Civil Wars

Acilius fled from the city secretly. His hiding-place was disclosed by a slave to the soldiers, but he prevailed upon them, by the hope of a larger reward, to send some of their number to his wife with a private token that he gave them. When they came she gave them all of her jewellery, saying that she gave it in return for what they had promised, although she. did not know whether they would keep their agreement. But her fidelity to her husband was not disappointed, for the soldiers hired a ship for Acilius and conducted him to Sicily. The wife of Lentulus asked that she might accompany him in his flight and kept watch upon his movements for that purpose, but he was not willing that she should share his danger, and fled secretly to Sicily. Being appointed prætor there by Pompeius he sent word to her that he was saved and elevated to office. When she learned in what part of the earth her husband was she escaped with two slaves from her mother, who was keeping watch over her. With these she travelled in the guise of a slave, with great hardship and the meanest fare, until she was able to make the passage from Rhegium to Messana about nightfall. She learned without difficulty where the prætor's tent was, and there she found Lentulus, not in the attitude of a prætor, but on a low pallet with unkempt hair and wretched food, mourning for his wife.

The wife of Apuleius threatened that, if he should fly without her, she would give information against him. So he took her with him unwillingly, and he succeeded in avoiding suspicion in his flight by travelling with his wife and his male and female slaves in a public manner. The wife of Antius wrapped him up in a clothes-bag and gave the bundle to some porters to carry from the house to the sea-shore, whence he made his escape to Sicily. The wife of Rheginus concealed him in a sewer by night. The soldiers were not willing to follow him there in the daytime, on account of the foul odor. The next night she fixed him up as a charcoal dealer, and furnished him an ass to drive, carrying coals. She led the way at a short distance, borne in a litter. One of the soldiers at the city gates suspected the litter and searched it. Rheginus was alarmed and hastened his steps, and as he passed along admonished the soldier not to give trouble to women. The latter, who took him for a charcoal dealer, answered him angrily, but suddenly recognizing him (for he had served under him in Syria), said, "Go on your way rejoicing, general, for such I ought still to call you." The wife of Coponius obtained his safety by yielding herself to Antony, although she had previously been chaste, thus curing one evil with another.

The son of Geta pretended to burn his father's remains in the courtyard of his house, making people believe that he had strangled himself. Then he conveyed him secretly to a newly bought field and left him. There the old man changed his appearance by putting a bandage over one of his eyes. After the return of peace he took off the bandage and found that he had lost the sight of that eye by disuse. Oppius, by reason of the infirmities of age, was unwilling to fly, but his son carried him on his shoulder till he had brought him outside the gates. The remainder of the journey as far as Sicily he accomplished partly by leading and partly by carrying him, nobody suspecting the trick and nobody troubling him. In like manner they say that Æneas was respected even by his enemies when carrying his father. In admiration of his piety the people in later days elected the young man to the ædileship, and since his property had been confiscated and he could not defray the expenses of the office [for public games], the artisans performed the work appertaining thereto without pay, and each of the spectators tossed such money as he could afford to give into the orchestra,[*](The orchestra of a Roman theatre was the place reserved for the Senate.) so that he became a rich man. By the will of Arrianus the following inscription was engraved on the father's tomb: "Here lies one who, when proscribed, was concealed by his son, who had not been proscribed, but who fled with him and saved him."

There were two men named Metellus, father and son. The father held a command under Antony at the battle of Actium and was taken prisoner, but not recognized. The son fought on the side of Octavius and held a command under him at the same battle. When Octavius looked over the prisoners at Samos the son was sitting with him. The old man was led forward covered with hair, misery, and dirt, and completely metamorphosed by them. When his name was called by the herald in the array of prisoners the son sprang from his seat, and, with difficulty recognizing his father, embraced him with a cry of anguish. Then restraining his lamentation he said to Octavius, "He was your enemy, I was your fellow-soldier. He has earned your punishment, I your reward. I ask you either to spare my father on my account, or to kill me at the same time on his account." There was much emotion on all sides, and Octavius spared Metellus, although he had been bitterly hostile to himself and had scorned many offers made to him to desert Antony.

The slaves of Marcus guarded him with fidelity and success within his own house during the whole period of the proscription until there was nothing more to fear, when Marcus came out of his house as though from exile. Hirtius escaped from the city with his household servants and traversed Italy releasing prisoners, collecting runaways, and ravaging small towns at first and afterward large ones, until he found himself possessed of sufficient force to master Bruttium. When an army was sent against him he crossed the straits with his forces and joined Pompeius. When Restio fled, thinking that he was alone, he was followed secretly by a slave, who had been brought up by himself and had been very well treated by him formerly, but had lately been branded for bad conduct. While Restio was stopping in a marsh the slave came up to him. He was startled at the sight, but the slave said that he did not feel the pain of the brand so much as he remembered the former kindness shown to him. Then he found a resting-place for his master in a cave, and by working procured such sustenance for him as he could. The soldiers in the neighborhood of the cave had their suspicions aroused concerning Restio, and went to it. The slave observed their movements and followed them, and, seeing an old man walking in front of them, he ran up and killed him and cut off his head. The soldiers were astounded. They arrested him for a highwayman, but he said, "I have killed Restio, my master, the man who marked me with these scars." The soldiers took the head from him for the sake of the reward, and made haste to the city to no purpose. The slave brought his master away and conveyed him by ship to Sicily.[*](The tale of Antius Restio and his slave is related in nearly the same words by Valerius Maximus (vi. 8. 7).)

Appion was resting at his country-place when the soldiers burst in. A slave put on his master's clothes and threw himself on his bed and voluntarily died for his master, who was standing beside him dressed as a slave.[*](This tale is related at greater length by Valerius Maximus (xi. 8. 6), who gives the name of the master as Urbinius Panopion.) When the soldiers made a descent upon the house of Menenius, one of his slaves got into his master's litter and procured himself to be carried by his fellow-slaves, and in this way allowed himself to be killed for Menenius, who thereby escaped to Sicily. Vinius had a freedman named Philemon, the owner of a splendid mansion, who concealed him in the inmost recess thereof, in an iron chest used for holding money or manuscripts, and gave him food in the night-time, until the return of peace.[*](Suetonius (Aug. 27) gives this freedman the name of T. Vinius Philopœmen.) Another freedman, who had the custody of his master's tomb, guarded his master's son, who had been proscribed, in the tomb with his father. Lucretius, who had been wandering about with two faithful slaves and had become destitute of food, set out to find his wife and was carried in a litter, in the guise of a sick man, by the slaves to the city. One of the slaves broke his leg and walked leaning upon the other with his hand. When they reached the gate where the father of Lucretius, who had been proscribed by Sulla, had been captured, he saw a cohort of soldiers coming out. Being unnerved by the coincidence, he concealed himself with one of the slaves in a tomb. When some tomb-robbers came there searching for plunder, the slave offered himself to these robbers to be stripped till Lucretius could escape to the city gate. There Lucretius waited for him and shared his clothing with him, and then went to his wife, by whom he was concealed between the planks of a double roof until his friends got his name erased from the proscription. After the restoration of peace he was raised to the consulship.