Swift as a thunderbolt Mithridates
himself crossed the Bosphorus, and the next news that reached Rome was
that northern Greece had risen also and was throwing itself into the arms
of its deliverers.
The defeat at Cannae had been received with dignified calm. Patricians and
plebeians forgot their quarrels and thought only how to meet their common
foe. The massacre in Asia and the invasion of Mithridates let loose a
tempest of political frenzy. Never was indignation more deserved. The
Senate had made no preparation. Such resources as they could command had
been wasted in the wars with the Italians. They had no fleet, they had no
armies available; nor, while the civil war was raging, could they raise an
army. The garrisons in Greece were scattered or shut in within their lines
and unable to move. The treasury was empty. Individuals were enormously
rich and the State was bankrupt. Thousands of families had lost brothers,
cousins, or friends in the massacre, and the manifest cause of the
disaster was the inefficiency and worthlessness of the ruling classes. In
Africa, in Gaul, in Italy, and now in Asia it had been the same story. The
interests of the Commonwealth had been sacrificed to fill the purses of
the few. Dominion, wealth, honors, all that had been won by the hardy
virtues of earlier generations, seemed about to be engulfed forever.
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