The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-12-10
THE PRAETORIAN GUARDS.

| Favored Troops Who Contributed so
 Much to the Destruction of the Ro-
 man Empire.
 The Praetorian guards who contribu-
 ted so little to, the building of the Ro-
 man empire and so much to the de-
 struction of it derived their constitution
 from the crafty and subtle Augustus.
 Sensible that his designs of despotic J power could only be supported by arms, | he organized this powerful bodyguard l of some fifteen thousand men in con l stant readiness to protect his person or
 to crush the first motions of rebellion. | These favored troops he distinguished | by double pay and special privileges, l but as their formidable aspect would | at once have alarmed and irritated the | Roman people, three cohorts only were | stationed in he capital while the Ter | mainder were dispersed in the adjacent towns of Italy. But Tiberius, his successor, ventured
 on a decisive measure which riveted forever the letters of his country Un- 1 der the plausible pretense of relieving
 Italy from the heavy burden of military
 quarters, and of introducing stricter
 NioSiPilliC tliiiOiiSo lilC $ Suui QS uC dSpCHi-
 bled them at Rome in permanent
 camp which was skillfully fortified and
 placed in commanding situation-an
 innovation which proved fatal to the
 peace and security of the empire
 In their close proximity to the palace
 and the senate, the Praetorian guards
 were not slow to perceive their own strength, and the weakness of civil gov ernment; to view the vices of their mas
 ters with familiar cont empt, and to lay aside that reverential awe which dis tance only, the mystery, can preserve toward an imaginary power. In the luxurious idleness of the capital, their pride was nourished by the sense of their irresistible weight: and it was hardly possible to conceal from them that they were the heal masters of the destiny of the Roman empire.
 The most virile and exacting of the emperors were obliged to conciliate those naughty warriors, and to pur- chase their precarious faith by a libe- ral donative; which, since the eleva- ton of Claudius, was exacted as legal claim on the succession of every new emperor. The guards maintained, and were prepared to enforce their argu- ment, that, according to the purest principles of the constitution, their consent was essentially iecessary in the | appointment of an emperor. The de- | lenders of the state, selected from the | flower of the Italian youth, and trained in the exercise of arms and virtue, were | the genuine representatives of the peo- | pie, and the best entitled to elect the | military chief of the republic. These | assertions, however defective in reason, became unanswerable when the furious Praetorians increased their weight by | throwing their swords into the scale.
 The gratuities lavished on the guards l were enormous it was not unusual for an emperor on his elevation to bestw from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and sixty pounds on each of them Hadrian complained that the promotion of a successor had cost him, in this way, some e3,500,000 The Prae- torian guards pursued their imperious career till they rashly imbrued their hands in the blood of an emperor, and finally disposed of the sacred throne by auction to the highest bidder. Their services in the field were inconsidera- ble and inglorious; enervated by dissi- patton and riotous living, they soon be- came incapable of the duties of their profession.
 The Praet brian guards were reduced by Diocletian, and suppressed by Con- stantine. Imperial Rome could neither command nor purchase the services rem dered so generously and ungrudgingly to the ancient republic. It was gravely asserted that Maxentius had lavished on his mercenary bands the riches which Rome had accumulated in peril od of one hundred years, and yet the Roman soldier of his time, when hard pressed in the field, was oftein discov- cred "devouring the paths of flight This conduct threatened to become so general that Julian determined to pa -ade those fleet footed warriors in fe- male attire, before the whole camp Westminster Review.
 TO CUREA COLD IN ONE DAY.
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