The Grass Crown

by Colleen McCullough

  Anyway, I hope the Senate sees its way clear to keeping me on as commander-in-chief in the north. If the men wouldn't countenance a Picentine, they certainly wouldn't countenance a stranger, now would they? We're a rough lot, we northerners.

  I would like to wish you very well in all your own endeavors, Lucius Cornelius. You are a champion of the old ways, but you do have an interesting new style.

  A man might learn from you. Please understand that you have my wholehearted support, and don't hesitate to let me know if there is any other way in which I can help you.

  Sulla laughed, then burned the letter, one of the few reassuring pieces of news he had received. That Rome wasn't happy with the Sullan alterations to the constitution he now knew beyond a shadow of a doubt, for the Plebeian Assembly had met and elected ten new tribunes of the plebs. Every man voted in was an opponent of Sulla and a supporter of Sulpicius; among them were Gaius Milonius, Gaius Papirius Carbo Arvina, Publius Magius, Marcus Vergilius, Marcus Marius Gratidianus (the adopted nephew of Gaius Marius), and none other than Quintus Sertorius. When Sulla had heard that Quintus Sertorius was putting himself up as a candidate, he had sent a warning to Sertorius not to stand if he knew what was good for him. A warning Sertorius had chosen to ignore, saying steadily that it could now make little difference to the State who was elected a tribune of the plebs.

  This signal defeat gave Sulla to understand that he must ensure the election of strongly conservative curule magistrates; both the consuls and all six praetors would have to be staunch proponents of the leges Corneliae. The quaestors were easy. They were all either reinstated senators or young men from senatorial families who could be relied upon to shore up the power of the Senate. Among them was Lucius Licinius Lucullus, who was seconded to Sulla's service.

  Of course one of the consular candidates would have to be Sulla's own nephew, Lucius Nonius, who had been a praetor two years before, and would not offend his uncle if elected a consul. The pity of it was that he was a rather insipid man who had done nothing so far to distinguish himself, and was therefore not going to be someone the electors fancied. But his choice as a candidate would please Sulla's sister, whom Sulla had almost forgotten, so little family feeling did he have. When she came to Rome to stay—as she did periodically—he never bothered to see her. That would have to change! Luckily Dalmatica was anxious to do what she could, and was an hospitable, patient kind of wife; she could look after his sister and the dreary Lucius Nonius, hopefully soon to be consul.

  Two other consular candidates were welcome. The erstwhile legate of Pompey Strabo, Gnaeus Octavius Ruso, was definitely for Sulla and the old ways; he probably also had orders from Pompey Strabo. The second promising candidate was Publius Servilius Vatia—a plebeian Servilius but from a fine old family, and highly thought of among the First Class. Into the bargain, he had a very formidable war record, always an electoral asset.

  However, there was one candidate who worried Sulla greatly, chiefly because he would appear on the surface to the First Class as just the right kind of consular material, sure to uphold senatorial privilege and bolster knightly prerogatives, no matter how unwritten. Lucius Cornelius Cinna was a patrician of Sulla's own gens, he was married to an Annia, possessed of a luminous war record, and well known as an orator and advocate. But Sulla knew he had tied himself in some way to Gaius Marius—probably Marius had bought him. Like so many senators, a few months ago his finances were well known to be shaky—yet when the senators were expelled for debt, Cinna was discovered to be very plump in the purse. Yes, bought, thought Sulla gloomily. How clever of Gaius Marius! Of course it was to do with Young Marius and the accusation that he had murdered Cato the Consul. In normal times, Sulla doubted if Cinna could have been bought; he didn't seem that sort of man—one reason why he was going to appeal to the electors of the First Class. Yet when times were hard and ruin loomed of a scale to affect a man's sons as well as his own future, many a highly principled man might allow himself to be bought. Particularly if that highly principled man didn't think his altered status would lead him to alter his principles.

  As if the curule elections were not worrying enough, Sulla was also aware that his army was tired of occupying Rome. It wanted to go east to fight Mithridates, and of course did not fully understand the reasons why its general kept lingering inside Rome. It was also beginning to experience increased resistance to its residence within the city; not that the number of free meals and free beds and free women had decreased, more that those who had never condoned its presence now were emboldened to retaliate by chucking the contents of their chamber pots out their windows onto hapless soldier heads.

