Another circumstance makes the conclusion yet clearer. On entering Rome, Marius surrounded himself, according to Plutarch, “with a guard _selected_ from the slaves that had repaired to his standard,”[190] or, according to the same authority in another place, “the slaves, whom he had admitted his fellow-soldiers,“[191] thus attesting still further their superior importance. In the troubles that ensued these freedmen played a bloody part, until they were destroyed by Sertorius; and here again their numbers appear. According to Plutarch, the guard ”_selected_ from the slaves that had repaired to his standard” was four thousand,[192] or not far from the ordinary complement of a Roman legion, which the accomplished scholar, Mr. George Long, tells us was the very force collected by Marius in Etruria.[193] Plainly, therefore, the emancipated slaves constituted the main body, if not the whole legion.
Whatever may be the text of Plutarch, and supposing freemen among the recruits, nothing can prevent the conclusion, that emancipated slaves constituted the decisive force by which success was achieved. Therefore this example illustrates the efficacy of a proclamation giving freedom to slaves, and for this purpose it was adduced.
This discussion seems a diversion now; but at the time of the speech the criticism was a reality,[194] attracting attention and helping to arrest the great cause. To cap the climax, it was gravely argued, that, even if the Proclamation had the effect attributed to it, we must not imitate Caius Marius,--for he was no better than a barbarian.
Specimens from the press show the condition of the public mind at the time, and the controversy which arose, extending to foreign countries. If there were enemies, so also were there friends, both at home and abroad.
The _Boston Daily Advertiser_ thus frankly denounced the speech.
“We are sorry to see a disposition in several quarters to represent the Republican party, mainly on the strength of Mr. Sumner’s unfortunate speech at Worcester, as a party of Emancipation, a ‘John Brown party,’ a party that desires to carry on this war as a war of Abolition.… The Convention certainly disavowed any intention of indorsing the fatal doctrines announced by Mr. Sumner, with a distinctness which can scarcely be flattering to that gentleman’s conception of his own influence in Massachusetts.… It is alleged that the Convention cheered Mr. Sumner. His supporters among the delegates and spectators undoubtedly did so: but who does not see that this goes for nothing, in the face of the obvious fact that the silent party who disapproved were so much superior in number as to control the action of the whole body?… We hold it for an incontestable truth, that neither men nor money will be forthcoming for this war, if once the people are impressed with the belief that the Abolition of Slavery, and not the defence of the Union, is its object, or that its original purpose is converted into a cloak for some new design of seizing this opportunity for the destruction of the social system of the South.… The speech to which we have several times referred has certainly done as much as lay within the compass of one man’s powers to inspire this suspicion, to distract and weaken the loyal, and by indirection to aid the disloyal.”