The Grass Crown

by Colleen McCullough

  In the meantime he girded his loins for battle, and proceeded to tell the Senate of his plans to issue a cheaper grain dole. Like the allocation of the ager publicus, cheap grain could never be confined to the lowly. Any Roman citizen prepared to join the long line at the aediles' booth in the Porticus Minucia could obtain his official chit entitling him to five modii of public wheat, then trek to the State granaries beneath the Aventine cliffs, present his chit, and cart his grain home. There were some, even of great wealth and prestige, who actually did avail themselves of this citizen privilege—about half because they were incurable misers, about half on principle. But on the whole, most men who could afford to drop some coins into the steward's hand and tell him to buy grain from the privately owned granaries along the Vicus Tuscus were not prone to seek a chit in person just to have cheap grain. Compared to the costs of other aspects of living in the city of Rome—like rent, which was always relatively astronomical—the sum of fifty or a hundred sesterces a month per person for privately vended grain was minute. Thus it was that the vast majority of those who did queue to receive their chits were the needful citizens of the Fifth Class, and the Head Count.

  "The land just will not extend to all of them by any means," said Drusus in the House, "but we must not forget them, or give them reason to assume they have been overlooked yet again. Rome's manger is sufficiently large, Conscript Fathers, to permit all of Rome's mouths to feed at it! If we cannot give the Head Count land, then we have to give them cheap grain. At a flat price of five sesterces per modius year in and year out, irrespective of times of shortage or times of surplus. This in itself will make the financial burden somewhat easier for our Treasury to bear—when times see a surplus of wheat, the Treasury buys it for between two and four sesterces the modius. Thus by selling at five, it will still be possible for the Treasury to make a small profit, which will bolster the Treasury's task during years of scarcity. For that reason, I suggest that a separate account be maintained within the Treasury that can only be used to purchase wheat. We must not make the mistake of dipping into the general revenues to fund this law."

  "And how, Marcus Livius, do you propose to pay for this magnificent largesse?" drawled Lucius Marcius Philip-pus.

  Drusus smiled. "I have it all worked out, Lucius Marcius. As one part of my law, I intend to devalue some of our normal issues of currency."

  The House stirred, murmured; no one liked to hear the word "devaluation" mentioned, for most were intensely conservative when it came to the fiscus. It was not Roman policy to debase the coinage, the device being condemned as a Greek trick. Only during the first and second Punic wars against Carthage had it been resorted to, and then much of it was due to attempts to standardize coin weight. Radical though he was in other ways, Gaius Gracchus had increased the value of silver currency.

  Nothing daunted, Drusus went on to explain. "One in every eight denarii will be cast of bronze mixed with a drop of lead to make the weight the same as a silver coin, then silver-plated. I have worked out my calculations in the most ultra-conservative way—namely, I have presumed we will have five poor grain years to every two good ones—which, as you all know, is far too pessimistic. In fact, we enjoy more good years than we do bad. However, one cannot exclude another period of famine like that we endured thanks to the Sicilian slave war. Also, there is more work involved in silver-plating a coin than there is in stamping out pure silver. Consequently I costed my program out at one in every eight denarii, whereas the true figure is more likely to be one in every ten. The Treasury, you perceive, cannot lose. Nor will the measure be burdensome to businessmen who negotiate with paper. The major load will fall upon those limited to using coins, and—the most important factor of all, in my opinion—it avoids the odium of a form of direct taxation."

  "Why go to the trouble of plating one in every eight coins in each issue when you could simply plate one in every eight issues?" asked the praetor Lucius Lucilius, who was (like all his family) very clever with words, but an absolute dunce at arithmetic and practicalities.

  "Because," said Drusus patiently, "it is, I think, vital that most of those using coins not be able to tell the real from the plated. If a whole issue were to be cast in bronze, no one would be willing to spend them."

  Miraculous though it seemed, Drusus got his lex frumentaria. Lobbied by the Treasury (which had done its sums and come out with the same answers Drusus produced, and seen how profitable this debasement might be), the Senate sanctioned its promulgation in the Plebeian Assembly. In that body the most powerful knights were quick to understand how little it would bother them in all transactions not requiring cash. Of course everyone knew it affected everyone, that the distinction between real money and pieces of paper was at best specious; but they were pragmatists, and knew full well that the only true value money of any kind had was the faith of the people who used it, in it.

