413 



SERTORIUS, QUINTUS. 



SERVANDONI, JEAN JER6ME. 



Ui 



while liis legate conquered Domitius and L. Manlius. Thoranius, a 

 legate of Metellus, was likewise defeated. About this time Sertorius 

 was joined by Perperua with the numerous remains of the Marian 

 party, and Metellus Pius, who had the command in Baetica, was 

 gradually driven to such extremities [METELLUS], that L. Lollius came 

 to his assistance from Gaul, and the senate at Rome thought it 

 necessary to send Pompey with a large force to support Metellus. 



[1'o.MrKlUS.] 



As soon as Sertorius had firmly established himself in Spain, he 

 formed the design of uniting the Romans and Spaniards in such a 

 manner that the Spaniards ehould have all the advantages of Roman 

 civilisation without losing their national character. At Osca, the 

 modern Huesca in Catalonia, he established a kind of academy, into 

 which he received the sons of distinguished Spaniards, and had them 

 instructed in Greek and Roman literature. The admirable discipline 

 of this establishment, the manner in which the youths were dressed, 

 for he gave them the Roman ' bulla ' and the ' prsetexta ' (which only 

 the sons of noble Romans used to wear), the prizes which were distri- 

 buted among them, and the promise that these young men should one 

 day be Roman citizens and be invested with high honours all these 

 things were in the highest degree flattering to the parents of the 

 youths, and could not fail to gain for Sertoriua the affections of the 

 nation. It was a custom of the young warriors among the Spaniards 

 to gather around a favourite general, to accompany him everywhere, 

 and to vow not to survive him. The number of men who became in 

 this manner attached to Sertorius was greater than had ever been 

 known before. (Plut., 'Sert.,' 14.) Sertorius also worked upon the 

 imagination of the Spaniards : he had a tame white fawn which accom- 

 panied him everywhere, aud which he said was the gift of Diana. 

 The Spaniards thus looked up to him almost as a being of a higher 

 order, who had intercourse with the gods. It may be that this was, 

 as Plutarch thinks, a piece of imposition upon the credulous Spaniards, 

 but we have no reason to suppose that Sertorius himself did not share 

 the belief of the Spaniards on this subject. (Confp. ' Gellius,' xv. 22.) 

 His object was to establish an independent power, or to raise a new 

 Roman republic in Spain. For this purpose he formed a senate of 

 300 members, consisting partly of exiled Romans, and partly of distin- 

 guished Spaniards (Appian, 'Civ.,' i. 108; Plut., 'Sert.,' 22), and also 

 appointed several officers analogous to those of Rome. Sertorius was 

 with the Romans and Spaniards the object of love and admiration. 

 Perperna had observed this state of thing?, ever since his arrival in 

 Spain, with secret jealousy and envy. He would have liked to carry 

 on the war against Metellus in his own name ; but when the news 

 came that Poinpey was advancing, his own soldiers compelled him to 

 join Sertorius, and to submit to him. 



On the arrival of Pompey in Spain, many towns declared for him, 

 and among others Lauron, though it was at the time besieged by Ser- 

 torius. Pompey hastened to its assistance, but could do nothing, and 

 was obliged to look on while Sertorius razed the town to the ground. 

 (Plut., ' Sert.,' 18 ; Appian, 'Civil.,' i. 109.) The first great battle with 

 Pompey was near Sucro. Metellus here defeated that part of the 

 army which was commanded by Perperna, and put him to flight; but 

 Sertorius, who commanded another division of the army, wounded 

 Pompey, and compelled him to retreat. A second battle was fought 

 in the plains of Saguntum, in which Pompey was again defeated, and 

 compelled to withdraw to the Pyrenees. It was iu the summer of the 

 year B.C. 74 that Mithridates sent ambassadors to Sertorius, to propose 

 an alliance, and to offer money and ships, on condition that all the 

 countries of Asia which he had been obliged to surrender should be 

 restored to him. Sertorius concluded the alliance, and encouraged 

 the king again to take up arms against Rome, but he scrupulously 

 avoided doing his own country more harm than his own safety 

 required. (Plut,, ' Sert.,' 23 ; Appian, ' De Bell. Mithrid.,' 68.) This 

 alliance, owing to the events which followed it, had few or.no results. 



Pompey, in the meanwhile, was reinforced by two legions from 

 Italy ; and he and Metellus again advanced from the Pyrenees towards 

 the Iberus, In this campaign, though many of the soldiers of Ser- 

 torius began to desert, no great advantages were gained by Pompey or 

 Metellus, and the former was no more successful in the siege of 

 Pallantia, than both together in that of Calaguris. Metellus, despairing 

 of victory over Sertorius in an honourable way, offered to any Roman 

 citizen who should kill Sertorius one hundred talents and 20,000 acres 

 of land. If the murderer should be an exile, Metellus promised that 

 he should be allowed to return to Rome. The whole summer of the 

 year B.C. 73 passed without any great battle, though the Roman party 

 seems to have gained some advantages. 



