this occasion, as on many others, those who might have controlled both the extreme parties and enforced moderation on both, preferred to sell their support to whichever of the combatants best served their private interests and class privileges.
When the contest with the allies developed in the years 88 and 87 into the first Civil War, the equestrian order patched up its differences with the Italians; but the alarm which Drusus had spread in its ranks was still the governing principle of its policy. In fear and hatred of the Nobility the Knights espoused the democratic cause. They saw with satisfaction their haughty rivals fall beneath the daggers of Marius, and pressed forward to buy up the confiscated properties. A terrible day of reckoning was in store for them. The full brunt of Sulla's savage retaliation fell on the equestrian order, twenty-six hundred of whose members found their names in the Proscription Lists.[1] Sulla reduced the survivors to political insignificance by expelling them from the jury-courts, and at the same time he deprived them of dignity and precedence by withdrawing their valued privilege of special seats in the theatre.
The equestrian order was naturally the enemy of the constitution established by Sulla; and, decimated though it had been by the Proscriptions, its influence was still considerable. The enfranchisement 90-81 B.C.of the Italians had filled its ranks with worthy recruits. In each new municipal town and district were to be found substantial and honour-- ↑ Appian, Bell. Civ., i., 103.
