After this triumph, the power of Rome in Africa, as well as in Europe, was supreme; but her empire in Asia was for a moment shaken by Mithridates. This powerful king, after seizing in succession the small adjacent states, was in command of not less than two hundred and fifty thousand men, and of a fleet of four hundred vessels, of which three hundred were decked. He defeated the three Roman generals who commanded in Cappadocia, invaded Asia Minor and massacred there at least eighty thousand Roman subjects, and even sent a large army into Greece.
Sylla landed in Greece with a reinforcement of twenty-five thousand Romans, and retook Athens; but Mithridates sent in succession two large armies by the Bosporus and the Dardanelles: the first, one hundred thousand strong, was destroyed at Chæronea, and the second, of eighty thousand men, met a similar fate at Orchomenus. At the same time, Lucullus, having collected all the maritime resources of the cities of Asia Minor, the islands, and particularly of Rhodes, was prepared to transport Sylla's army from Sestos to Asia; and Mithridates, from fear, made peace.
In the second and third wars, respectively conducted by Murena and Lucullus, there were no descents effected. Mithridates, driven step by step into Colchis, and no longer able to keep the sea, conceived the project of turning the Black Sea by the Caucasus, in order to pass through Thrace to assume the offensive,—a policy which it is difficult to understand, in view of the fact that he was unable to defend his kingdom against fifty thousand Romans.
Cæsar, in his second descent on England, had six hundred vessels, transporting forty thousand men. During the civil wars he transported thirty-five thousand men to Greece. Antony came from Brundusium to join him with twenty thousand men, and passed through the fleet of Pompey,—in which act he was as much favored by the lucky star of Cæsar as by the arrangements of his lieutenants.