LETTER OF GNAEUS POMPEIUS TO THE
SENATE.[1]
If I had been warring against you, against my country, and against my fathers' gods, when I endured such hardships and dangers as those amid which from my early youth the armies under my command have routed the most criminal of your enemies and insured your safety; even then, Fathers of the Senate, you could have done no more against me in my absence than you are now doing. For after having exposed me, in spite of my youth,[2] to a most cruel war, you have, so far as in you lay, destroyed me and a faithful army by starvation, the most wretched of all deaths. Was it with such expectations that the Roman people sent its sons to war? Are these the rewards for wounds and for so often shedding our blood for our country? Wearied with writing letters and sending envoys, I have exhausted my personal resources and even my expectations, and in the meantime for three years you have barely given me the means of meeting a year's expenses. By the immortal gods! do you think that I can play the part of a treasury or maintain an army without food and pay?
I admit that I entered upon this war with more zeal than discretion; for within forty days of the time when I received from you the empty title of
- ↑ In the autumn of 75 B.C. Sertorius by avoiding pitched battles and resorting to guerilla warfare cut off Pompey's supplies. Since Pompey had long since exhausted his own means, he wrote this letter to the senate, asking for reinforcements and money.
- ↑ Pompey was only twenty-eight years old at the time and had held no civil office.