  By the end of June the law was on the tablets. The public grain in all future years was to be sold at five sesterces the modius, and the quaestors attached to the Treasury were planning their first issue of debased coins, as were the viri monetales who would supervise the actual minting. It would take a little time, of course, but the concerned officials estimated that by September one in every eight new denarii would be silver-plated. There were grumblings. Caepio never ceased to shout his protests, the knights were not entirely happy with the way Drusus was heading, and Rome's lowly suspected that they were being fobbed off in some way their rulers had not divulged. But Drusus was no Saturninus, and the Senate was grateful for it. When he held a contio in the Plebeian Assembly, he insisted upon decorum and legality; if either became at risk, he suspended his meeting at once. Nor did he fly in the face of the augurs, or employ strong-arm tactics.

  The end of June saw an enforced cessation in Drusus's program, as official summer had arrived; the Senate broke off its meetings, as did the Comitia. Glad of the respite— he found himself increasingly fatigued by less and less activity—Drusus too quit Rome. His mother and the six children in her care he sent to his sumptuous villa on the sea at Misenum, while he traveled first to see Silo, then Mutilus, and accompanied both of them all over Italy.

  He couldn't help but notice that the Italian nations of the central peninsula were ready to put themselves on a war footing; as he rode down some dusty track with Silo and Mutilus, he saw whole legions of well-equipped troops engaged in training maneuvers far from Roman or Latin settlements. But he said nothing, asked no questions, believing implicitly that none of this martial practice would be needed. In an unprecedented spate of legislation, he had succeeded in convincing the Senate and the Plebeian Assembly that reform was necessary in the major law courts, the Senate, the ager publicus, and the grain dole. No one—not Tiberius Gracchus, Gaius Gracchus, Gaius Marius, or Saturninus— had done what he had done, introduce so much contentious, legislation without violence, senatorial opposition, knight rejection. Because they believed him, they respected him, they trusted him. He knew now that when he made his intentions public about general enfranchisement for Italy, they would let him lead them, even if they did not precisely follow him. It would be done! And as a consequence he, Marcus Livius Drusus, would hold one quarter of the population of the Roman world as his clients, for the oath of personal allegiance to him had been sworn from one end of the Italian peninsula to the other, even in Umbria and Etruria.

  About eight days before the Senate reconvened on the Kalends of September, Drusus arrived at his villa in Misenum to enjoy a little rest before the hardest work began. His mother, he had discovered, was as great a joy to him as she was a comfort—witty, clever, well read, easygoing, almost masculine in her appreciation of what was, after all, a man's world. She took a keen interest in politics, and had followed Drusus's program of laws with pride and pleasure. Her liberal Cornelian background predisposed her to a certain radicalism, yet the essential conservatism of that same Cornelian background approved of her son's masterly grasp on the realities of Senate and People
. No force or violence, no battering ram of threats, no other weapons than a golden voice and a silver tongue. That was what great politicians should be! That was how Marcus Livius Drusus was, and she congratulated herself that he never got it from his pigheaded, stiff-necked, misunderstanding father. No, he got it from her.

  "Well, you've dealt brilliantly with the law, the land, and the lowly," she said neatly. "What next, if anything?"

  He drew a breath, looked at her directly, sternly. "I will legislate the full Roman citizenship for every last man in Italy."

  Paler than her bone-colored dress, she cried, "Oh, Marcus Livius! They've let you have your way so far, but they won't let you have your way in this!"

  "Why not?" he asked, surprised; he had got quite used to thinking these days that he could do what no one else could do.

  “The guarding of the citizenship has become a task given to Rome by the gods," she said, still pallid. "Not if Quirinus himself appeared in the middle of the Forum and ordered them to dole it out to everyone, would they consent!" Out went her hand to grasp his arm. "Marcus Livius, Marcus Livius, give it up! Don't try!" She shivered. "I beg you, don't try!"

  "I have sworn to do it, Mama—and do it I will!"

