the possession of the enemy.

XXX. It was now far on in the night when men came to Sulla's camp from
Crassus to get something to eat for him and his soldiers, for after
putting the enemy to flight they had pursued them to Antemnae,[281] and
there encamped. Upon this intelligence, and that most of the enemy
were killed, Sulla came to Antemnae at daybreak. Here three thousand
soldiers sent to him to propose to surrender, and Sulla promised them
their lives if they would punish the rest of his enemies before they
joined him. Trusting to his promise, these men attacked their
comrades, and a great number on both sides were cut to pieces.
However, Sulla got together the soldiers who had offered to surrender
and those who had survived the massacre, to the number of six
thousand, in the Circus,[282] and at the same time he summoned the
Senate to the temple of Bellona. As soon as he began to speak, the
men who were appointed to do the work began to cut down the six
thousand men. A cry naturally arose from so many men being butchered
in a narrow space, and the Senators were startled; but Sulla
preserving the same unmoved expression of countenance, bade them
attend to what he was saying, and not trouble themselves about what
was going on outside; it was only some villains who were being
punished by his orders. This made even the dullest Roman see that
there was merely an exchange of tyrants, not a total change. Now
Marius was always cruel, and he grew more so, and the possession of
power did not change his disposition. But Sulla at first used his
fortune with moderation and like a citizen of a free state, and he got
the reputation of being a leader who, though attached to the
aristocratical party, still regarded the interests of the people;
besides this, he was from his youth fond of mirth, and so soft to pity
as to be easily moved to tears. It was not without reason, then, that
his subsequent conduct fixed on the possession of great power the
imputation that it does not let men's tempers abide by their original
habits, but makes them violent, vain, and inhuman. Now whether
fortune really produces an alteration and change in a man's natural
disposition, or whether, when he gets to power, his bad qualities
hitherto concealed are merely unveiled, is a matter that belongs to
another subject than the present.

XXXI. Sulla now began to make blood flow, and he filled the city with
deaths without number or limit; many persons were murd