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Yet privately designing to betray him, he sent for Lucius Sylla, quaestor to Marius, and who had on a previous occasion befriended Bocchus in the war.
He therefore sent a message to Bocchus urging him to think seriously of the course of action which he had adopted. An opportunity was still open to him of becoming the friend and ally of Rome; why should he adopt this motiveless attitude of hostility? The cause of Jugurtha was desperate; did the King of Mauretania wish to bring his own country into the same miserable plight?
Sulla had been left with the usual title of pro-praetor to represent his absent commander. To the headquarters of the winter camp Bocchus now sent five of his closest friends, men chosen for their approved loyalty and ability. His last access of hesitancy, if it were more than a semblance, had certainly been shortlived, and the envoys were given full powers to arrange the terms of peace.
In the west Bocchus king of Mauretania, whose friendship the Romans had in earlier times despised, seemed now not indisposed to make common cause with his son-in-law against them; he not only received him in his court, but, uniting to Jugurtha's followers his own numberless swarms of horsemen, he marched into the region of Cirta, where Metellus was in winter quarters.
But if Tigranes should now make peace, not only would Mithradates lose the last chance of being reinstated in his kingdom, but his surrender would be beyond doubt the first condition of peace; and certainly Tigranes would not have acted otherwise towards him than Bocchus had formerly acted towards Jugurtha.
With these troops, who would be more easily satisfied and more manageable, he filled up the gaps in the legions in Africa, and set to work, as Metellus had done, taking towns and forts and plundering the country. Bocchus had separated from Jugurtha, for they hoped that the Romans having two foes to chase would be the more easily harassed.
Bocchus, having both of them now in his power, was necessitated to betray one or other, and after long debate with himself, at last resolved on his first design, and gave up Jugurtha into the hands of Sylla. For this Marius triumphed, but the glory of the enterprise, which through people's envy of Marius was ascribed to Sylla, secretly grieved him.
Now Bocchus happened for some time to have disliked his son-in-law Jugurtha, whom he was also afraid of; and as Jugurtha had been defeated by the Romans and had fled to Bocchus, he formed a design to make him his prisoner and deliver him to his enemies; but as he wished Sulla to be the agent rather than himself, he invited Sulla to come and see him.
He longed, he said, for peace, but was stirred to pity for the fortunes of Jugurtha. If the latter were also given the chance of making terms with Rome, all might be arranged. Metellus replied with another message framed to meet the position taken up by the king; the answer of Bocchus was a cautious mixture of assent and protest.
He called the protecting god of his own race, the guardian of its international honour, Jupiter Maximus, to witness the crime and perfidy of Bocchus, and he ordered Volux to leave his camp. The unhappy prince was probably in a state of genuine terror of Jugurtha, of complete uncertainty as to the intentions of that jealous kinsman and ally.
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