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CÆSAR CROSSES THE RUBICON

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examples in history of the all-importance of time in war. Pompey's military merits were many, but rapidity was not one of them. He was a good organiser, a sure and steady leader, a capable strategist; but he was not one of those generals who fly from point to point with lightning speed, and win by swift marching as much as by hard fighting. Cæsar's sudden move across the Rubicon had caught him with his army still unmobilised. To those who had questioned him about his preparations he had replied that "he had but to stamp his foot in any part of Italy and legions would at once spring up." The boast was not unfounded, for his name had still the greatest influence with the military classes, and if he had been allowed a few weeks of preparation he would have taken the field at the head of an imposing force. But Cæsar knew the fact, and was determined that those few weeks should not be granted him. It was this knowledge that made him strike so early, and advance into Picenum with a mere vanguard, while the main body of his legions was still trailing through the Alpine passes. This sudden irruption disarranged all Pompey's plans; instead of being able to mobilise at leisure and to face the invader on the frontier, he was forced to abandon Rome in the first days of the war, and to order his recruits to collect far to the south in Apulia. He had no force actually under arms and capable of taking the field, save two legions at Capua, which could not lightly be trusted. For they had been under Cæsar's orders till the preceding year, and had been borrowed from him for the ostensible purpose of being sent to the Parthian war. If Pompey

risked opposing them to their old leader, it was possible, or even probable, that they would desert to him en masse. They were not given the chance, but were marched off at once to the south, out of harm's way. The levies of Northern Italy were never raised by the Republicans—

Cæsar had been too quick for them. But those of the central regions ought to have been led in safety to the camp at Luceria, the great centre of mobilisation, if Pompey's orders had been properly carried out. If they had arrived, it might yet have been possible to maintain a hold on Southern Italy. But the plan of campaign was ruined by the strange mixture of presumption and cowardice displayed by L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, one of the many officers of tried Optimate principles and equally tried incapacity whom Pompey had been forced to put in high command. With 20,000 newly embodied men, not wholly armed nor even told off into legions, Domitius ventured to oppose himself to Cæsar, in spite of orders that bade him march for Luceria without risking the smallest skirmish. He was promptly surrounded, driven into Corfinium and blockaded. Seven days later the undisciplined horde of conscripts surrendered to Cæsar, when they saw that there was no relief at hand, and that their general was preparing to abscond by night and to leave them in the lurch.

Deprived of half the army which he had hoped to concentrate at Luceria, and left alone with two untrustworthy legions and the not over numerous levies of Apulia and Lucania, Pompey dared not fight. In spite of the complaints and criticisms of his Optimate allies—even Cicero dared to taunt him with want of military skill-he resolved to evacuate Italy and retire to Epirus, where, under cover of his fleet, he might drill and organise his recruits in safety. The whole army was shipped off from Brundisium, in spite of Cæsar's efforts to prevent its retreat. When pressed by his opponent, Pompey showed that his old reputation was not undeserved, by foiling the attack of the Gallic legions and bringing off his whole force without any appreciable loss.

It was now only the 17th of March, and the whole

POMPEY RETIRES TO EPIRUS

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campaigning season lay at the disposal of the two adversaries. But Pompey could not use it for active operations. He had to form his masses of conscripts into a fighting machine, and to wait for the distant reinforcements that could be raised in the East. There were two old legions in Syria-the wrecks of Crassus' host-and one other in Cilicia. More could undoubtedly be raised among the numerous Roman citizens residing in Greece and Asia, but it would take months to bring these distant resources into working order. Meanwhile Pompey could do nothing but order his fleet to blockade Italy, and to prevent the Cæsarians from taking ship to follow him across the Ionian Sea.

Cæsar, on the other hand, was in a very different position; his old army was entirely at his disposition, and he had already raised many new legions from Italy. Secure against any interruption from Pompey for many months, he could strike at the one region where the Republican party was really strong-Spain. In that province lay seven old legions devoted to Pompey, if not to the Senate; they were in charge of Afranius and Petreius, two commonplace veterans, willing and courageous enough, but destitute of any spark of military genius. Cæsar resolved to destroy this dangerous force in his rear, before paying any further attention to Pompey's disorganised host. I march," he said, "to deal with the army that has no general; I shall then come back to deal with the general who has no army." He carried out his project; in a campaign of three short months he defeated, surrounded, and captured five of the Pompeian legions at Ilerda: the other two surrendered a few weeks later. Long ere the army of Epirus was ready to move, Cæsar was back again in Italy and planning out his second task, the destruction of Pompey's main body.

When Pompey and Cæsar were once face to face, we

note that the younger general found that his task was far harder than he had supposed. It was the best-contested campaign that he ever conducted; hazardous it was bound to be, since the Republicans were in very superior force, but Cæsar endeavoured to reduce the hazard to a minimum, and in especial made his troops entrench and stockade themselves in the most laborious fashion. He could have paid no greater compliment to his adversary's generalship, for he knew that man for man his soldiers were each worth two of Pompey's recruits. Pompey, on the other hand, was bound to show an even greater caution; if once his active and vigilant enemy could force a battle upon him on anything like equal ground, the result (in spite of their relative numbers) would be more than doubtful. It was his object to contain and check Cæsar rather than to endeavour to destroy him; his strategy had to be defensive, and for ultimate success he relied on his power to starve out his adversary by confining him to a narrow space of barren coastland and cutting off his supplies that came by sea. In all of this he was successful; Cæsar's attempts to bring on a battle were foiled; the war stood still for four months in the long lines which both parties had constructed outside Dyrrhachium. This delay was all in Pompey's favour, for he had far more reinforcements to expect and resources to draw upon than had his opponent. When Cæsar tried the desperate game of trying to cast a complete circumvallation round the Republican camp he was utterly foiled. Waiting till the line-some twenty miles long-grew over-thin, Pompey burst out one morning, broke through the entrenchments, drove off the legions opposed to him, and inflicted on the Cæsarians a loss which their leader himself confesses to have amounted to over 1000 men.

The prospects of the great adventurer looked dark his food was giving out, his ranks were growing thin, even

THE BATTLE OF DYRRHACHIUM

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his hardy veterans were somewhat dashed in spirits by their first defeat. The prolongation of the present situation was impossible, and Cæsar tried his last move. It was skilful and daring, but hazardous in the extreme. Abandoning his lines, he marched off southward, and then struck inland, up the valley of the Aöus, across the Epirot mountains, as if he were meditating a blow at his opponent's base at Thessalonica. Pompey would probably have done well to have let Cæsar march whither he pleased, and to have thrown his whole army on to Italy. His fleet could have taken him over in a few days, and the Peninsula was practically undefended. There was nothing but a legion or two of recruits to defend the Cæsarian cause, and the country-side would probably have received the return of Pompey with enthusiasm.

But Pompey preferred to consider Cæsar and his army, not Rome, as his objective, and marched off inland in pursuit of the enemy. He came up with them at Pharsalus, and there at last risked battle. There was much to encourage him: his legions were improving in value every day; during the last combats round Dyrrhachium they had behaved admirably. He had nearly double his adversary's numbers, including a force of cavalry to which Cæsar had hardly anything to oppose. His officers were set on fighting: the Optimates thought that they had their enemy in a trap, and were only anxious to make an end of him. Their constant appeals, which grew into taunts and angry recriminations, finally drove their commander into risking the general engagement which he had so long avoided.

He was, as it turned out, misled when he yielded to the murmurs of his officers and the prayers of his legionaries. The great battle in the plain of Pharsalus turned out a complete disaster, not from any want of tactical skill in Pompey, but mainly from the inferior quality of his men.

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