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Neither candidacy was precisely illegal, but both were highly disapproved of because they flouted custom.
    Matters came to a head during the consular elections when Glaucia murdered another candidate. Marius convened the Senate, which passed its Ultimate Decree (a form of martial law); the Senate and its supporters went home to get their arms, and battle was joined in the Forum Romanum. Saturninus and Glaucia had thought that the lowest classes, threatened with starvation, would rise up in revolt. But the lowest classes were not willing to do so. Quietly they went home instead. Using Sulla as his right-hand man, Marius defeated the consequently limited forces Saturninus had at his disposal. Saturninus sought asylum in the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, but was forced to surrender when Sulla cut off the water supply to the Capitol.
    Glaucia committed suicide, but Saturninus and the rest of his close friends were imprisoned in the Senate House until they could be tried for treason-a trial everybody in the Senate knew would fracture Rome's already tottering constitutional framework. Sulla solved the problem by secretly leading a small band of young aristocrats onto the roof of the Senate House, from which vantage point they killed Saturninus and his friends by bombarding them with tiles torn from the roof. Saturninus's grain law was repealed, but Marius-now fifty-seven years old-had to face the fact that his political career had ground to a halt. Consul six times, it seemed he would never fulfill the prophecy by being consul a seventh time. But Sulla hoped to be elected praetor in a year's time. He decided he would therefore have to withdraw from Marius, now politically odious, in order to preserve his own career.
    During these ten years, the private lives and loves of Marius and Sulla fared differently.
    Marius's marriage to Julia prospered. They had a son born in 109 B.C., their only child, who was called Young Marius. Old Caesar died, but not before he saw both his sons firmly placed for future political and military eminence. His younger son, Gaius, married a rich and beautiful daughter of the Famous Family Aurelius Cotta, one Aurelia, and sensibly the young couple took up residence in Aurelia's apartment house in the Subura, a district of Rome in evil repute. They had two girls, and finally in 100 B.C. a son (the great Caesar) who was of course, as Marius immediately recognized, the child of the prophecy-the greatest Roman of all time. Marius resolved that he would try to foil this part of his cherished foretelling.
    Sulla's marriage to old Caesar's younger girl, Julilla, was not a happy one, mostly due to Julilla's febrile and overly dramatic nature. Two children were born of it, a daughter and a son. Loving Sulla obsessively, Julilla was aware she did not hold all of Sulla's heart, though she had no idea of his true sexual inclinations. Unhappiness prompted her to drink, and as time went on she became completely dependent upon her wine.
    Then a rare event took place; the young Greek actor Metrobius came to visit Sulla in his house. Sight of Metrobius broke down Sulla's resolve never again to become physically involved with him. Unbeknownst to them, Julilla witnessed their lovemaking. And immediately committed suicide. Later on Sulla married a charming and childless widow of excellent family, one Aelia, to provide his children with a mother.
    Scaurus Princeps Senatus had a son who was guilty of cowardice while serving with the army of Catulus Caesar in northern Italy. Disgusted, Scaurus disowned the young man, who committed suicide. Whereupon Scaurus, now close to sixty years of age, promptly married his son's fiancée, the seventeen-year-old daughter of Metellus Numidicus's older brother; she was known as Dalmatica. No one asked her what she thought of this union.
    And young Marcus Livius Drusus, eminently aristocratic son of a famous man, in 105 B.C. arranged a double wedding; he married the sister of his best friend,