  For a long moment she searched his dark eyes, her own less remarkable orbs filled with fear for him. Then she sighed, shrugged. "Well, I won't talk you out of it, I can see that. You're not the great-grandnephew of Scipio Africanus for nothing. Oh, my son, my son, they'll kill you!"

  One peaked brow went up. "Why should they, Mama? I am no Gaius Gracchus, no Saturninus. I proceed absolutely within the law—I threaten neither man nor mos maiorum."

  Too upset to continue this particular conversation, she got up quickly. "Come and see the children, they've missed you."

  If that was an exaggeration, it wasn't a large one. Drusus had achieved a measure of popularity among the children.

  That a quarrel was in progress became obvious as they neared the children's playroom.

  "I'm going to kill you, Young Cato!" the two adults heard Servilia say as they entered.

  "Enough of that, Servilia!" Drusus said sharply, sensing something serious in the girl's tone. "Young Cato is your half brother, and inviolate."

  "Not if I get him alone for long enough, he isn't," said Servilia ominously.

  "You won't ever get him alone, Miss Knobby-nose!" said Young Caepio, pushing himself in front of Young Cato.

  "I do not have a knobby nose!" said Servilia angrily.

  "You do so too!" said Young Caepio. "It's a horrible little nose with a horrible little knob on the end, ugh, erk, brrh!"

  "Be quiet!" cried Drusus. "Do you ever do anything save fight?"

  "Yes!" said Young Cato loudly. "We argue!"

  "How can we not, with him here?" asked Drusus Nero.

  "You shut up, Nero Black-face!" said Young Caepio, leaping to Young Cato's defense.

  "I am not a black-face!"

  "Are, are, are!" shouted Young Cato, fists clenched.

  "You're no Servilius Caepio!" said Servilia to Young Caepio. "You're the descendant of a red-haired Gallic slave, you were foisted on us Servilii Caepiones!"

  "Knobby nose, knobby nose, ugly horrible knobby nose!"

  "Tacete!" yelled Drusus.

  "Son of a slave!" hissed Servilia.

  "Daughter of a dullard!" cried Porcia.

  "Freckledy-face porky!" said Lilla.

  "Sit down over here, my son," said Cornelia Scipionis, quite unruffled by this nursery brawl. "When they've finished, they'll pay attention to us."

  "Do they always bring up ancestry?" asked Drusus above the cries and shouts.

  "With Servilia here, of course," said their avia.

  The girl Servilia, figure formed at thirteen and blessed with a lovely, secretive face, ought to have been segregated from the younger children two or three years earlier, but had not been, as part of her punishment. After witnessing some of the contents of this quarrel, Drusus found himself wondering if he had been wrong to keep her in the nursery.

  Servililla-Lilla, now just turned twelve, was also maturing fast. Prettier than Servilia yet not as attractive, her dark and roguish, open face told everyone what sort of person she was. The third member of the senior group, and very much aligned with them against the junior group, was Drusus's adopted son, Marcus Livius Drusus Nero Claudianus; nine years old, handsome in the mould of the Claudii—who were dark and dour—he was not a clever boy, alas, but he was pleasant and docile.

  Then came Cato's brood, for Drusus could never think of Young Caepio as Caepio's child, no matter how Livia Drusa had insisted. He was so like Cato Salonianus—the same slenderly muscular build, the promise of tall stature, the shape of his head and ears, the long neck, long limbs— and the bright red hair. Though his eyes were light brown, they were not Caepio's eyes, for they were widely spaced, well opened, and deeply set within their bony orbits. Of all six children, Young Caepio was Drusus's favorite. There was a strength about him, a need to shoulder responsibility, and this appealed to Drusus; now aged three quarters past five, the child would converse with Drusus like an old, tremendously wise man. His voice was very deep, the expression in his reddish eyes always serious and thoughtful. Of smiles he produced few, save when his little brother, Young Cato, did something he found amusing or touching; his affection for Young Cato was so strong it amounted to outright paternalism, and he would not be separated from him.