  Had Sulla only been willing to bribe heavily, he might have ensured success in the curule elections, as the climate was exactly right for bountiful bribery. But for nothing and nobody would Sulla consent to part with his little hoard of gold. Let Pompey Strabo pay legions out of his own purse if he chose and let Gaius Marius say he was prepared to do the same; Lucius Cornelius Sulla regarded it as Rome's duty to foot the bill. If Pompeius Rufus had still been alive, Sulla might have secured the money from the wealthy Picentine; but he hadn't thought of that before he sent the wealthy Picentine north to his death.

  My plans are good but their execution is precarious, he thought. This wretched city is too full of men with opinions of their own, all determined to get what they want. Why is it that they can't see how sensible and proper my plans are? And how can any man draw sufficient power unto himself to ensure his plans remain undisturbed? Men of ideals and principles are the ruin of the world!

  And so toward the end of December he sent his army back to Capua under the command of the good faithful Lucullus, now officially his quaestor. Having done that, he threw caution to the winds and his chances into the lap of Fortune by holding the elections.

  Though he was convinced he had not underestimated the strength of the resentment against him in every stratum of Roman society, the truth was that Sulla did not grasp the depth and the extent of that animosity. No one said a word, no one looked at him awry; but beneath this lip service the whole of Rome was finding it impossible to forget or forgive Sulla's bringing an army into Rome—or Sulla's army holding its allegiance to Sulla ahead of its allegiance to Rome.

  This seething resentment ran from the highest echelons all the way down into the very gutter. Even men as inescapably committed to him and to the supremacy of the Senate as the Brothers Caesar and the Brothers Scipio Nasica wished desperately that Sulla could have lit upon some other way of solving the Senate's dilemma than using his army. And below the First Class there were two additional ulcerations festering inside men's minds; that a tribune of the plebs had been condemned to death during his year in office, and that the old and crippled Gaius Marius had been hounded out of home, family, position—and condemned to death.

  Some hint of all this rankling dissatisfaction became apparent as the new curule magistrates were returned. Gnaeus Octavius Ruso was the senior consul, but the junior consul was Lucius Cornelius Cinna. The praetors were an independent lot, among whom were none Sulla could really count on.

  But it was the election of the tribunes of the soldiers in the Assembly of the Whole People that troubled Sulla most of all. They were uniformly ugly men, and included wolfs-heads like Gaius Flavius Fimbria, Publius Annius, and Gaius Marcius Censorinus. Ripe to ride roughshod over their generals, thought Sulla—let any general with this lot in his legions try to march on Rome! They'd kill him with as little scruple as Young Marius did Cato the Consul. I am very glad I am passing out of my consulship and won't have them in my legions. Every last one of them is a potential Saturninus.

  Despite the disappointing electoral results, Sulla was not a wholly unhappy man as the old year wore away to its end. If the delay had done nothing else, it had given his agents in Asia Province, Bithynia, and Greece time to apprise him what the true situation was. Definitely his wisest course was to go to Greece, worry about Asia Minor later. He had not the troops
to attempt a flanking maneuver; it would have to be a straight effort to roll Mithridates back and out of Greece and Macedonia. Not that the Pontic invasion of Macedonia had gone according to plan; Gaius Sentius and Quintus Bruttius Sura had proven yet again that might was not always enough when the enemy was Roman. They had wrought great deeds with their tiny armies. But they couldn't possibly keep going.

  His most urgent consideration was therefore to get himself and his troops out of Italy. Only by defeating King Mithridates and plundering the East would he inherit Gaius Marius's unparalleled reputation. Only by bringing home the gold of Mithridates would he pull Rome out of her financial crisis. Only if he did all this would Rome forgive him for marching against her. Only then would the Plebs forgive him for turning their precious assembly into a place best suited for playing dice and twiddling thumbs.

  On his last day as consul, Sulla called the Senate to a "special meeting and spoke to them with genuine sincerity; he believed implicitly in himself and in his new measures.

