[6] Sylla had himself nominated a large number of senators.
[7] So says Suetonius, reporting the traditions of the following century;
but the authority is doubtful, and the story, like so many others, is
perhaps apocryphal.
CHAPTER IX.
The able men of the democracy had fallen in the proscription. Sertorius,
the only eminent surviving soldier belonging to them, was away, making
himself independent in Spain. The rest were all killed. But the Senate,
too, had lost in Sylla the single statesman that they possessed. They were
a body of mediocrities, left with absolute power in their hands, secure as
they supposed from further interference, and able to return to those
pleasant occupations which for a time had been so rudely interrupted.
Sertorius was an awkward problem with which Pompey might perhaps be
entrusted to deal. No one knew as yet what stuff might be in Pompey. He
was for the present sunning himself in his military splendors; too young
to come forward as a politician, and destitute, so far as appeared, of
political ambition. If Pompey promised to be docile, he might be turned to
use at a proper time; but the aristocracy had seen too much of successful
military commanders, and were in no hurry to give opportunities of
distinction to a youth who had so saucily defied them.
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