  Porcia called Porcella was almost due to turn four. A homely child, she was just beginning to develop freckles everywhere, big splotchy brown freckles which made her the object of contemptuous teasing from her older half sisters, who disliked her intensely, and made her poor little life a secret misery of sly pinches, kicks, bites, scratches, slaps. The Catonian beak of a nose ill became her, but she did have a beautiful pair of dark grey eyes, and by nature she was a nice person.

  Young Cato was three quarters past two, a veritable monster both in looks and essence. His nose seemed to grow faster than the rest of him, beaked with a Roman bump rather than a Semitic hook, and was out of keeping with the rest of his face, which was strikingly good-looking-exquisite mouth, lovely luminous and large light grey eyes, high cheekbones, good chin. Though broad shoulders hinted that he might develop a nice body later on, he was painfully thin because he evinced absolutely no interest in food. By nature he was obnoxiously intrusive, with the kind of mentality Drusus, for one, abominated most; a lucid and reasonable answer to one of his loud and hectoring questions only provoked more questions, indicating that Young Cato was either dense, or too stubborn to see another point of view. His most endearing characteristic—and he needed an endearing characteristic!—was his utter devotion to Young Caepio, from whom he refused to be parted, day or night; when he became absolutely intolerable, a threat to take his brother away from him produced immediate docility.

  Not long after Young Cato's second birthday, Silo had paid his last visit to Drusus; Drusus was now a tribune of the plebs, and Silo had felt it unwise to show Rome that their friendship was as strong as ever. A father himself, Silo had always liked to see the children whenever he was a guest in Drusus's house. So he had paid attention to the little spy, Servilia, and flattered her, yet could be detached enough to laugh at her contempt for him, a mere Italian. The four middle children he loved, played with them, joked with them. But Young Cato he loathed, though he was hard put to give Drusus a logical reason for detesting a two-year-old.

  "I feel like a mindless animal when I'm with him," said Silo to Drusus. "My senses and instincts tell me he is an enemy."

  It was the child's Spartan endurance got under his skin, admirable trait though Spartan endurance was. When he saw the tiny little fellow stand tearless and firm-jawed after a nasty injury, physical or mental, Silo found his hackles rising along with his temper. Why is this so? he would ask himself, and could never arrive at an answer that satisfied him. Perhaps it was because Young Cato never bothered to hide his contempt for mere Italians. Tha
t of course was the malign influence of Servilia. Yet when he encountered the same sort of treatment from her, he could brush it off. Young Cato, he concluded, was just not the sort of person anyone would ever be able to brush off.

  One day, goaded beyond endurance by Young Cato's harsh and badgering questions to Drusus—and his lack of appreciation for Drusus's patience and kindness—Silo picked the child up and held him out the window above a rock garden full of sharp stones.

  "Be reasonable, Young Cato, or I'll drop you!" Silo said.

  Young Cato hung there doggedly silent, as defiant and in control of his fate as ever; no amount of shaking, pretended dropping, or other threats served to loosen the child's tongue or determination. In the end Silo put him down, the loser of the battle, shaking his head at Drusus.

  "Just as well Young Cato is a baby," he said. "If he were a grown man, Italy would never persuade the Romans!"

  On another occasion, Silo asked Young Cato whom he loved.

  "My brother," said Young Cato.

  "And who next after him?" Silo asked.

  "My brother."

  "But who next-best after your brother?"

  "My brother."

  Silo turned to Drusus. "Does he love no one else? Not you? Not his avia, your mother?"

  Drusus shrugged. "Apparently, Quintus Poppaedius, he loves no one but his brother."

  Silo's reaction to Young Cato was very much the reaction of most people; certainly Young Cato did not provoke fondness.

  The children had permanently polarized into two groups, the seniors allied against Cato Salonianus's brood, and the nursery resounded perpetually to the cries and screeches of battle. It might logically have been presumed that the Servilian-Livians outweighed, outranked and outdid the much smaller Catonians, but from the time Young Cato turned two years old and could add his minuscule bulk to the fray, the Catonians gained the ascendancy. No one could cope with Young Cato, who couldn't be pummeled into submission, shouted into submission, argued into submission. A slow learner when it came to facts Young Cato might be, but he was the absolute quintessence of a natural enemy— indefatigable, constant, carping, loud, remorseless, monstrous.