The Project Gutenberg eBook of Plutarch's Lives, Translated from the Greek by Aubrey Stewart and George Long.

[101] The character of the Roman roads is here accurately described. The straight lines in which they ran are nowhere more apparent than in England, as may be seen by inspecting the Ordnance maps. That from Lincoln to the Humber is a good example. It is conjectured that some of the strong substructions at La Riccia (Aricia) on the Appian Road near Rome may be the work of Caius; but I do not know on what this opinion rests. (See Classical Museum, ii. 164.)

The Roman mile is tolerably well ascertained. It is variously estimated at 1618 and 1614 yards, which is less than the English mile. The subject of the stadium, which was the Greek measure of length, is fully examined by Colonel Leake, London Geographical Journal, vol. ix.

[102] Caius Fannius Strabo must not be confounded with the historian of the same name. He was consul B.C. 122 with C. Domitius Ahenobarbus. Cicero speaks of an excellent speech of his against the proposal of Gracchus to give the Latins the full citizenship, and the suffrage to the Italian allies. (Cic., Brutus, c. 26.)

[103] M. Fulvius Flaccus was consul B.C. 125, and during his year of office he defeated the Transalpine Ligurians. He was an orator of no great note, but an active agitator. He perished with Caius Gracchus (c. 16): his house was pulled down, and the ground made public property.

[104] Plutarch’s Life of the younger Scipio Africanus is lost. Scipio died B.C. 159, six years before Caius was tribune. He had retired to rest in the evening with some tablets on which he intended to write a speech to deliver before the people on the subject of the Agrarian Law of Tiberius Gracchus and the difficulties of carrying it into effect. He was found dead in the morning, and it was the general opinion that he was murdered. His wife Sempronia was suspected, and even Cornelia his mother-in-law, as well as C. Gracchus. C. Papirius Carbo, one of the triumviri for dividing the land with Caius and Fulvius Flaccus is distinctly mentioned by Cicero as one of the murderers. As to him, there is no doubt that he was believed to be guilty. It is also admitted by all authorities that there was no inquiry into the death of Scipio; and Appian adds that he had not even a public funeral.

[105] This was the first Roman colony that was established beyond the limits of the Italian Peninsula, which Velleius reckons among the most impolitic measures of Gracchus. The colony of Gracchus appears to have been neglected, and the town was not built. At the destruction of Carthage heavy imprecations were laid on any man who should restore the city. The colony was established by Cæsar the Dictator.

The foundation of a Roman colony was accompanied with solemn ceremonials, to which Plutarch alludes. The anniversary day of the foundation was religiously observed. On some Roman coins there is a representation of a man driving a yoke of oxen and a vexillum (standard), which are the symbols of a Roman colony.

[106] Plutarch has here used the word oligarch (ὀλιγαρχικός), one who is a friend to the party of the Few as opposed to the Many. The meaning of an oligarchy, according to Aristotle (Politik, 4, c. 4), is a government in which the rich and those of noble birth possess the political power, being Few in number. But the smallness of the number is only an accident: the essence of an oligarchy consists in the power being in the hands of the rich and the noble, who happen in all countries to be the Few compared with the Many.

[107] This was a proverbial expression, of which different explanations were given. Sardinia, it is said, was noted for a bitter herb which contracted the features of those who tasted it. Pausanias (x. 17) says it is a plant like parsley, which grows near springs, and causes people who eat it to laugh till they die; and he supposes that Homer’s expression (Odyssey xx. 302), a Sardanian laugh, is an allusion to this property of the plant: but this is not a probable explanation of the expression in Homer.

[108] Some fragments of the Letters of Cornelia are extant, but there is great difficulty in determining if they are genuine, and opinions are divided on the subject. Gerlach, in his essay on Tiberius and Caius Gracchus (p. 37), maintains their genuineness against the opinion of Spalding and Bernhardy. The Fragments are collected by Roth.

[109] The story in Appian (Civil Wars, i. 25) is somewhat different.

