Page:The City-State of the Greeks and Romans.djvu/340

316 adaptation rather than invention was what they chiefly excelled in. In dealing with their conquests they turned to account their faculty of adaptation in two distinct ways. First, they used their city-magistracy for the government of their new acquisitions; that dread imperium, which their fathers had handed down to them as the greatest political treasure of their State, they now simply extended in its full force over the vast territories they conquered. We saw (p. 108) that the consul in the field retained undiminished the imperium of the Rex. Now as fresh wars or rebellions might always be expected in the conquered lands, this undiminished imperium, i.e. supreme military and judicial power in combination, was utilised to do the required work. The consul, holding this power, presided over Italy as the sphere of his government (provincia). Even when the islands of Sicily and Sardinia were annexed, no new office was created; four prætors were elected, instead of two, and among these four the provinciæ were allotted, two of jurisdiction at home, two of government beyond the sea. Those who undertook these last held an imperium precisely equal in all essentials to that of the consul in the field; and like him they were in the eye of the law simply magistrates of the City-State of Rome. With a slight extension this simple system was maintained during more than two centuries. In course of time the imperium of consul or prætor came to be prorogued, as it was called, so that he might discharge the growing business of the home government during one year, and proceed