se and uproar, was at length aroused from his
stupor, and began to summon his faculties to the question what he was to
do. At length a party of fugitives, hotly pursued by some of Caesar's
soldiers, broke into his tent. "What!" said Pompey, "into my tent too!"
He had been for more than thirty years a victorious general, accustomed
to all the deference and respect which boundless wealth, extended and
absolute power, and the highest military rank could afford. In the
encampments which he had made, and in the cities which he had occupied
from time to time, he had been the supreme and unquestioned master, and
his tent, arranged and furnished, as it had always been, in a style of
the utmost magnificence and splendor, had been sacred from all
intrusion, and invested with such a dignity that potentates and princes
were impressed when they entered, with a feeling of deference and awe.
Now, rude soldiers burst wildly into it, and the air without was filled
with an uproar and confusion, drawing every moment nearer and nearer,
and warning the fallen hero that there was no longer any protection
there against the approaching torrent which was coming on to
overwhelm him.
[Sidenote: Pompey disguises himself.]
[Sidenote: He escapes from the camp.]
Pompey aroused himself from his stupor, threw off the military dress
which belonged to his rank and station, and assumed a hasty disguise, in
which he hoped he might make his escape from the immediate scene of his
calamities. He mounted a horse and rode out of the camp at the easiest
place of egress in the rear, in company with bodies of troops and guards
who were also flying in confusion, while Caesar and his forces on the
other side were carrying the intrenchments and forcing their way in. As
soon is he had thus made his escape from the immediate scene of danger,
he dismounted and left his horse, that he might assume more completely
the appearance of a common soldier, and, with a few attendants who were
willing to follow his fallen fortunes, he went on to the eastward,
directing his weary steps toward the shores of the Aegean Sea.
[Sidenote: The Vale of Tempe.]
[Sidenote: Its picturesqueness.]
[Sidenote: Pompey's sufferings.]
[Sidenote: A drink of water.]
The country through which he was traveling was Thessaly. Thessaly is a
vast amphitheater, surrounded by mountains, from whose sides streams
descend, which, after watering many fertile valleys and plains, combine
to form one great
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