  "If it were not for me, Conscript Fathers, you would not now exist. I can say that in truth, and I do say it. Had the laws of Publius Sulpicius Rufus remained on the tablets, the Plebs—not even the People!—would now be ruling Rome without any kind of check or balance. The Senate would be just another vestigial relic staffed by too few men to form a quorum. No recommendations to Plebs or People could be made, nor any decisions be taken about matters we regard as purely senatorial business. So before you start weeping and wailing about the fate of the Plebs and the People, before you start wallowing in an excess of undeserved pity for the Plebs and the People, I suggest that you remember what this august body would be at this moment were it not for me."

  "Here, here!" cried Catulus Caesar, very pleased because his son, one of the new slightly-too-young senators, had finally come back from his war duties and was sitting in the Senate; he had been anxious that Catulus should see Sulla act as consul.

  "Remember too," said Sulla, "that if you wish to retain the right to guide and regulate Rome's government, you must uphold my laws. Before you contemplate any upheavals, think of Rome! For Rome's sake, there must be peace in Italy. For Rome's sake, you must make a strenuous effort to find a way around our financial troubles and give Rome back her old prosperity. We cannot afford the luxury of seeing tribunes of the plebs run riot. The status quo as I have set it up must be maintained! Only then will Rome recover. We cannot permit Sulpician idiocies!"

  He looked directly at the consuls-elect. "Tomorrow, Gnaeus Octavius and Lucius Cinna, you will inherit my office and the office of my dead colleague, Quintus Pompeius. I shall have become a consular. Gnaeus Octavius, will you give me your solemn word that you will uphold my laws?"

  Octavius didn't hesitate. "I will, Lucius Sulla. You have my solemn word on it."

  "Lucius Cornelius of the branch cognominated Cinna, will you give me your word that you will uphold my laws?"

  Cinna stared at Sulla fearlessly. "That all depends, Lucius Cornelius of the branch cognominated Sulla. I will uphold your laws if they prove to be a workable way of governing. At the moment I am not sure they will. The machinery is so incredibly antique, so manifestly unwieldy, and the rights of a large part of our Roman community have been—I can find no other word for it—annulled. I am very sorry to inconvenience you, but as things stand, I must withhold my promise."

  An extraordinary change came over Sulla's face; like some other people of late, the Senate was now privileged to catch a glimpse of that naked clawed creature which dwelt inside Lucius Cornelius Sulla. And like all others, the senators never forgot that glimpse. And in the years to come, would shiver at the memory as they waited for the reckoning.

  Before Sulla could open his mouth to answer, Scaevola Pontifex Maximus interjected.

  "Lucius Cinna, leave well enough alone!" he cried; he was remembering that after his first glimpse of Sulla's beast, Sulla had marched on Rome. "I implore you, give the consul your promise!"

  Then came the voice of Antonius Orator. "If this is the sort of attitude you intend to adopt, Cinna, then I suggest you watch your back! Our consul Lucius Cato neglected to do so, and he died."

  The House was murmuring, new senators as well as old, and most of the words were of exasperation and fear at Cinna's stand. Oh, why couldn't all these consular men leave ambition and posturing aside? Didn't they see how desperately Rome needed peace, internal stability?

  "Order!" said Sulla, just the once, and not very loudly. But as he still wore that look, silence fell immediately,

  "Senior consul, may I speak?" asked Catulus Caesar, who was remembering that his first experience of Sulla's look had been followed by a retreat from Tridentum.

  "Speak, Quintus Lutatius."

  "First of all, I wish to pass a comment about Lucius Cinna," said Catulus Caesar coldly. "I think he bears watching. I deplore his election to an office I do not think he will fill meritoriously. Lucius Cinna may have a magnificent war record, but his political understanding and his ideas as to how Rome ought to be governed are minimal. When he was urban praetor none of the measures which ought to have been taken were taken. Both the consuls were in the field, yet Lucius Cinna—virtually in charge of the governance of Rome!—made no attempt to stave off her terrible economic afflictions. Had he done at that early stage, Rome might now be better off. Yet here today we have Lucius Cinna, now consul-elect, demurring at giving a far more intelligent and able man a promise which was asked of him in the true spirit of senatorial government."