[110] The Roman stilus, which Plutarch translates by graphium (γραφεῖον), “a writing instrument,” was of metal, iron or brass, sharp at one end and flat at the other. The point was used for writing on tablets which were smeared with wax: the other end was used for erasing what was written and making the surface even again. The word was often used by the best Roman writers in a metaphorical sense to express the manner and character of a written composition, and from them it has passed into some of the modern languages of Europe, our own among the rest: thus we speak of a good style, a bad style of writing, and so on.

[111] The form of the decree was, Videant consules ne quid respublica detrimenti capiat (Livius, 3, c. 4), which empowered the consuls or consul, as the case might be, to provide that the commonwealth sustained no damage. The word detrimentum, which signifies damage caused by rubbing off, had a tacit reference to the majestas of the Populus Romanus. The majestas (majesty) of the state is its integrity, its wholeness, any diminution of which was an offence; and under the Emperors the crime of majestas, that is majestas impaired, was equivalent to high treason. The decree here alluded to was only adopted, as Livius expresses it, in the utmost extremity, when the state was in danger; its effect was to proclaim martial law, and to suspend for the time all the usual forms of proceeding.

[112] This was one of the hills or eminences in Rome: it was the plebeian quarter.

[113] This is the Roman term which corresponds to the kerukeion (κηρύκειον) of Plutarch, or the staff which ambassadors or heralds carried in time of war when they were sent to an enemy.

[114] The Cretans were often employed as mercenaries in the Roman army, as we see from passages in Livius (37, c. 41).

[115] This is not Plutarch’s word, but it expresses his meaning, and he uses the word elsewhere. Amnesty is Greek and was used by the later Greek writers in a sense the same or nearly the same as in modern times, to express a declaration on the part of those who had the sovereign power for the time that they would pardon those who had in any way acted in opposition to such power.

[116] The Pons Sublicius as it was called, the oldest bridge over the Tiber at Rome.

[117] As usual in such cases, there is a dispute about the person or at least his name. Velleius (ii. 6,) and Aurelius Victor called him Euporus. Both names are Greek, and the faithful slave was doubtless a Greek, of whom there were now many at Rome. They were valued for their superior acquirements and dexterity, and filled the higher places in great families. The slaves from barbarous nations, that is, nations not Greek, were used for meaner purposes.

[118] Kaltwasser remarks that Aurelius Victor (De Viris Illustribus, c. 55) says that Caius died in the grove of Furina, the goddess of thieves, whose sacred place was beyond, that is on the west side of the Tiber, and that Plutarch appears to have confounded this with the name of the Furies, the Greek Erinnyes. This may be so; or Victor may have made a mistake, which he often has done.

[119] Opimius must have been as great a knave as Septimuleius, for the fraud was palpable. Stories of this kind are generally given with variations. Plinius (N. H. 33, c. 14) says it was the mouth that was filled with lead, and that Septimuleius had been a confidential friend of Caius. This was the first instance in Rome of head money being offered and paid; but the example was followed in the proscriptions of Sulla, and those of the triumviri Lepidus, M. Antonius, and Cæsar Octavianus.

[120] I have followed Kaltwasser in translating the Greek word ἀπονοία, which signifies madness, desperation, or a desperate deed, by discord, for the sake of maintaining something like the opposition between the two words which exists in the original.

[121] Caius Opimius was consul with Q. Fabius Maximus Allobrogicus, B.C. 121, the year of the death of Caius. The history of his conduct in Libya is told by Sallustius in the Jugurthine war. He was one of ten commissioners who were sent, B.C. 112, to settle the disputes between Adherbal, the son of Micipsa, and Jugurtha, the illegitimate son of Micipsa’s brother. The commissioners were bribed by Jugurtha and decided in his favour. Opimius and the rest of them were tried for the offence, B.C. 109, and banished. Opimius died in great poverty at Dyrrachium (Durazzo) in Epirus. (Sallustius, Jugurthine War, c. 134; Velleius, ii. 7.) Cicero thinks that Opimius was very hardly used after his services in crushing the insurrection at Fregellæ and putting down the disturbances excited by Caius Gracchus and Fulvius Flaccus: he calls him the saviour of the state, and laments his condemnation. (Cicero, Pro Plancio, c. 28, &c.; Brutus, c. 34; &c.)

[122] M. Fulvius Flaccus was consul, B.C. 125, during which year he defeated the Transalpine Ligurians.

