Cato the Younger

But from that day, as we are told; Cato neither cut his hair nor trimmed his beard nor put on a garland, but maintained the same mien of sorrow, dejection, and heaviness of spirit in view of the calamities of his country, alike in victory and in defeat, until the end. At the time, however, having had Sicily allotted to him as a province, he crossed over to Syracuse, and on learning that Asinius Pollio had come to Messana with a force from the enemy, he sent and demanded a reason for his coming.

But having been asked by Pollio in turn a reason for the convulsion in the state, and hearing that Pompey had abandoned Italy altogether, and was encamped at Dyrrhachium, he remarked that there was much inconsistency and obscurity in the divine government, since Pompey had been invincible while his course was neither sound nor just, but now, when he wished to save his country and was fighting in defence of liberty, he had been deserted by his good fortune.

As for Asinius, indeed, Cato said he was able to drive him out of Sicily; but since another and a larger force was coming to his aid, he did not wish to ruin the island by involving it in war, and therefore, after advising the Syracusans to seek safety by joining the victorious party, he sailed away.

After he had come to Pompey, he was ever of one mind, namely, to protract the war; for he looked with hope to a settlement of the controversy, and did not wish that the state should be worsted in a struggle and suffer at its own hands the extreme of disaster, in having its fate decided by the sword.

Other measures, too, akin to this, he persuaded Pompey and his council to adopt, namely, not to plunder a city that was subject to Rome, and not to put a Roman to death except on the field of battle. This brought to the party of Pompey a good repute, and induced many to join it; they were delighted with his reasonableness and mildness.

When Cato was dispatched to Asia, that he might help those who were collecting transports and soldiers there, he took with him Servilia his sister and her young child by Lucullus. For Servilia had followed Cato, now that she was a widow, and had put an end to much of the evil report about her dissolute conduct[*](Cf. chapter xxiv. 3.) by submitting to Cato’s guardianship and sharing his wanderings and his ways of life of her own accord.

But Caesar[*](In his Anti-Cato. Cf. chapter xi. 4.) did not spare abuse of Cato even on the score of his relations with Servilia.

Now, in other ways, as it would seem, Pompey’s commanders in Asia had no need of Cato, and therefore, after persuading Rhodes into allegiance, he left Servilia and her child there, and returned to Pompey, who now had a splendid naval and military force assembled.

Here, indeed, and most clearly, Pompey was thought to have made his opinion of Cato manifest. For he determined to put the command of his fleet into the hands of Cato, and there were no less than five hundred fighting ships, besides Liburnian craft, look-out ships, and open boats in great numbers.