for an
oath, no scruples.
Translation of Church and Brodribb.
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LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
THE BATTLE OF LAKE TRASIMENE
H
From the Twenty-second Book of the History of Rome ›
ANNIBAL devastated with all the horrors of war the country
between Cortona and Lake Trasumennus, seeking to infuri-
ate the Romans into avenging the sufferings of their allies.
They had now reached a spot made for an ambuscade, where the
lake comes up close under the hills of Cortona. Between them
is nothing but a very narrow road, for which room seems to have
been purposely left. Further on is some comparatively broad
level ground. From this rise the hills, and here in the open
plain Hannibal pitched a camp for himself and his African and
Spanish troops only; his slingers and other light-armed troops he
marched to the rear of the hills; his cavalry he stationed at the
mouth of the defile, behind some rising ground which conven-
iently sheltered them. When the Romans had once entered the
pass and the cavalry had barred the way, all would be hemmed
in by the lake and the hills.
Flaminius had reached the lake at sunset the day before. On
the morrow, without reconnoitring and while the light was still
uncertain, he traversed the narrow pass. As his army began to
deploy into the widening plain, he could see only that part of
the enemy's force which was in front of him; he knew nothing
of the ambuscade in his rear and above his head. The Cartha-
ginian saw his wish accomplished. He had his enemy shut in
by the lake and the hills, and surrounded by his own troops.
He gave the signal for a general charge, and the attacking col-
umns flung themselves on the nearest points. To the Romans
the attack was all the more sudden and unexpected because the
mist from the lake lay thicker on the plains than on the heights,
while the hostile columns on the various hills had been quite
visible to each other and had therefore advanced in concert. As
for the Romans, with the shout of battle rising all round them,
before they could see plainly they found themselves surrounded;
and fighting began in their front and their flanks before they
could form in order, get ready their arms, or draw their swords.
Amidst universal panic the consul showed all the courage that
could be expected in circumstances so alarming. The broken
ranks, in which every one was turning to catch the discordant
shouts, he re-formed as well as time and place permitted; and as
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9101
far as his presence or his voice could reach, bade his men stand
their ground and fight. "It is not by prayers," he cried, “or
entreaties to the gods, but by strength and courage that you must
win your way out. The sword cuts a path through the midst of
the battle; and the less fear, there for the most part the less
danger. " But such was the uproar and confusion, neither encour-
agements nor commands could be heard; so far were the men
from knowing their standards, their ranks, or their places, that
they had scarcely presence of mind to snatch up their arms and
address them to the fight, and some found them an overwhelm-
ing burden rather than a protection. So dense too was the mist,
that the ear was of more service than the eye. The groans of
the wounded, the sound of blows on body or armor, the mingled
shouts of triumph or panic, made them turn this way and that an
eager gaze. Some would rush in their flight on a dense knot of
combatants, and become entangled in the mass; others returning
to the battle would be carried away by the crowd of fugitives.
But after awhile, when charges had been vainly tried in every
direction, when it was seen that the hills and the lake shut them
in on either side, and the hostile lines in front and rear, when it
was manifest that the only hope of safety lay in their own right
hands and swords, then every man began to look to himself
for guidance and for encouragement, and there began afresh what
was indeed a new battle. No battle was it with its three ranks
of combatants, its vanguard before the standards and its second
line fighting behind them, with every soldier in his own legion,
cohort, or company: chance massed them together, and each
man's impulse assigned him his post, whether in the van or rear.
So fierce was their excitement, so intent were they on the battle,
that not one of the combatants felt the earthquake which laid
whole quarters of many Italian cities in ruins, changed the
channels of rapid streams, drove the sea far up into rivers, and
brought down enormous landslips from the hills.
For nearly three hours they fought, fiercely everywhere, but
with especial rage and fury round the consul. It was to him
that the flower of the army attached themselves. He, wherever
he found his troops hard pressed or distressed, was indefatigable
in giving help; conspicuous in his splendid arms, the enemy
assailed and his fellow Romans defended him with all their
might. At last an Insubrian trooper (his name was Ducarius),
recognizing him also by his face, cried to his comrades, "See!
-
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LIVY (TITUS LIVIUS)
this is the man who slaughtered our legions, and laid waste our
fields and our city: I will offer him as a sacrifice to the shades
of my countrymen whom he so foully slew. " Putting spurs to
his horse, he charged through the thickest of the enemy, struck
down the armor-bearer who threw himself in the way of his
furious advance, and ran the consul through with his lance.
When he would have stripped the body, some veterans thrust
their shields between and hindered him.
Then began the flight of a great part of the army. And now
neither lake nor mountain checked their rush of panic; by every
defile and height they sought blindly to escape, and arms and
men were heaped upon each other. Many, finding no possibility
of flight, waded into the shallows at the edge of the lake, ad-
vanced until they had only head and shoulders above the water,
and at last drowned themselves. Some in the frenzy of panic
endeavored to escape by swimming; but the endeavor was end-
less and hopeless, and they either sunk in the depths when their
courage failed them, or they wearied themselves in vain till they
could hardly struggle back to the shallows, where they were
slaughtered in crowds by the enemy's cavalry which had now
entered the water. Nearly six thousand men of the vanguard
made a determined rush through the enemy, and got clear out
of the defile, knowing nothing of what was happening behind
Halting on some high ground, they could only hear the
shouts of men and clashing of arms, but could not learn or see
for the mist how the day was going. It was when the battle
was decided, that the increasing heat of the sun scattered the
mist and cleared the sky. The bright light that now rested
on hill and plain showed a ruinous defeat and a Roman army
shamefully routed. Fearing that they might be seen in the dis-
tance and that the cavalry might be sent against them, they took
up their standards and hurried away with all the speed they
could. The next day, finding their situation generally desperate,
and starvation also imminent, they capitulated to Hannibal, who
had overtaken them with the whole of his cavalry, and who
pledged his word that if they would surrender their arms, they
should go free, each man having a single garment. The promise
was kept with Punic faith by Hannibal, who put them all in
chains.
Such was the famous fight at Trasumennus, memorable as
few other disasters of the Roman people have been. Fifteen
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thousand men fell in the battle; ten thousand, flying in all direc-
tions over Etruria, made by different roads for Rome. Of the
enemy two thousand five hundred fell in the battle.