[123] The legislation of the Gracchi, particularly of Caius Gracchus, comprehended many objects, the provisions as to which are comprehended under the general name of Semproniæ Leges, for it was the fashion to name a law after the gentile name of him who proposed it. The most important of the measures of Caius have been mentioned by Plutarch, with the exception of a law about the provinces. At the outbreak of the Social War, B.C. 91, the Roman provinces comprehended Sardinia, Corsica, Sicily, the Spanish Peninsula, the whole of which, however, was not subdued, Cisalpine Gaul, Asia, Macedonia, Achæa, Transalpine Gaul, and some others of less note.

The original sense of the word provincia had no reference to a territory, though this is the later sense of the word and the common usage of it. The functions of the prætor urbanus who stayed at Rome were called his provincia, that is, the administration of justice was his provincia or business. The word is used in the sense of a function or office by Livius with reference to a time when there was no provincia in the later sense of the word. In the time of Cicero, provincia signified a territory out of Italy, which was administered by a Roman governor. The term Italy, at this time, did not comprise the whole peninsula, but only that part which was south of the rivers Rubico and Macra. The primary meaning of the word is confirmed by its etymology; provincia is a shortened form of providentia, which also appears in the shape prudentia. Providentia signifies “foresight,” “superintending care,” and so forth; and it is formed on the same principle as beneficentia, benevolentia, and other Latin words which are of a participial character. The etymology of Niebuhr (proventus) is untenable, and that which I have partly adopted (Smith’s Dict. of Antiquities, art. “Provincia”) is no better. Since writing that article, I saw that the word is only another form of providentia, and a friend has pointed out to me that Mr. G. C. Lewis first suggested this as the origin of the word in his Essay on the Government of Dependencies, London, 1841, Note H. p. 353. If this explanation of the word is correct, the true orthography is provintia, but I have not yet been able to find it on an inscription.

The old practice was for the Senate, after the elections of the Consuls and Prætors, to name two provinces which should be given to the consuls after the consulship was expired. The two consuls settled by lot or by agreement which province of the two they should have. As the consuls were chosen before the two consular provinces were determined by the senate, it was in the power of the senate to give what provinces they pleased to the consuls, and so make the appointment either a favour or not. A law of Gracchus enacted that the two consular provinces should be determined before the election of consuls, and that the senate should not have the power, which they had formerly exercised, of prolonging a man’s government in a province beyond the year. This law manifestly limited the power of the Senate, though some writers conceive that it was enacted for the advantage of that body as some compensation for their loss of the judicial power.

Plutarch has treated the subject of the Gracchi with perfect impartiality. He has given them credit for good motives, and approved of their measures in general, but he has not disguised their faults. Appian considered that the measures of Tiberius were for the public good, but that his conduct was not judicious. Sallustius also admits that the Gracchi did not conduct themselves with sufficient moderation (Jugurthine War, c. 46); but Sallustius belonged to the popular party, and he approved of their measures. Most of the other Roman writers express an unfavourable opinion of the Gracchi. Florus however gives them credit for good intentions, but disapproves of the means by which they attempted to carry their measures into effect. That part of the work of Livius which treated of this period is lost, but we may collect his opinions of the Gracchi from the Epitomes of the lost books, and the general tenor of his History. The measures of the Gracchi were estimated by the rule of party spirit. The judgment of Cicero, who often mentions the Gracchi, is both for and against. His expressed opinion, whatever might be his real opinion, varied with circumstances. If we only knew his opinion from the second oration against the Agrarian Law of Rullus (ii. 5), we should consider him as approving of all the measures of the Gracchi. When he delivered that oration, Cicero had just been elected Consul: he was a Novus homo, a new man as the Romans called him, who was the first of his family to attain to the high honours of the State, and he had obtained the consulship as a friend of the people, as a popular man (Popularis). In his treatise on Friendship and other of his writings, he gives a contradictory judgment of the Gracchi; he says that Tiberius Gracchus aimed at the kingly power, or rather in fact was king for a few months; he calls the two Gracchi degenerate sons of their father; he extols the murderers of Tiberius Gracchus; he commiserates the hard fate of Opimius after saving the state by putting Caius Gracchus to death. All this was written or said after he was consul, after he had done what the murderers of the Gracchi had done, after he had put to death Catilina and his accomplices without trial contrary to the constitution, contrary to a special law which Caius Gracchus had carried that no Roman citizen should be put to death without a duly constituted trial; after he had, like Nasica and Opimius, made himself a murderer by putting men to death without letting them be tried according to law; whether they were guilty or not, is immaterial; they were put to death without trial, contrary to a principle of justice which, before he became guilty himself, Cicero had maintained and defended. The acts of the Gracchi were on record and well understood; but Cicero made his opinion of their acts depend not on his convictions, but on his interests; it is to him mainly that we may trace the common notion that the Gracchi were merely a couple of designing demagogues. The Gracchi were not wise enough or firm enough to be good reformers, but few reformers in so difficult a situation have left behind them so fair a reputation for honest intention. There was a great mass of contemporary materials for the history of the Gracchi, consisting of the speeches of the two brothers, of the numerous speeches made against them, the history of Polybius, who could not have overlooked the Gracchi in his account of the Numantine war, the history of Fannius, and other materials which Gerlach has enumerated in his Essay on the Gracchi. It is plain from Plutarch’s narrative, that he used these authorities; and if we consider how far removed he was from the time of the Gracchi, and his character, we may conclude that he has given as impartial a view of the times as he could collect from contemporary evidence. He may have made mistakes, and some mistakes we cannot help considering that he has made; but he can hardly have made any mistake in his representation of the nature of the reforms which the two brothers attempted, of the opposition that they encountered, and of their general character.

