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 war. Meanwhile a terrible reaction had occurred at Rome in Sulla's absence. Scarcely had he left the city ( 87), when Lucius Cornelius Cinna, one of the consuls whose appointment he had sanctioned, proclaimed himself on the popular side, and commenced a series of measures directly opposed to Sulla's views. His colleague Octavius drove him from Rome, and the senate deposed him from the consulship. The Italians, however, gathered round Cinna; Marius and his fellow-exiles hearing of the movement, hastened back to Italy; all the able military men of the Marian party, and among them a young and generous commander named Sertorius, exerted themselves to raise troops; and at length the aristocratic party found themselves besieged in Rome. Famine and pestilence began their ravages in the city; and the senate, reinstating Cinna in the consulship, capitulated on the understanding that blood should not be shed. But there was little softness in the nature of Marius. Admitted into the city, the stern old man, who was already tottering on the brink of the grave, revenged his wrongs by a frightful massacre, in which many men of distinction fell. Marius then caused himself to be elected to a seventh consulship ( 86), his colleague being Cinna. He enjoyed the unprecedented honor but a few days, dying on the 13th of January ( 86), and Valerius Flaccus was named his successor. Flaccus, setting out with authority to supersede Sulla in the Mithridatic war, was murdered by his legate Flavius Fimbria, who assumed the command of the army, and gained some successes; but being afterwards hard pressed by Sulla, and deserted by his army, committed suicide. This occurred about the time of the conclusion of the peace with Mithridates ( 84); and Sulla, after settling the affairs of Asia Minor, and draining the country of money, so remorselessly as to affect its prosperity for a century, commenced his journey homewards, with bloody purposes against Cinna and his adherents, and an army ready to execute them.

Cinna did not live to face his dreadful enemy. Murdered by his soldiers in his fourth consulship, he left, as his successors in the leadership of the popular party, Caius Marius the Younger, Papirius Carbo, and the brave Sertorius—the two former of whom were chosen consuls for the year 82, to oppose Sulla in Italy, while Sertorius was despatched to Spain to secure that province. But Carbo and the younger Marius, even when backed by the brave Samnites and other Italian nations, were not equal to a contest with such a general as Sulla, assisted as he was by commanders like Metellus, Lucullus, and young Cneius Pompeius Strabo, more commonly called Pompey, the son of that Pompeius who had been one of the Roman generals in the Marsic War. The consular armies were defeated; Marius killed himself; Carbo fled to Africa; and Sulla remained master of Italy. Fearful was his vengeance. The massacre which Marius had ordered five years before, was slight compared with the butcheries which took place by the command of Sulla. In Rome, and over all Italy, every man of distinction implicated in the popular movement was sought out and slain. Proscription lists, as they were called—that is, lists of doomed individuals—were published; and soldiers were ready to track them out for the prices put upon their heads. Military colonies were likewise planted in all parts of Italy—lands being taken by force for that purpose: thus purging Italy of the Marian leaven, Sulla was resolved to create in it a new population, which should be pliant to aristocratic influence.