Sertorius was at last disposed of, but by methods promising ill for the
future. He beat Metellus till Metellus could do no more against him. The
all-victorious Pompey was sent at last to win victories and gain nothing
by them. Six campaigns led to no result and the difficulty was only
removed at last by treachery and assassination.
A more extraordinary and more disgraceful phenomenon was the growth of
piracy, with the skirts of which Caesar had come in contact at Pharmacusa.
The Romans had become masters of the world, only that the sea from one end
of their dominions to the other should be patrolled by organized rovers.
For many years, as Roman commerce extended, the Mediterranean had become a
profitable field of enterprise for those gentry. From every country which
they had overrun or occupied the conquests of the Romans had let loose
swarms of restless patriots who, if they could not save the liberties of
their own countries, could prey upon the oppressor. Illyrians from the
Adriatic, Greeks from the islands and the Asiatic ports, Syrians,
Egyptians, Africans, Spaniards, Gauls, and disaffected Italians, trained
many of them to the sea from their childhood, took to the water in their
light galleys with all the world before them. Under most circumstances
society is protected against thieves by their inability to combine.
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