Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/70

 others; though, as we have already observed, the whole body belonged almost exclusively to the few very wealthy. Their numbers excited constant apprehension; but care was taken not to distinguish them by a peculiar dress. Their ranks were recruited in various ways. The captives in war were sold at auction. The good Cicero, in the little wars in which he was commander, sold men enough to produce, at half price, half a million dollars. When it was told in Rome that Cæsar had invaded Britain, the people, in the true spirit of robbers, could not but ask one another what plunder he could hope to find there. 'There is not a scruple of silver,' said they, 'in the whole island;' neque argenti scrupulum in ilia insula. 'Yes,' it was truly answered, 'but he will bring slaves.'

The second mode of supplying the slave market was by commerce; and this supply was so uniform and abundant, that the price of an ordinary laborer hardly varied very much for centuries. The reason is obvious. The slave merchant gets his cargoes from kidnappers, and the first cost, therefore, is inconsiderable. The great centres of this traffic were in the harbors bordering on the Euxine; and [sic]Scythians were often stolen. Caravans penetrated the deserts of Africa, and made regular hunts for slaves. Blacks were in high value; they were somewhat rare, and therefore both male and female negroes were favorite articles of luxury among the opulent Romans. At one period, Delos was most remarkable as the emporium for slavers. It had its harbors, chains, prisons, every thing so amply arranged to favor a brisk traffic, that ten thousand slaves could change hands and be shipped in a single day.

Such was the character of the Italian population over which a government was to be instituted, at the time when Cæsar appeared with his army on the borders of the Rubicon. In the contest which followed, it was the object of Pompey to plunder, to devastate, and to revenge. There did not exist any armed party in favor of a democratic republic. The spirit of the democracy was gone; and its shade only moved, with powerless steps, through the forum and the temples, which had once been the scenes of its glory.

Julius Cæsar was a great statesman, not less than a great soldier. His ambition was in every thing gratified; the noise of his triumphs had filled the shores of England, the swamps of Belgium, and the forests of Germany. Any distinction in the Roman State was within his reach. He was childless; and therefore his ambition hardly seemed to require a subversion of the Roman Commonwealth. And yet, with all this, he deliberately perceived that the continuance of popular liberty was impossible, in the actual condition of the Roman State; that a wasting, corrupt, and most oppressive aristocracy was preparing to assume the dominion of the world; that this aristocracy threatened ruin to the provinces, perpetual cruelty to the slaves, and hereditary, intolerant contempt for the people. Democracy had expired; and the worst form of aristocracy, like that of the Venetian nobles of a later day, could be prevented only by a monarchy. Julius Cæsar coolly resolved on the establishment of a monarchy. This was the third great revolution prepared by slavery.

Slavery having impoverished, but not wholly corrupted the free citizens, Gracchus had endeavored to restore the democracy by creating an independent yeomanry, and had failed from the opposition of the nobles. The nobles, perceiving the increase of the evil, the great degradation of the electors, and the multiplication of slaves, and being firmly resolved on maintaining the system of slave labor, endeavored to effect a revolution, by substituting a strong aristocracy for the democracy. The plan failed, owing to he strength of the democratic forms, which had survived the democratic spirit. Cæsar came, and finding the evil excessive, could devise no cure; but he clearly saw that a monarchical form of government was the only one which would endure in Rome. Had Cæsar possessed the virtues of Washington, the democracy of Jefferson, the legislative genius of Madison, he could not have changed the course of events. The condition of the Roman population demanded monarchy.