[
18]
Accordingly, Pompey and Crassus were chosen consuls
and
Cæsar's governorship was extended for five years according to the
agreement. The provinces were allotted with an army to each consul in the
following manner: Pompey chose Spain and Africa, but sent friends to take
charge of them, he himself remaining in Rome. Crassus took Syria and the
adjacent country because he wanted a war with the Parthians, which he
thought would be easy as well as glorious and gainful. But when he took his
departure from the city there were many unfavorable omens, and the tribunes
forbade the war against the Parthians, who had done no wrong to the Romans.
As he would not obey, they invoked public imprecations on him, which Crassus
disregarded; wherefore he perished in Parthia, together with his son of the
same name, and his army, not quite 10,000 of whom, out of 100,000, escaped
to Syria. The disaster to Crassus will be described in my Parthian history.
As the Romans were suffering from scarcity, they appointed Pompey the sole
manager of the grain supply and gave him, as in his operations against the
pirates, twenty assistants from the Senate. These he distributed in like
manner among the provinces while he superintended the whole, and thus Rome
was very soon provided with abundant supplies, by which means Pompey again
gained great reputation and power.
