Book LXXXIX.
Marcus Brutus being sent in a fishing-boat to Lilybaeum, by Cneius Papirius Carbo, who
had sailed to Cossura, to discover if Pompeius were there, and being surrounded by the
ships, which Pompey had sent, turned the point of his sword against himself, and threw
himself on it with all the weight of his body, at one of the ship's benches. Cneius
Pompeius, being sent by the senate to Sicily, with full powers, having taken Carbo
prisoner, put him to death; he dies weeping with womanly weakness. Sylla, having been
created dictator, marched through the city with twenty-four lictors, which no one had ever
done before. He established new regulations in the state; abridged the authority of the
plebeian tribunes; took from them the power of proposing laws; increased the college of
priests and augurs to fifteen; filled up the senate from the equestrian order; took from
the descendants of the proscribed persons all power of reclaiming the property of their
ancestors, and sold such of their effects as had not been already confiscated, to the
amount of one hundred and fifty millions of sesterces. He ordered Lucretius Ofella to be
put to death in the forum, for having declared himself a candidate for the consulship,
without having previously obtained his permission; and when the people of Rome were
offended he called a meeting, and told them that Ofella was slain by his orders. [Y.R.
671. B.C. 81.] Cneius Pompeius vanquished and killed, in Africa, Cneius Domitius, one of
the proscribed persons, and Hiarbas, king of Numidia, who were making preparations for
war. He triumphed over Africa, although not more than twenty-four years of age, and only
of equestrian rank, which never happened to any man before. Caius Norbanus, of consular
rank, being proscribed, when he was taken at Rhodes, committed suicide. Mutilus, one of
the proscribed, coming privately and in disguise to the back door of his wife Bastia's
house, was refused admission, and she told him that he was a proscribed man, whereupon he
stabbed himself, and sprinkled the door of his wife's house with his blood. Sylla took
Nolla, a city of the Samnites, [Y.R. 672. B.C. 80,] and led forth forty-seven legions into
the conquered lands, and divided them among them. [Y.R. 673. B.C. 79.] He besieged and
took the town of Volaterra, which was as yet at war with him. Mitylene, the only town in
Asia which continued to adhere to Mithridates, was likewise stormed and demolished.