The dishonourable conduct on the part of the Romans, and the 

 increasing desertion in the army of Sertorius, as well as the manifest 

 envy of others about his own person, produced a change in the conduct 

 of Sertorius also; he lost his confidence in those who surrounded him, 

 and punished severely wherever he found reason for suspicion. While 

 he was in this state of mind, he committed one act which will ever be 

 a stain on his otherwise blameless character: the young Spaniards 

 assembled at Osca, who were in some measure his hostages, were one 

 day partly put to death, and partly sold as slaves. The immediate 

 cause of this is unknown, but the effect produced on the Spaniards 

 may easily be conceived. In addition to all this, Perperna now found 

 au opportunity of giving vent to his hostile feelings. He formed a 



conspiracy of some Romans who served under Sertorius, and in order 

 to gain associates among the Spaniards, and provoke them still more 

 against Sertorius, the conspirators inflicted severe punishments for 

 slight offences, and exacted heavy taxes, pretending that they were 

 only executing the commands of Sertorius. Desertion and insurrec- 

 tion among the Spaniards were the natural results. According to 

 Appian, several of the conspirators were discovered and put to death, 

 but Plutarch does not mention this circumstance. Perperna at last, 

 seeing no possibility of attacking Sertorius, as he never appeared 

 without an armed body-guard, invited him to a repast, ostensibly 

 given on account of some victory gained by one of his lieutenants. At 

 this repast he was treacherously murdered by the conspirators (B.C. 72), 

 and Perperua placed himself at the head of his army. 



Such was the end of one of the noblest characters that appear in 

 the pages of Roman history during the last century of the republic. 

 The war which he had carried on in Spain was not directed against 

 his country, but only against a party who wished to annihilate him. 

 How little he was actuated by any hostile feeling towards the republic 

 itself may be seen from the statement of Plutarch ('Sert.,' 22), that 

 after every victory which Sertorius gained, he sent to Metellus and 

 Pompey, offering to lay down his arms, if they would but allow him 

 to return to Rome, and to live there in peace and retirement, declaring 

 that he would rather be the obscurest person at home than a monarch 

 in exile. As long as his mother lived, it was principally in order to 

 comfort her old age that he wished to return to Italy ; but she died a 

 few years before her son, to his great grief. If we regard Sertorius aa 

 a general, it was surely no vulgar flattery that his contemporaries 

 compared him wita Hannibal. The details of his wars in Spain are 

 very little known, for the account of Appian ('Civil.,' i. 108-114) is 

 excessively meagre and incoherent ; and Plutarch, in writing the life 

 of Sertorius, had other objects in view than to present to his readers a 

 clear description of his military operations. Appian says that the 

 war in Spain lasted eight years, which is incorrect, whether we date 

 the commencement of the war from the time when Sertorius left 

 Italy in the consulship of Scipio and Norbanus (B.C. 83), or from the 

 time that he was invited by the Lusitanians to take the command 

 (B.C. 78). 



SER VANDO'NI, JEAN JE'ROME, was born at Florence in 1695, 

 but he may be reckoned among the artists and architects of France, 

 as he established himself in that country, where he signalised himself 

 by his extraordinary talents. His first instructor in painting waa 

 Panini, under whom he became an expert artist in landscape and 

 architectural scenery, and many of his productions of that period are 

 preserved in various collections. He afterwards applied himself to 

 architecture under De Rossi. After passing some time at Lisbon, 

 where he was employed as scene-painter and in getting up the per- 

 formances of the Italian opera, he proceeded to Paris in 1724, and 

 was engaged in a similar capacity. He had now opportunities of 

 exercising his talents on the most extensive and even prodigal scale, 

 and he not merely improved the former system of theatrical decora- 

 tion, but produced an entirely new species of it, in which the scenic 

 illusion and effect were aided by machinery, and heightened by every 

 possible artifice. The fame of his achievements of this class is now 

 of course merely traditional, but if we may believe the testimony of 

 contemporaries, they must have been most extraordinary. Among 

 the most celebrated of them waa the representation of the fable of 

 Pandora (at the Tuileries in 1738), and of the 'Descent of vEneas into 

 the Infernal Regions.' These and other scenic exhibitions, aa they may 

 properly be denominated, were received with enthusiasm by the 

 pubMc, nor were they least of all admired by those who were capable 

 of appreciating the poetical invention, the just taste, and the profound 

 classical study displayed by the artist. 



As may be supposed, his talents were greatly in request upon all 

 extraordinary public festivities, and he directed those which took 

 place at Paris, in 1739, in honour of the marriage of Philip V. of 

 Spain with the Princess Elizabeth. Unfortunately such triumphs are 

 so exceedingly fugitive and ephemeral, that however much they may 

 contribute to an artist's fame, they are attended with no benefit to 

 art itself. It would have been more to the advantage of art, if 

 Servandoni had been afforded the opportunity of realising some 

 of his projects for the improvement or embellishment of various 

 parts of the capital, including one for an extensive place or amphi- 

 theatre for public festivals, surrounded with arcades and galleries 

 capable of containing twenty-five thousand persons. The chief 

 structure executed by him is the fagade which he added to the church 

 of St. Sulpice at Paris, erected by Oppeuord. Although not altogether 

 unexceptionable, this work, begun about 1732, is superior to almost 

 every other of its kind of the same period. The arrangement of the 

 loggia formed by the Doric order below, where the columns are 

 coupled, not in front, but one behind the other, is good, and combines 

 lightness with solidity ; but this merit is in a great measure counter- 

 acted by the inter-columns of the second order being filled in with 

 arcades and piers, whereby that portion is rendered more solid and 

 heavier in appearance than the one below. 



Servandoni died at Paris in 1766, leaving, instead of a splendid 

 fortune, as was expected, scarcely any property at all behind him ; 

 for though he might easily have amassed wealth, he was too great a 

 votary of pleasure to put any restraint upon his habits of profusion. 



