XXV. In Iberia, the senators and nobles about Sertorius, as soon as
they were put into a condition to hope that they were a match for the
opposite party, and their fears were over, began to feel envious, and
had a foolish jealousy of the power of Sertorius. Perpenna encouraged
this feeling, being urged by the empty pride of high birth to aspire
to the supreme command, and he secretly held treasonable language to
those who were favourable to his designs. "What evil dæmon," he would
say, "has got hold of us, and carried us from bad to worse--us who did
not brook to stay at home and do the bidding of Sulla, though in a
manner he was lord of all the earth and sea at once, but coming here
with ill luck, in order to live free, have voluntarily become slaves
by making ourselves the guards of Sertorius in his exile, and while we
are called a senate, a name jeered at by all who hear it, we submit to
insults, and orders, and sufferings as great as the Iberians and
Lusitanians endure." Their minds filled with such suggestions as
these, the majority did not, indeed, openly desert Sertorius, for they
feared his power, but they secretly damaged all his measures, and they
oppressed the barbarians by severe treatment and exactions, on the
pretext that it was by the order of Sertorius. This caused revolts and
disturbances in the cities; and those who were sent to settle and
pacify these outbreaks returned after causing more wars, and
increasing the existing insubordination; so that Sertorius, contrary
to his former moderation and mildness, did a grievous wrong to the
sons of the Iberians, who were educating at Osca,[166] by putting some
to death, and selling others as slaves.

XXVI. Now Perpenna, having got several to join him in his conspiracy,
gained over Manlius, one of those who were in command. This Manlius
was much attached to a beautiful boy, and to give the youth a proof of