XXIX.  When he had settled all things properly he took leave of the Greeks, and reminding the Macedonians to keep by orderly and unanimous conduct the liberty which the Romans had bestowed upon them, he started for Epirus, as the Senate had passed a decree that the soldiers who had been present in the battle against Perseus should be gratified with the spoil of the cities of Epirus.  Desiring therefore to fall upon them all at once and unexpectedly, he sent for ten of the chief men from each city, and ordered them to bring together, on a fixed day, all the gold and silver which they had in their houses and temples.  With each party he sent, as if for this purpose, a guard of soldiers and a captain, who was to pretend that he came to seek for and receive the money.  But when day broke, they all at the same time fell to sacking and plundering the cities, so that, in one hour, a hundred and fifty thousand people were reduced to slavery, and seventy cities plundered; yet from such ruin and destruction as this, there resulted no more than eleven drachmae for each soldier, while all mankind shuddered at this termination of the war, that a whole nation should be cut to pieces to produce such a pitiful present.

XXX.  Aemilius, having performed this work, greatly against his real nature, which was kind and gentle, proceeded to Oricum, and thence crossed to Italy with his army.  He himself sailed up the river Tiber in the king’s own ship of sixteen banks of oars, adorned with the arms of the vanquished, and crowns of victory and crimson flags, so that all the people of Rome came out in a body as if to a foretaste of the spectacle of his triumphal entry, and walked beside his ship as she was gently rowed up the river.  But the soldiery, casting longing glances at the king’s treasure, like men who had not met with their deserts, were angry and dissatisfied with Aemilius; for this reason really, though the charge they openly put forward was that he was a harsh and tyrannical ruler:  so they showed no eagerness for the triumph.

Servius Galba,[A] an enemy of Aemilius, who had once commanded a legion under him, hearing this, plucked up spirit to propose openly that he should not be allowed a triumph.  He disseminated among the soldiers many calumnies against their general, and so still more exasperately their present temper; next he asked the tribunes of the plebs for another day, as that day would not suffice for his speech, only four hours remaining of it.  However, the tribunes bade him speak, and he, beginning a long and abusive speech, consumed all the time.  At nightfall the tribunes dismissed the assembly.  But the soldiers, now grown bolder, assembled round Galba, and, forming themselves into an organized body, again at daybreak occupied the capitol; for it was thither that the tribunes had summoned the people.

[Footnote A:  He had been military tribune of the second legion in Macedonia.  Liv. xlv. 35.]