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of their answer declared their sentence beforehand.

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      Independently of the general odium, one charge bore heavily on the accused; that Marcus Volscius Fictor, who some years before had been tribune of the people, had come forward as a witness: "that not long after the pestilence had been in the city, he had fallen in with a party of young men rioting in the Suburra; that a scuffle arose there; and that his elder brother, not yet perfectly recovered from his illness, had fallen down almost dead, being struck with the fist by Cæso; that he was carried home between the hands of some persons, and that he considered that he died from that blow; and that it had not been permitted to him by the consuls of former years to follow up the matter." In consequence of Volscius vociferating these charges, the people became so excited, that Cæso was near being killed through the violence of the people. Virginius orders him to be seized and carried to prison. The patricians oppose force to force. Titus Quintius exclaims, "that a person for whom a day of trial for a capital offence has been appointed, and whose trial was now at hand, ought not to be outraged before trial and without sentence being passed." The tribune says, "that he would not inflict punishment117 on him before condemnation, that he would however keep him in prison until the day of trial; that the Roman people may have an opportunity of inflicting punishment on one who had killed a man." The tribunes being appealed to, secure their prerogative by adopting a middle course;118 they forbid his being thrown into confinement, and declare it to be their wish that the accused should appear on his trial, and that a sum of money should be promised to the people, in case he should not appear. How large a sum of money ought to be promised, came under discussion: that is referred to the senate. The accused was detained in the public assembly, until the patricians should be consulted: it was determined that he should give bail:119 each bail they bound to the amount of three thousand asses; how many should be given, was left to the tribunes; they limited the number to ten; for ten sureties the prosecutor discharged the accused. He was the first who gave public sureties. Being discharged from the forum, he went the following night into exile among the Etrurians. When on the day of trial it was pleaded that he had quitted his home in order to go into exile, Virginius notwithstanding holding the comitia, his colleagues when appealed to dismissed the assembly: the fine was rigorously exacted120 from the father; so that after selling all his effects, he lived for a considerable time in a solitary cottage on the other side of the Tiber, as if in exile. This trial and the proposing of the law gave full employment to the state: there was quiet from foreign arms.

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      When the tribunes, flushed as it were with victory, imagined that the law was in a manner passed, the patricians being now dismayed by the banishment of Cæso, and when, with respect to the seniors of the patricians, they had relinquished all share in the administration of the commonwealth; the juniors, more especially those who were the intimate friends of Cæso, redoubled their resentful feelings against the commons, and suffered not their spirits to droop; but the greatest improvement was made in this particular, that they tempered their animosity by a certain degree of moderation. When for the first time after Cæso's banishment the law began to be brought forward, arrayed and well prepared with a numerous body of clients, they attacked the tribunes, on their affording a pretext for it by attempting to remove them, in such a manner, that no one individual carried home from thence any prominent share either of glory or ill-will; the people complained that for one Cæso a thousand had started up. During the intermediate days, when the tribunes made no stir regarding the law, nothing could be more mild or peaceable than those same persons; they saluted the plebeians courteously, entered into conversation, and invited them home; they attended the forum, and suffered the tribunes themselves to hold their meetings without interruption: they never were uncivil to any one either in public or in private, unless when the business respecting the law began to be agitated. On other occasions the young men were popular. And not only did the tribunes transact all their other affairs without disturbance, but they were even re-elected for the following year, without one offensive expression, much less any violence being employed. By soothing and managing the commons they gradually rendered them tractable. By these methods the law was evaded for the entire year.

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      The consuls Caius Claudius, the son of Appius, and Publius Valerius Publicola, found the state in a more tranquil condition. The new year had brought with it nothing new; the thoughts about carrying the law, or submitting to it, engrossed all the members of the state. The more the younger members of the senate endeavoured to insinuate themselves into favour with the commons, the more strenuously did the tribunes strive to thwart them, so that they rendered them suspicious in the eyes of the commons by alleging: "that a conspiracy was formed; that Cæso was in Rome; that plans were concerted for assassinating the tribunes, and butchering the commons. That the commission assigned by the elder members of the patricians was, that the young men should abolish the tribunitian power from the state, and the form of government should be the same as it had been before the sacred mount had been taken possession of." Both a war from the Volsci and Æqui, which was now a stated thing, and one that was a regular occurrence for almost every year, was apprehended, and another evil nearer home started up unexpectedly. The exiles and slaves to the number of four thousand and five hundred men took possession of the Capitol and citadel during the night, under the command of Appius Herdonius, a Sabine. Immediately a massacre took place in the citadel of those who had evinced an unwillingness to enter into the conspiracy and to take up arms. Some, during the alarm, run down to the forum, driven precipitately through the panic; the cries, "to arms," and "the enemy are in the city," were heard alternately. The consuls were both afraid to arm the commons, and to suffer them to remain unarmed; uncertain what sudden calamity had assailed the city, whether external or intestine, whether from the hatred of the commons or the treachery of the slaves: they were for quieting the tumults, by such endeavours they sometimes exasperated them; for the populace, panic-stricken and terrified, could not be directed by authority. They give out arms, however, not indiscriminately; only so that, the enemy being still uncertain,121 there might be a protection sufficient to be relied on for all emergencies. The remainder of the night they passed in posting guards through proper places through the entire city, anxious and uncertain, as to who the persons might be, and how great the number of the enemy was. Day-light then disclosed the war and the leader of the war. Appius Herdonius summoned the slaves to liberty from the Capitol: "that he had espoused the cause of every most unfortunate individual, in order to bring back to their country those driven out by oppression, and to remove the grievous yoke from the slaves. That he had rather that were done under the authority of the Roman people. If there be no hope in that quarter, that he would rouse the Volscians and Æqui, and would try all extremities."

      16

      The matter began to disclose itself more clearly to the patricians and the consuls; besides those things, however, which were openly declared, they dreaded lest this might be a scheme of the Veientes or Sabines; and, as there were so many of the enemy in the city, lest the Sabine and Etrurian troops might come on according to a concerted plan; and then lest their eternal enemies, the Volscians and Æqui, should come, not to ravage their territories, as before, but to their very city, already in part taken. Many and various were their fears; among others, the most prominent was their dread of the slaves, lest each might harbour an enemy in his own house, one whom it was neither sufficiently safe to trust, nor to deny122 confidence to him lest, by not trusting him, he might become more incensed. And (the evil) seemed scarcely capable of being resisted by perfect harmony (between the different orders of the state); only no one apprehended the tribunes or commons, other evils predominating and constantly starting up; that appeared an evil of a mild nature, and one always arising during the cessation of other evils, and it then appeared to be lulled to rest by external terror. Yet that was almost the only one that most aggravated their distressing circumstances: for such madness took possession of the tribunes, that they contended that not war, but the empty appearance of war had taken possession of the Capitol, to avert the people's minds from attending to the law; that these friends and clients of the patricians would depart in greater silence than they came, if they once perceived that, by the law being passed, they had raised these tumults in vain. They then held a meeting for passing the law, having called away

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