age, or for some other reason, was very inefficient and unsuccessful in his government.  Sylla proposed to supersede him by sending Pompey to take his place.  Pompey replied that it was not right to take the command from a man who was so much his superior in age and character, but that, if Metellus wished for his assistance in the management of his command, he would proceed to Gaul and render him every service in his power.  When this answer was reported to Metellus, he wrote to Pompey to come.  Pompey accordingly went to Gaul, where he obtained new victories, and gained new and higher honors than before.

[Sidenote:  An example.] [Sidenote:  Pompey divorces his wife.] [Sidenote:  He marries Sylla’s daughter-in-law.]

These, and various anecdotes which the ancient historians relate, would lead us to form very favorable ideas of Pompey’s character.  Some other circumstances, however, which occurred, seem to furnish different indications.  For example, on his return to Rome, some time after the events above related, Sylla, whose estimation of Pompey’s character and of the importance of his services seemed continually to increase, wished to connect him with his own family by marriage.  He accordingly proposed that Pompey should divorce his wife Antistia, and marry Aemilia, the daughter-in-law of Sylla.  Aemilia was already the wife of another man, from whom she would have to be taken away to make her the wife of Pompey.  This, however, does not seem to have been thought a very serious difficulty in the way of the arrangement.  Pompey’s wife was put away, and the wife of another man taken in her place.  Such a deed was a gross violation not merely of revealed and written law, but of those universal instincts of right and wrong which are implanted indelibly in all human hearts.  It ended, as might have been expected, most disastrously.  Antistia was plunged, of course, into the deepest distress.  Her father had recently lost his life on account of his supposed attachment to Pompey.  Her mother killed herself in the anguish and despair produced by the misfortunes of her family; and Aemilia the new wife, died suddenly, on the occasion of the birth of a child, a very short time after her marriage with Pompey.

[Sidenote:  Pompey’s success in Africa.] [Sidenote:  Attachment of his soldiers.] [Sidenote:  Pompey’s title as “Great.”]

These domestic troubles did not, however, interpose any serious obstacle to Pompey’s progress in his career of greatness and glory.  Sylla sent him on one great enterprise after another, in all of which Pompey acquitted himself in an admirable manner.  Among his other campaigns, he served for some time in Africa with great success.  He returned in due time from this expedition, loaded with military honors.  His soldiers had become so much attached to him that there was almost a mutiny in the army when he was ordered home.  They were determined to submit to no authority but that of Pompey.  Pompey at length