the murderer of my brother. What can I there expect, but that Jugurtha should hasten to imbrue, in my blood, those hands which are now reeking with my brother's? If I were to fly for refuge, or for assistance, to any other court, from what prince can I hope for protection, if the Roman commonwealth give me up? From my own family or friends I have no expectations. 9. My royal father is no more. He is beyond the reach of violence, and out of hearing of the complaints of his unhappy son. Were my brother alive, our mutual sympathy would be some alleviation. But he is hurried out of life, in his early youth, by the very hand which should have been the last to injure any of the royal family of Numidia. The bloody Jugurtha has butchered all whom he suspected to be in my interest. Some have been destroyed by the lingering torment of the cross. Others have been given a prey to wild beasts; and their anguish made the sport of men more cruel than wild beasts. If there be any yet alive, they are shut up in dungeons, there to drag out a life more intolerable than death itself. 10. Look down, illustrious senators of Rome! from that height of power to which you are raised, on the unexampled distresses of a prince, who is, by the cruelty of a wicked intruder, become an outcast from all mankind. Let not the crafty insinuations of him who returns murder for adoption prejudice your judgment. Do not listen to the wretch who has butchered the son and relations of a king, who gave him power to sit on the same throne with his own sons. 11. I have been informed that he labors by his emissaries to prevent your determining any thing against him in his absence; pretending that I magnify my distress, and might, for him, have staid in peace in my own kingdom. But, if ever the time comes, when the due vengeance from above shall overtake him, he will then dissemble as I do. Then he who, now hardened in wickedness, triumphs over those whom his violence laid low, will, in his turn, feel distress, and suffer for his impious ingratitude to my father, and his blood-thirsty cruelty to my brother. 12. Oh murdered, butchered brother! Oh dearest to my heart,-now gone forever from my sight! But why should I lament his death? He is, indeed, deprived of the blessed light of heaven, of life, and kingdom, at once, by the very person who ought to have been the first to hazard his own life, in defence of any one of Micipsa's family. But, as things are, my brother is not so much deprived of these comforts, as delivered from terror, from flight, from exile, and the endless train of miseries which render life to me a burden. 13. He lies full low, gored with wounds, and festering in his own blood. But he lies in peace. He feels none of the miseries which rend my soul with agony and distraction, while I am set up a spectacle to all mankind, of the uncer tainty of human affairs. So far from having it in my power to punish his murderer, I am not master of the means of securing my own life. So far from being in a condition to defend my kingdom from the violence of the usurper, I am obliged to apply for foreign protection for my own person. 14. Fathers! Senators of Rome the arbiters of nations! to you I fly for refuge from the murderous fury of Jugurtha. By your affection for your children; by your love for your country; by your own virtues; by the majesty of the Roman commonwealth: by all that is sacred, and all that is dear to you, deliver a wretched prince from undeserved, unprovoked injury; and save the kingdom of Numidia, which is your own property, from being the prey of violence, usurpation, and cruelty. SALLUST. 11. ALARIC THE VISIGOTH. [The Visigoths were a race of barbarians occupying Middle Europe, who made war upon the Roman Emperor Arcadias, ravaging Greece and Italy. Their leader, Alaric, boasted that where his hosts trod, the grass never grew. He besieged and plundered Rome, A. D 400. Afterwards, feeling his end ap. proaching, he ordered that the Busentius, a river of Italy, should be diverted from its channel, that his body might be interred in its bed, Mr. Everett has made this dying injunction the subject of his fine verses.] W HEN I am dead, no pageant train Shall waste their sorrows at my bier, Stain it with hypocritic tear; 2. Ye shall not raise a marble bust Lay down the wreck of power to rest; 4. But ye the mountain stream shall turn, 5. My gold and silver ye shall fling Back to the clods that gave them birth; For e'en though dead, will I control 6. But when beneath the mountain tide Ye've laid your monarch down to rot, Pillar or mound to mark the spot; 7. My course was like a river deep, And from the northern hills I burst, 8. See how the haughty barriers fail 9. Not for myself did I ascend, In judgment, my triumphal car; 'T was God alone on high did send The avenging Scythian to the war, To shake abroad, with iron hand, The appointed scourge of his command. 10. With iron hand that scourge I reared, O'er guilty king and guilty realm; Destruction was the ship I steered, And Vengeance sat upon the helm; When launched in fury on the flood, I ploughed my way through seas of blood, And in the stream their hearts had spilt, Washed out the long arrears of guilt. 11. Across the everlasting Alp I poured the torrent of my powers, In vain within their seven-hilled towers; And struck a darker, deeper die, 12. My course is run, my errand done; Of glory that adorns my name; 13. My course is run, my errand done,- And in the caves of vengeance, wait; EVERETT 12. SPEECH OF SALATHIEL IN FAVOR OF RESISTING THE ROMAN POWER. THAT! must we first mingle in the cabals of Jerusalem, WHAT and rouse the frigid debaters and disputers of the Sanhedrim into action? Are we first to conciliate the irreconcil able, to soften the furious, to purify the corrupt? If the Romans are to be our tyrants till we can teach patriotism to faction, we may as well build the dungeon at once; for to the dungeon we are consigned for the longest life among us. |