Misenum. Misenum was on the coast of Campania near Cape Miseno, a favourite residence of the wealthy Romans, who built villas there. The house of Cornelia had many occupants. It became the property of Caius Marius (c. 34), then of Lucius Lucullus, and finally of the Emperor Tiberius, who died here. It was seated on a hill which commanded an extensive sea-view.

In the last sentence of this chapter I have adopted the reading of Sintenis (φυλαττομένης), which is necessary for the sense.

[124] Alluding to the fight of Herakles with the Lernæan hydra which had nine heads. Herakles struck off its heads with his club, but in the place of the head he cut off, two new heads grew forth each time.

[125] This was a frontier town, whose possession was disputed by the Athenians and Bœotians.

[126] An Athenian of the township of Thriasia, near Eleusis.

[127] A fellow-scholar of Demosthenes.

[128] A low quarter of Athens.

[129] See Life of Crassus, ch. 2.

[130] The battle of Chæronea, B.C. 338, in which Philip defeated the Athenians and Bœotians, and crushed the liberties of Greece.

[131] The hero of a mock-heroic poem supposed to have been written by Homer.

[132] Kassander built a new city on the site of Potidæa, on the narrow isthmus of the promontory of Pallene. Potidæa had been destroyed by Philip, B.C. 356. The new city of Kassandrea soon became the most flourishing city in Macedonia.

[133] This was Agis III. who at the time of the battle of Issus, B.C. 333, was communicating with the Persian naval commanders in the Ægean, to obtain supplies for the war against the Macedonians. He was killed in action, about the time of the battle of Arbela, B.C. 331.

[134] The second month of the Attic year, the latter half of August and first of September. The two next months mentioned in the text correspond to the latter half of September and the first of October and the latter half of October and first of November respectively.

[135] A small island in the Saronic Gulf off the coast of Argolis and opposite Troezen, where was a celebrated temple of Poseidon which was regarded as an inviolable asylum. Hither Demosthenes fled to avoid Antipater, and here he took poison, B.C. 322.

[136] The Greek word signifies a reed, in the upper part of which poison might easily be placed.

[137] A festival in honour of Demeter. For details see Smith ‘Dict. of Antiq.’

[138] The Helvia Gens was plebeian. It becomes historical from the time of the second Punic war, and became ennobled (nobilis) by M. Helvius being elected prætor B.C. 197, the first year in which six prætors were elected (Liv. 32. c. 27). It is said that Cicero never mentions his mother in his writings, but an anecdote of her careful housekeeping is recorded by her son Quintus (Cic. Ad Diversos, xvi. 26).

