d to rebuild it. Spain began again
to experience more tolerable times. The suppression of piracy, which
found dangerous lurking-places in the Baleares, through the occupation
of these islands by Quintus Caecilius Metellus in 631, was singularly
conducive, to the prosperity of Spanish commerce; and in other respects
also the fertile islands, inhabited by a dense population which was
unsurpassed in the use of the sling, were a valuable possession.
How numerous the Latin-speaking population in the peninsula was even
then, is shown by the settlement of 3000 Spanish Latins in the towns
of Palma and Pollentia (Pollenza) in the newly-acquired islands.
In spite of various grave evils the Roman administration of Spain
preserved on the whole the stamp which the Catonian period, and
primarily Tiberius Gracchus, had impressed on it. It is true that
the Roman frontier territory had not a little to suffer from the
inroads of the tribes, but half subdued or not subdued at all, on
the north and west. Among the Lusitanians in particular the poorer
youths regularly congregated as banditti, and in large gangs levied
contributions from their countrymen or their neighbours, for which
reason, even at a much later period, the isolated homesteads in this
region were constructed in the style of fortresses, and were, in case
of need, capable of defence; nor did the Romans succeed in putting
an end to these predatory habits in the inhospitable and almost
inaccessible Lusitanian mountains. But what had previously been wars
assumed more and more the character of brigandage, which every tolerably
efficient governor was able to repress with his ordinary resources;
and in spite of such inflictions on the border districts Spain was
the most flourishing and best-organized country in all the Roman
dominions; the system of tenths and the middlemen were there
unknown; the population was numerous, and the country was rich
in corn and cattle.

The Protected States

Far more insupportable was the condition--intermediate between formal
sovereignty and actual subjection--of the African, Greek, and Asiatic
states which were brought within the sphere of Roman hegemony through
the wars of Rome with Carthage, Macedonia, and Syria, and their
consequences. An independent state does not pay too dear a price
for its independence in accepting the sufferings of war when it
cannot avoid them; a state which has lost its independence may find
at least some compensa