avish measure, the corsairs could as little cope
as the combined gangs of thieves in a great city can cope
with a well-organized police. It was a naive proceeding to celebrate
such a razzia as a victory. But when compared with the prolonged
continuance and the vast and daily increasing extent of the evil,
it was natural that the surprisingly rapid subjugation
of the dreaded pirates should make a most powerful impression
on the public; and the more so, that this was the first trial of rule
centralized in a single hand, and the parties were eagerly waiting
to see whether that hand would understand the art of ruling better
than the collegiate body had done. Nearly 400 ships and boats,
including 90 war vessels properly so called, were either taken
by Pompeius or surrendered to him; in all about 1300 piratical vessels
are said to have been destroyed; besides which the richly-filled
arsenals and magazines of the buccaneers were burnt.
Of the pirates about 10,000 perished; upwards of 20,000 fell alive
into the hands of the victor; while Publius Clodius the admiral
of the Roman army stationed in Cilicia, and a multitude of other
individuals carried off by the pirates, some of them long believed
at home to be dead, obtained once more their freedom through
Pompeius. In the summer of 687, three months after the beginning
of the campaign, commerce resumed its wonted course and instead
of the former famine abundance prevailed in Italy.

Dissensions between Pompeius and Metellus as to Crete

A disagreeable interlude in the island of Crete, however,
disturbed in some measure this pleasing success of the Roman arms.
There Quintus Metellus was stationed in the second year of his command,
and was employed in finishing the subjugation-already substantially
effected--of the island,(2) when Pompeius appeared in the eastern
waters. A collision was natural, for according to the Gabinian law
the command of Pompeius extended concurrently with that of Metellus
over the whole island, which stretched to a great length but was
nowhere more than ninety miles broad;(3) but Pompeius was considerate
enough not to assign it to any of his lieutenants. The still resisting
Cretan communities, however, who had seen their subdued countrymen
taken to task by Metellus with the most cruel severity and had learned
on the other hand the gentle terms which Pompeius was in the habit
of imposing on the townships which surrendered to him in the south
of Asia