ce. The Senate gave him the "woods and forests,"--an unsubdued
country, where he would have hard work and unknown perils, and from
which it was probable he would never return. They sent him to Gaul. But
this was just the field for his marvellous military genius, then only
partially developed; and the second period of his career now began.

It was during this second period that he rendered his most important
services to the State and earned his greatest fame. The dangers which
threatened the Empire came from the West, and not the East. Asia was
already-subdued by Sulla, Lucullus, and Pompey, or was on the point of
being subdued. Mithridates was a formidable enemy; but he aimed at
establishing an Asiatic empire, not conquering the European provinces.
He was not so dangerous as even Pyrrhus had been. Moreover, the conquest
of the East was comparatively easy,--over worn-out races and an effete
civilization; it gave _eclat_ to Sulla and Pompey,--as the conquest of
India, with a handful of British troops, made Clive and Hastings
famous; it required no remarkable military genius, nor was it necessary
for the safety of Italy. Conquest over the Oriental monarchies meant
only spoliation. It was prompted by greed and vanity more than by a
sense of danger. Pompey brought back money enough from the East to
enrich all his generals, and the Senate besides,--or rather the State,
which a few aristocrats practically owned.

But the conquest of Gaul would be another affair. It was peopled with
hardy races, who cast their greedy eyes on the empire of the Romans, or
on some of its provinces, and who were being pushed forward to invasion
by a still braver people beyond the Rhine,--races kindred to those
Teutons whom Marius had defeated. There was no immediate danger from the
Germans; but there was ultimate danger, as proved by the union they made
in the time of Marcus Antoninus for the invasion of the Roman provinces.
It was necessary to raise a barrier against their inundations. It was
also necessary to subdue the various Celtic tribes of Gaul, who were
getting restless and uneasy. There was no money in a conquest over
barbarians, except so far as they could be sold into slavery; but there
was danger in it. The whole country was threatened with insurrections,
leagues, and invasion, from the Alps to the ocean. There was a
confederacy of hostile kings and chieftains; they commanded innumerable
forces; they controlled important posts and passe