him that he could hide him in a safer place than his cottage; and, showing him a hole by the riverside, covered him up in it with some rushes.  But he was soon rudely disturbed.  Geminius was on his trail, and Marius heard some of his emissaries loudly threatening the old man for hiding an outlaw.  In his terror Marius stripped and plunged into the river, and so betrayed himself to the pursuers, who hauled him out naked and covered with mud, and gave him up to the magistrates of Minturnae.  By these he was placed under a strong guard in the house of a woman named Fannia.  She, like Geminius, had a personal grudge against him, for in his sixth consulship he had fined her four drachmas for ill-conduct.  But now when she saw his misery she forgot her resentment, and did her best to cheer him.  Nor was this difficult, for the stout heart of Marius had never failed him.  He told Fannia that, as he was coming to her house, an ass had come out to drink at a neighbouring fountain, and, fixing its eyes steadily on him, had brayed aloud and frisked vivaciously, whence he augured that he would find safety by sea.  The magistrates, however, had resolved to kill him, and sent a Cimbrian to do the deed, for no citizen would do it.  The man went armed with a sword into the gloomy room where Marius lay.  But soon he ran out crying, ‘I cannot slay Marius.’  He had seen eyes glaring in the darkness, and had heard a terrible voice say, ’Darest thou slay Caius Marius?’ His heart had failed him; he had thrown down the sword and fled.  Either the magistrates now changed their minds, or the people forced them to let Marius go, or perhaps Fannia connived at his escape.  Plutarch says that the people escorted him to the coast, and, when they came to a sacred grove, called the Marician Grove, which no man might enter, but which it would take a long time to go round, an old man had led the way into it, saying that no place was so sacred but that it might be entered to save Marius. [Sidenote:  Aenaria.] In some way he reached the coast where a friend had secured a vessel, and being driven by the wind to Aenaria (Ischia), he there found his son-in-law and sailed for Africa.

[Sidenote:  Eryx.] Want of water forced them to put in at Eryx on the N.W. of Sicily; but the Roman quaestor there was on the look-out, and killing sixteen of the crew nearly took Marius.  Landing at Meninx (Jerbah), the fugitive heard that his son was in Africa too, and had gone to Hiempsal, King of Numidia, to ask for aid, upon which he set sail again and landed at Carthage. [Sidenote:  Carthage.] The Roman governor there sent to warn him off from Africa.  Marius was dumb with indignation, but on being asked what answer he had to send, replied, so ran the story, ’Go and say you have seen Caius Marius sitting on the ruins of Carthage.’

Hiempsal meanwhile had been keeping young Marius in a sort of honourable captivity.  But, according to a story similar to that told of Thomas a Becket’s father, a damsel of the country had fallen in love with his handsome face, and helped him to escape. [Sidenote:  Circina.] Father and son now retired to Circina (Kerkennah), where news soon reached him which brought him back to Italy.