147
when he was thirty-seven years of age, the law as to age being for
that occasion not enforced. There was an old Plebiscitum (law passed
in the Comitia Tributa) which enacted that no man should hold the same
magistracy without an interval of ten full years. (Livius. 7, c. 42;
10, c. 13). The first instance of the law being suspended was in the
case of Q. Fabius Maximus. One of Sulla's laws re-enacted or confirmed
the old law.]

[Footnote 79: This canal of Marius is mentioned by Strabo (p. 183) and
other ancient writers. The eastern branch of the Rhone runs from
Arelate (Arles) to the sea, and the canal of Marius probably commenced
in this branch about twenty Roman miles below Arles (which did not
then exist), and entered the sea between the mouth of this branch and
Maritima, now Martigues. The length of the canal of Marius might be
about twelve Roman miles. Marseilles is east of Martigues. (D'Anville.
_Notice de la Gaule Ancienne_.)]

[Footnote 80: The movements of the barbarians are not clearly stated.
It appears from what follows that the Cimbri entered Italy on the
north-east over the Noric Alps, for their march brought them to the
banks of the Adige. Florus says that they came by the defiles of
Tridentum (Trento). The Teutones, if they marched through the Ligurian
country along the sea to meet Marius, who was near Marseilles, must
have come along the Riviera of Genoa.]

[Footnote 81: Plutarch calls her a Syrian. Martha may have been a
Syrian name, as well as a Jewish name. Syrians and Jews flocked to
Rome in great numbers under the later Republic and the Empire, and got
their living in various ways not always reputable. The Jews at Rome
used to cause disturbances in the popular assemblies in Cicero's time.
(Cic. _Pro Flacco_, c. 28.) Jews and Syrians are often mentioned
together by the Roman writers. The Jews at Rome were greatly troubled
at the assassination of the Dictator Caesar, and they crowded round the
place where the body was burnt for nights in succession. Caesar had
rather favoured the nation for their services in the Alexandrine War.
(Suetonius, _Caesar_, c. 84, and Casaubon's note.)]

[Footnote 82: He wrote on Natural History; among other things, a
History of Birds, from which this story is probably taken. There is
evidently an error in the text [Greek: espazonto tous stratiotas]. I
have adopted Reiske's emendation.]

[Footnote 83: Pessinus was in Galatia, properly a part of Phrygia, and
the se