to his innocence of such extreme enormities.  One is that it was the son of Catulus who begged as a boon from Sulla the death of this Marius, and his name was very likely confused with Catiline’s in the street rumours of the time; and the other and more direct piece of evidence is, that Catiline was tried in the year 64 for murders committed at this time, and was acquitted.  It is a curious thing that the obloquy which has clung to Catiline’s name on such dubious reports has never attached in the same measure to the undoubted horrors and abominations of Sulla’s career.

Sulla, though he meant above all to have his own way, had no objection to use constitutional forms where they could be conveniently employed.  He made the Senate pass a resolution approving his acts, and, as there were no consuls in 82, after the death of Marius and Carbo, he retired from Rome for a while and told the Senate to elect an Interrex, in conformity with the prescribed usage under such circumstances.  Then he wrote to the Interrex and recommended that a Dictator should be appointed, not for a limited time, but till he had restored quiet in the Roman world, and, with a touch of that irony which he could not resist displaying in and out of season, went on to say that he thought himself the best man for the post. [Sidenote:  Sulla’s power.] Thus, in November 82, he was formally invested with despotic power over the lives and property of his fellow-citizens, could contract or extend the frontiers of the State, could change as he pleased the constitution of the Italian towns and the provinces, could legislate for the future, could nominate proconsuls and propraetors, and could retain his absolute power as long as he liked.  He might have dispensed with consuls altogether.  But he did not care to do this.  The consuls whom he allowed to be elected for 81 were of course possessed of merely nominal power.  Twenty-four lictors preceded him in the streets.  He told the people to hail him as ‘Felix,’ declared that his least deliberate were his most successful actions, signed himself ‘Epaphroditus’ when he wrote to Greeks, named his son and daughter Faustus and Fausta, boasted that the gods held converse with him in dreams, and sent a golden crown and axe to the goddess whom he believed to be his patroness.  Like Wallenstein, he mingled indifference to bloodshed with extreme superstition and boundless self-confidence.  But, as the historian remarks, ’a man who is superstitious is capable of any crime, for he believes that his gods can be conciliated by prayers and presents.  The greatest crimes have not been committed by men who have no religious belief.’  No doubt to his mind there was a sort of judicial retribution in all this bloodshed; and, as he tried to make himself out the favourite of the gods, so by formally announcing the close of the proscription lists for June 1, 81 B.C., he spread some veil of legality over his shameless violence. [Sidenote:  Peculiarly horrible nature