The allusion is to the Volscian with whom Coriolanus took refuge when he left Rome (Plutarch, Life of Coriolanus, c. 22; Livy, 2, c. 35).

[139] Cicero himself did not claim any illustrious descent. The family had been long settled at Arpinum, now Arpino, a Volscian town. The first person who is mentioned as bearing the name of Cicero is C. Claudius Cicero, a tribunus plebis, B.C. 454 (Liv. 3. c. 31). M. Tullius Cicero, the grandfather of the orator, was born B.C. 140, and nothing is known of the orator’s family before him. Arpinum received the limited Roman civitas in B.C. 303 (Liv. 10. c. 1), that is, probably Commercium and Connubium, for the suffrage (suffragii latio) was not given to the people of Arpinum till B.C. 188 (Liv. 38. c. 36). The orator’s grandfather lived to see his grandson born B.C. 106. Cicero’s father belonged to the class of Equites. He spent the greater part of his life on his lands at Arpinum, near the junction of the Fibrenus with the Liris (Garigliano). He afterwards removed to Rome to educate his sons Marcus and Quintus, and had a house in the Carinæ. Among his friends were the orators M. Antonius and Lucius Crassus, and Q. Scævola the Augur, a distinguished Jurist. His sons had accordingly the advantage of being acquainted in their youth with some of the most distinguished of the Romans. He is said to have died B.C. 64, the year before his son was consul. A letter of Cicero to Atticus (i. 6) is generally supposed to speak of his father’s death, but the true reading is undoubtedly “pater a nobis discessit;” and it is plain that Cicero is simply speaking of his father leaving Rome for a time (Drumann, Tullii, p. 213).

[140] The cognomen Cicero, as already observed, occurs early in Roman history. Many of the Roman cognomina were derived from some particular plant which a man cultivated, or from some personal peculiarity, or from some other accidental circumstance. The mark on the nose is just as likely to be the origin of the name as the cultivation of the cicer; for if the name Fabius comes from faba, “a bean,” and Lentulus, from lens, “pulse;” yet Catulus means “a whelp,” and Scaurus means “knock-knee’d,” or something of the kind.

The words διαστόλη, διαφύη mean what I have translated them. Kaltwasser has translated the passage thus, according to Reiske’s explanation:—“Jener hatte an der spitze der nase einen kleinen anwuchs oder warze in form einer solchen erbse, woven er den beinamen erhielt.” But this is not a translation. Plutarch does not say that he had a wart at the end of his nose, but that the end of his nose was like a vetch, because there was a kind of split or cleft in it. There is no reason for misrepresenting even a man’s nose.

[141] The “third day of the new calends” is the third of January of the unreformed Roman calendar. Pompeius Magnus was born in the same year, B.C. 106. Cicero himself mentions his birthday (Ad Attic. vii. 5; xiii. 42). Plutarch’s stories of his aptitude for learning might be collected from the mass of anecdotes that existed in his time about all the great Romans of Cicero’s period. The story shows at least what were the traditional stories about Cicero’s youth.

[142] Kaltwasser refers to the passage in Plato’s Republic, book v. p. 56, of the Bipont edition.

[143] Glaucus was a fisherman of Anthedon in Bœotia. After eating of a certain herb he jumped into the sea and became a sea-god with the power of prophecy (Pausanias, ix. 22). Strabo (p. 405, ed. Casaub.) says that he became a fish of some kind (κῆτος), a change more appropriate to his new element, though perhaps not to his new vocation. Æschylus made a drama on the subject, which Cicero may have used.

[144] Cicero translated the poem of Aratus into Latin verse. He also wrote an epic poem, the subject of which was his countryman Caius Marius; and one on his own consulship, which was always a favourite topic with him. Of the translation of the ‘Phænomena’ of Aratus, which was made when he was a youth, about four hundred lines remain. The fragments of these poems, and of others not here enumerated, are in Orelli’s edition of Cicero, vol. iv.

[145] Philo, a pupil of the Carthaginian Clitomachus, fled from Athens to Rome in B.C. 88, at the time when the troops of Mithridates were in possession of Athens (Cicero, Brutus, c. 89, and Meyer’s note).

