do, the vast assemblies in silent and breathless attention, was a power
as delightful in its exercise as it was glorious in its fame. Caesar had
felt this ambition, and had devoted himself very earnestly to the study
of oratory.

[Sidenote: Apollonius.]
[Sidenote: Caesar studies under him.]

His teacher was Apollonius, a philosopher and rhetorician from Rhodes.
Rhodes is a Grecian island, near the southwestern coast of Asia Minor
Apollonius was a teacher of great celebrity, and Caesar became a very
able writer and speaker under his instructions. His time and attention
were, in fact, strangely divided between the highest and noblest
intellectual avocations, and the lowest sensual pleasures of a gay and
dissipated life. The coming of Sylla had, however, interrupted all; and,
after receiving the dictator's command to give up his wife and abandon
the Marian faction, and determining to disobey it, he fled suddenly from
Rome, as was stated at the close of the last chapter, at midnight, and
in disguise.

[Sidenote: Caesar's wanderings.]
[Sidenote: He is seized by a centurion.]

He was sick, too, at the time, with an intermittent fever. The paroxysm
returned once in three or four days, leaving him in tolerable health
during the interval. He went first into the country of the Sabines,
northeast of Rome, where he wandered up and down, exposed continually to
great dangers from those who knew that he was an object of the great
dictator's displeasure, and who were sure of favor and of a reward if
they could carry his head to Sylla He had to change his quarters every