  "You haven't said a word to make me change my mind, Quintus Lutatius Servilis," said Cinna harshly, calling Catulus Caesar servile.

  "I am aware of that," said Catulus Caesar, at his haughtiest. "In fact, it is my considered opinion that nothing any one of us—or all of us!—could say would influence you to change your mind. Your mind is closed fast, like your purse upon the money Gaius Marius gave you to whiten the reputation of his murdering son!"

  Cinna flushed; it was an affliction he loathed, yet could not seem to cure, and it always betrayed him.

  "There is one way, however, in which we Conscript Fathers can make sure Lucius Cinna upholds the measures our senior consul has taken with such care," said Catulus Caesar. "I suggest that a most solemn and binding oath be required of both Gnaeus Octavius and Lucius Cinna. To the effect that they will swear to uphold our present system of government, as laid down on the tablets by Lucius Sulla."

  "I agree," said Scaevola Pontifex Maximus.

  "And I," said Flaccus Princeps Senatus.

  "And I," said Antonius Orator.

  "And I," said Lucius Caesar the censor.

  "And I," said Crassus the censor.

  "And I," said Quintus Ancharius.

  "And I," said Publius Servilius Vatia.

  "And I," said Lucius Cornelius Sulla, turning to Scae­vola. "High priest, will you administer this oath to the consuls-elect?"

  "I will."

  "And I will take it," said Cinna loudly, "if I see the House divide in a clear majority."

  "Let the House divide," said Sulla instantly. "Those in favor of the oath, please stand to my right. Those not in favor, please stand to my left."

  Only a very few senators stood to Sulla's left, but the first to get there was Quintus Sertorius, his muscular frame exuding anger.

  "The House has divided and shown its wishes conclusively," said Sulla, the look vanished completely from his face. "Quintus Mucius, you are the Pontifex Maximus. How do you say this oath should be administered?''

  "Legally," said Scaevola promptly. "The first phase involves the whole House going with me to the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, where the flamen Dialis and I will sacrifice a victim to the Great God. It will be a two-year-old sheep, and the Priests of the Two Teeth will attend us."

  "How convenient!" said Sertorius loudly. "I'll bet that when we get to the top of the Capitol, all the requisite men and animals will be waiting for us!"

  Scaevola carried on as if no one had spok
en. "After the sacrifice I will ask Lucius Domitius—who is son of the late Pontifex Maximus and not directly involved in this business—to take the auspices from the liver of the victim. If the omens are suitably propitious, I will then lead the House to the temple of Semo Sancus Dius Fidius, the god of Divine Good Faith. There—under the open sky, as is required of all oath-takers—I will charge the consuls-elect to uphold the leges Corneliae."

  Sulla rose from his curule chair. “Then by all means let us do it, Pontifex Maximus."

  The omens were propitious, made the more so on the walk from the Capitol to the temple of Semo Sancus Dius Fidius when an eagle was seen to be flying from left to right across the Porta Sanqualis by the whole Senate in procession.

  But Cinna had no intention of allowing himself to be bound by an oath to uphold Sulla's constitution, and he knew exactly how he was going to render his oath no oath. As the senators wended their way up the hill to the temple of the Great God on the Capitol, he deliberately fell in with Quintus Sertorius, and without letting anyone see him speak—let alone hear what he said—he asked Quintus Sertorius to find him a certain kind of stone. Then as the senators wended their way from one temple to the other, Sertorius dropped the stone unnoticed within the folds of Cinna's toga. To work it to a place where he could close the fingers of his left hand around it was easy; for it was a small stone, smooth and oval.

  From early childhood he, like every other Roman boy, had known that he must go outside into the open air before he could take one of the splendidly juicy oaths so loved by little boys—oaths of friendship and enmity, fear and fury, daring and delusion. For the swearing of an oath had to be witnessed by the gods of the sky; if they did not witness it, then it was not a true and binding oath. Like all his boyhood companions, Cinna had taken the ritual with total seriousness. But he had once met a fellow—the son of the knight Sextus Perquitienus—who, having been brought up in that hideous house, had abrogated every oath he ever swore. The two were much of an age, though the son of Sextus Perquitienus did not mix with the sons of senators. The encounter had been a chance one, and it had involved the taking of an oath.