damage to the scrolls by his attempt to restore their
worm-eaten paragraphs. Sulla took the city soon afterwards, and carried
the books to Rome, and here more damage was done by the careless editing
of Tyrannion, who made a trade of copying 'Aristotle's books' for the
libraries that were rising on all sides at Rome.

The Romans learned to be book-collectors in gathering the spoils of war.
When Carthage fell, the books, as some say, were given to native
chieftains, the predecessors of King Jugurtha in culture and of King Juba
in natural science: others say that they were awarded as a kind of
compensation to the family of the murdered Regulus. Their preservation is
attested by the fact that the Carthaginian texts were cited centuries
afterwards by the writers who described the most ancient voyages in the
Atlantic. When the unhappy Perseus was deprived of the kingdom of
Macedonia, the royal library was chosen by AEmilius Paullus as the
general's share of the plunder. Asinius Pollio furnished a great
reading-room with the literary treasures of Dalmatia. A public library
was established by Julius Caesar on the Aventine, and two were set up by
Augustus within the precinct of the palace of the Caesars; and Octavia
built another near the Tiber in memory of the young Marcellus. The gloomy
Domitian restored the library at the Capitol, which had been struck and
fired by lightning. Trajan ransacked the wealth of the world for his
collection in the 'Ulpiana,' which, in accordance with a later fashion,
became one of the principal attractions of the Thermae of Diocletian.

The splendours of the private library began in the days of Lucullus.
Enriched with the treasure of King Mithridates and all the books of
Pontus, he housed his collection in such stately galleries, thronged with
a multitude of philosophers and poets, that it seemed as if there were a
new home for the Muses, and a fresh sanctuary for Hellas. Seneca, a
philosopher and a millionaire himself, inveighed against such useless
pomp. He used to rejoice at the blow that fell on the arrogant
magnificence of Alexandria. 'Our idle book-hunters,' he said, 'know about
nothing but titles and bindings: their chests of cedar and ivory, and the
book-cases that fill the bath-room, are nothing but fashionable
furniture, and have nothing to do with learning.' Lucian was quite as
severe on the book-hunters of the age of the Antonines. The bibliophile
goes book in hand, like the statue of B