Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/657

Rh CATO. The return of Cato appears to have been accele- rated by the enmity of P. Scipio AfricanuB, who w^s consul, B. c. 194, and is said to have coveted the command of the province in which Cato was reaping renown. There is some variance between Nepos (or the pseudo-Nepos), and Plutarch (Cat. Maj. 11), in their accounts of this transaction. The former asserts that Scipio was unsuccessful in his attempt to obtain the province, and, offended by the repulse, remained after the end of his consul- ship, in a private capacity at Rome. The latter relates that Scipio, who was disgusted by Cato's severity, was actually appointed to succeed him, but, not being able to procure from the senate a vote of censure upon the administration of his rival, passed the time of his command in utter inactivity. From the statement in Livy (xxxiv. 43), that B. c. 194, Sex. Digitiuswas appointed to the pro- vince of Citerior Spain, it is probable that Plutarch was mistaken in assigning that province to Scipio Africanus. The notion that Africanus was ap- pointed successor to Cato in Spain may have arisen from a double confusion of name and place, for P. Scipio Nasica was appointed, B. c. 194, to the Ul- terior province. However this may be, Cato successfully vindi- cated himself by his eloquence, and by the pro- duction of detailed pecuniary accounts, against the attacks made upon his conduct while consul ; and the existing fragments of the speeches, (or the same speech under different names,) made after his re- turn, attest the vigour and boldness of his defence. Plutarch {Cat Maj. 12), states that, after his consulship, Cato accompanied Tib. Senipronius Longus as legatus to Thrace, but here there seems to be some error, for though Scipio Africanus was of opinion that one of the consuls ought to have Macedonia, we soon find Sempronius in Cisalpine Gaul (Liv. xxxiv. 43, 46), and in B. c. 193, we find Cato at Rome dedicating to Victoria Virgo a small temple which he had vowed two years before. (Liv. XXXV. 9.) The military career of Cato was not yet ended. In B. c. 191, he was appointed military tribune (or legatus ? Liv. xxxvi. 17, 21), under the con- sul M Acilius Glabrio, who was despatched to Greece to oppose the invasion of Antiochus the Great, king of Syria. In the decisive battle of Thermopylae, which led to the downfall of Antio- chus, Cato behaved with his wonted valour, and en- joyed the good fortune which usually waits upon genius. By a daring and difficult advance, he sur- prised and dislodged a body of the enemy's Aeto- lian auxiliaries, who were posted upon the Calli- dromus, the highest summit of the range of Octa. He then commenced a sudden descent from the hills above the royal camp, and the panic occasioned by this unexpected movement at once turned the day in favour of the Romans. After the action, the general embraced Cato with the utmost warmth, and ascribed to him the whole credit of the victory. This fact rests on the authority of Cato himself, who, like Cicero, often indulged in the habit, offen- sive to modem taste, of sounding his own praises. After an interval spent in the pursuit of Antiochus and the pacification of Greece, Cato was despatched to Rome by the consul Glabrio to announce the successful result of the campaign, and he performed his journey with such celerity that he had com- menced his report in the senate before the arrival of L. Scipio, (the subsequent conqueror of Antiochus,) CATO. 63J> who had been sent off from Greece a few days b*"- fore him. (Liv. xxxvi. 21.) It was during the campaign in Greece under Glabrio, and, as it would appear from the account of Plutarch, (rejected by Drumann,) before the battle of Thermopylae, that Cato was commissioned to keep Corinth, Patrae, and Aegium, from siding with Antiochus. It was then too that he visited Athens, and, to prevent the Athenians from listen- ing to the overtures of the Syrian king, addressed them in a Latin speech, which was explained to them by an interpreter. Already perhaps he had a smattering of Greek, for, it is said by Plutarch, that, while at Tarentum in his youth, he became intimately acquainted with Nearchus, a Greek phi- losopher, and it is said by Aurelius Victor that while praetor in Sardinia, he received instruction in Greek from Ennius. It was not so much, per- haps, on account of his still professed contempt for everj'thing Greek, as because his speech was an affair of state, that he used the Latin language, in compliance with the Roman custom, which was ob- served as a diplomatic mark of Roman majesty. (Val. Max. ii. 2. § 2.) After his arrival at Rome, there is no certain proof that Cato was eter again engaged in w^ar. Scipio, who had been legatus under Glabrio, was consul B. c. 190, and the province of Greece was awarded to him by the senate. An expression occurs in Cicero {pro Muren. 14), which might lead to the opinion that Cato returned to Greece, and fought under L. Scipio, but, as to such an event, history is silent. "Nunquam cum Scipione esset profectus [M. Cato], si cum mulierculis bellandum esse arbitraretur." That Cicero was in error seems more likely than that he referred to the time when Cato and L. Scipio served together under Glabrio, or that the words " cum Scipione," as some critics have thought, are an interpolation. In B. c. 189, M. Fulvius Nobilior, the consul, obtained Aetolia as his province, and Cato was sent thither after him, as we learn from an extract (preserved by Festus, s. v. Oraiores), from his speech " de suis Virtutibus contra Thennum." It seems that his legation was rather civil than mili- tary, and that he was sent to confer with Fulvius on the petition of the Aetolians, who were placed in an unfortunate situation, not sufficiently pro- tected by Rome if they maintained their fidelity, and yet punished if they were induced to assist her enemies. We have seen Cato in the character of an emi- nent and able soldier : we have now to observe him in the character of an active and leading citizen. If Cato were in B. c. 190 with L. Scipio Asiaticus (as Cicero seems to have imagined), and in B. c 189 in Aetolia with Fulvius, he must still have passed a portion of those years in Rome. We find him in b. c. 190 most strenuous in resisting the claims of Q. Minucius Thermus to a triumph. Thermus had been displaced by Cato in the com- mand of Citerior Spain, and was afterwards en- gaged in repressing the incursions of the Ligurians, whom he reduced to submission, and now demanded a triumph as his reward. Cato accused him of fabricating battles and exaggerating the numbers of the enemy slain in real engagements, and declaimed against his cruel and ignominious execution of ten magistrates (decemviri) of the Boian Gauls, with- out even the forms of justice, on the pretext that they were dilatory in furnishing the required sup-