we meet with examples of so ardent and ready an affection amongst the soldiers of old times, who kept strictly to the ancient police. Passion has a more absolute command over us than reason; and yet it happened, in the war against Hannibal, that, after the generous example of the people of Rome in the city, the soldiers and captains refused their pay in the army; and, in Marcellus's camp, those who would receive any, were branded with the name of Mercenaries. Having been worsted near Dyrrachium, his soldiers came and offered themselves to be chastised and punished, so that he was more inclined to comfort than reprove them.

their intre

One single cohort of his withstood four of Pom- Instances of pey's legions above four hours together, till it was pidity. almost demolished with arrows, of which there were a hundred and thirty thousand found in the trenches.* A soldier, called Scæva, who commanded at one of the avenues, invincibly maintained his ground, having lost an eye, besides being wounded in one shoulder, and one thigh, and his shield shot in two hundred and thirty places. It happened that many of his soldiers, being taken prisoners, rather chose to die than promise to take the contrary side. When Granius Petronius was taken by Scipio, in Africa, Scipio, having put his companions to death, sent him word, "That he gave him his life, for he

was a man of quality and a questor;" Petronius returned for answer, "That Caesar's soldiers were "wont to give life to others, and not to receive "it;" and immediately, with his own hand, killed himself.

Of their fidelity there are infinite examples; Fidelity of amongst which, that of those who were besieged in the garrison Salona, a city that stood for Cæsar against Pompey, is not to be forgotten, on account of an extraordi

* Sueton. in Jul. Cæs. sect. 58, Cæsar makes the number but thirty thousand.

+ Plutarch, in the Life of Cæsar, chap. 5.

VOL. II.

2 H

of Salona.

*

nary accident that there happened. Marcus Octavius kept them close besieged; they within being reduced to an extreme necessity, so that, to supply the want of men, most of them being either slain or wounded, they had set all their slaves at liberty, and had been constrained to cut off all the women's hair, to twist instead of cordage, besides a wonderful dearth of victuals, yet they continued resolute never to yield after having drawn the siege to a great length, by which Octavius was grown more negligent, and less attentive to his enterprise, they made choice of one day about noon, and, having first placed the women and children upon the walls to make a show, they sallied upon the besiegers with such fury, that, having routed the first, second, and third corps, and afterwards the fourth, and then the rest, and beaten them all out of their trenches, they pursued them even to their ships; and Octavius himself was forced to fly to Dyrrachium, where Pompey lay. I do not at present remember, that I have met with any other example, where the besieged ever gave the besiegers a total defeat, and won the field; nor that a sally ever was attended with a pure and entire victory.

CHAPTER XXVI.

Of three good Women,

True proof THEY do not run thirteen to a dozen as every one of a good knows, and especially in the duties of marriage; for that is a bargain full of so many nice circumstances, that it is hard for a woman's will to keep to it long;

marriage.

* Cæsar de Bell. Civil. lib. i. cap. 3.

12

men, though their condition be something better under that tie, have yet enough to do: the true touchstone and test of a happy marriage respects the time of their cohabitation only, whether it has been constant, mild, loyal, and commodious.

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"

opinion of

who never

for their

are dead.

In our age, women commonly reserve the publica- Montion of their good offices, and their vehement affection for their husbands, till they have lost them; or, the women, at least, then it is that they deign to give proofs of declare their good-will: a too slow testimony, and that comes their love too late; by which they rather manifest, that they husbands never loved them till dead. Their life is full oftill they combustion, their death full of love and courtesy; as fathers conceal their affections from their children, women likewise conceal theirs from their husbands, to maintain a modest respect. This is a mystery I do not relish; it is to much purpose that they scratch themselves and tear their hair. I whisper in a waiting-woman's or a secretary's ear," How were they? How did they live together?" I always have that saying in my head, Janctantius mœrent quæ minus dolent: They make the most ado "who are least concerned." Their whimpering is offensive to the living, and vain to the dead; we would willingly give them leave to laugh after we are dead, provided they will smile upon us whilst we are alive. Is it not enough to make a man revive in spite, that she who spit in my face whilst I was in being, shall come to kiss my feet when I am no more? If there be any honour in lamenting a husband, it only appertains to those who smiled upon them whilst they had them; let those who wept during their lives laugh at their deaths, as well outwardly as inwardly. Besides, never regard those blubbered eyes and that pitiful voice; but consider her deportment, her complexion, and the plumpness of her cheeks, under all those formal veils; it is there the discovery is to be made. There are few who do not mend upon it, and health is a quality that cannot lie; that starched and ceremonious

countenance looks not so much back as forward, and is rather intended to get a new husband, than to lament the old. When I was a boy, a very beautiful and virtuous lady, who is yet living, and the widow of a prince, had, I know not what, more ornament in her dress than our laws of widowhood will well allow; which being reproached with, as a great indecency, she made answer, "That it was because she was not cultivating more friendships, " and would never marry again.'

I have here, not at all dissenting from our custom, made choice of three women, who have also expressed the utmost of their goodness and affection about their husbands' death; yet are they examples of another kind than are now in use, and so severe, as will hardly be drawn into imitation.

*

The younger Pliny had, near a house of his in Italy, a neighbour who was exceedingly tormented with certain ulcers in his private parts; his wife, finding him languish so long, entreated that he would give her leave to see, and at leisure to consider of the state of his disease, adding, that she would freely tell him what she thought of it: this permission being obtained, she curiously examined the business, found it impossible he could ever be cured, and that all he was to expect was to linger out a painful and miserable life for a great while; therefore, as the most sure and sovereign remedy, she resolutely advised him to kill himself; but finding him a little tender and backward in so rude an attempt, "Do not think, my dear," said she, "that "I have not an equal feeling of the torments which "I see thou endurest, and that, to deliver myself "from them, I will not myself make use of the "same remedy I have prescribed to thee: I will

accompany thee in the cure, as I have done in "the disease; fear nothing, but believe that we "shall have pleasure in this passage that is to free

Ep. 24. lib. vi.

"us from so many miseries, and go off happily together." Having said this, and roused up her husband's courage, she resolved that they should throw themselves headlong into the sea, out of a window that leaned over it; and that she might maintain to the last the loyal and vehement affection wherewith she had embraced him during his life, she would vet have him die in her arms; but for fear they should fail, and lest they should leave their hold in the fall, and through fear, she tied herself fast to him by the waist, and so gave up her own life to procure her husband's repose. This was a woman of a mean family, and even amongst that condition of people it is no very new thing to see some examples of uncommon good-nature:

The other two are noble and rich, where examples of virtue are rarely lodged. Arria, the wife of Cecina Pætus, a consular person, was the mother of another Arria, the wife of Thrasea Pætus, whose virtue was so renowned in the time of Nero, and, by means of this son-in-law, the grand-mother of Fannia; for the resemblance of the names of these men and women, and their fortunes, had led many into a mistake. This first Arria (her husband Ce- The Story cina Pætus having been made prisoner by some of of the the emperor Claudius's people, after Scribonianus's Arria, the defeat, whose party he had embraced in the war) Cecina "Begged of those who were carrying him prisoner Pætus. "to Rome, that they would take her into their

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ship, where she should be of much less charge " and trouble to them than a great many persons they must otherwise have to attend her husband, "and that she alone would undertake to serve him

* Virg. Georg. lib. ii. ver 473.

death of

wife of