im. Pompeius, however, was not made
vain by these marks of distinction, but on being immediately sent into
Gaul by Sulla, where Metellus[203] commanded and appeared to be doing
nothing correspondent to his means, Pompeius said it was not right to
take the command from a man who was his senior and superior in
reputation; however he said he was ready to carry on the war in
conjunction with Metellus, if he had no objection, in obedience to his
orders and to give him his assistance. Metellus accepted the proposal
and wrote to him to come, on which Pompeius entering Gaul, performed
noble exploits, and he also fanned into a flame again and warmed the
warlike and courageous temper of Metellus, which was now near becoming
extinct through old age, as the liquid, heated stream of copper by
flowing about the hard, cold metal is said to soften and to liquefy it
into its own mass better than the fire. But as in the case of an
athlete[204] who has obtained the first place among men and has
gloriously vanquished in every contest, his boyish victories are made
of no account and are not registered; so the deeds which Pompeius then
accomplished, though of themselves extraordinary, yet as they were
buried under the number and magnitude of his subsequent struggles and
wars, I have been afraid to disturb them, lest if we should dwell too
long on his first exploits, we should miss the acts and events which
are the most important and best show the character of the man.

IX.[205] Now when Sulla was master of Italy and was proclaimed
Dictator, he rewarded the other officers and generals by making them
rich and promoting them to magistracies and by granting them without
stint and with readiness what they asked for. But as he admired
Pompeius for his superior merit and thought that he would be a great
support to his own interests, he was anxious in some way to attach him
by family relations. Metella, the wife of Sulla, had also the same
wish, and they persuaded Pompeius to put away Antistia and to take to
wife Aemilia, the step-daughter of Sulla, the child of Metella by
Scaurus, who was then living with her husband and was pregnant. This
matter of the marriage was of a tyrannical character, and more suited
to the interests of Sulla than conformable to the character of
Pompeius, for Aemilia, who was pregnant, was taken from another to be
married to him, and Antistia was put away with dishonour and under
lamentable circumstances, inasmuch as she ha