[146] The elder of these Mucii was Q. Mucius Scævola, Consul B.C. 117, commonly called the Augur. After his death Cicero attached himself to Q. Mucius Scævola, Pontifex Maximus, who was a distinguished jurist. The Pontifex was assassinated in the consulship of the younger Marius, B.C. 82, in the temple of Vesta (Florus, iii. 21). Cicero has in several places commemorated his virtues and talents (De Orat. i. 39; iii. 3).

Cicero, in his Brutus, c. 88, &c., has given an account of his own early studies.

[147] In B.C. 89 Cicero served under Cn. Pompeius Strabo, the father of Pompeius Magnus (Life of Pompeius, c. 1. notes). Cicero speaks of this event of his life in his twelfth Philippic, c. 11.

[148] L. Cornelius Chrysogonus was probably a Greek. His name Cornelius was derived from his patron (Life of Sulla, c. 31, notes). Cicero’s speech for Sextus Roscius Amerinus was spoken B.C. 80; it is still extant. Cicero’s first extant speech, pro P. Quintio, was spoken B.C. 81.

[149] Cicero went to Greece B.C. 79. The reasons for his journey are stated by himself in his Brutus (c. 91). He speaks of his leanness and weakness, and of the length and slenderness of his neck. His physicians recommended him to give up speaking for a time. When he left Rome he had been engaged for two years in pleading causes.

[150] Cicero stayed six months at Athens. The New Academy was founded by Arkesilaus. The school taught that certainty was not attainable in anything, and that the evidence of the senses was deceptive. The words “by the evidence and by the senses” are the exact copy of the original. Schaefer proposes to omit “and” (καὶ), in which case the passage would stand thus—“by the evidence of the senses.” Sintenis retains the conjunction (καὶ), and refers to Cicero, Academ. 2. 6 and 7.

[151] Cicero was at Rhodes in B.C. 78 (compare his Brutus, c. 91). Cicero calls this “Apollonius the son of Molo,” simply Molo (see the Life of Cæsar, c. 3, notes). Molo had the two most distinguished of the Romans among his pupils, C. Julius Cæsar and Cicero.

Poseidonius was the chief Stoic of his time.

[152] Cicero never mentions this visit to Delphi in his writings, and Middleton thinks the visit is improbable, because Cicero (De Divinatione, ii. 56) shows that he knew what was the value of the oracle. But a man who despises a popular superstition may try to use it for his purposes, and may be disappointed if he cannot. Perhaps the soundness of the oracle’s advice may be a good reason for disbelieving the story.

Cicero returned to Rome in B.C. 77.

[153] This was Q. Roscius, in whose behalf Cicero made a speech in B.C. 76, before C. Piso as judex. The subject of the cause is stated in the arguments to the oration.

Claudius Æsopus, the great tragic actor, whom Cicero considered a perfect master of his art, was probably a Greek and a freedman of some member of the Claudia Gens. He was liberal in his expenditure, and yet he acquired an enormous fortune, which his son spent.

[154] ἐκ τοῦ ὑποκρίνεσθαι, that is, from “acting.” One Greek word for actor is ὑποκριτής. Oratorical action was therefore viewed as a part of the histrionic art; and so it is. But oratorical acting requires to be kept within narrower limits.

[155] Bawling is properly viewed as an effort to accomplish by loudness of voice what ought to be accomplished by other means. It is simply ridiculous, and misses the mark that it aims at. “If you mouth it,” says Hamlet to the players, “as many of your players do, I had as lief the town crier had spoke my lines.”—“Let your discretion be your tutor: suit the action to the word, and the word to the action; with this special observance, that you o’erstep not the modesty of nature.”

[156] Cicero was elected quæstor B.C. 76, when he was thirty years of age. He discharged the duties of his office during B.C. 75. He speaks well of his own quæstorship in his oration for Cn. Plancius (c. 26).

[157] Cicero tells the story himself in his oration for Cn. Plancius (c. 26). The place of the adventure was Puteoli (Pozzuoli), B.C. 74, a place to which the Romans used to resort to enjoy the natural hot springs and the agreeable neighbourhood.

[158] Verres during his prætorship in Sicily, B.C. 73-71, had greatly misconducted himself. He was prosecuted in B.C. 70, in which year Pompeius Magnus and M. Licinius Crassus were consuls (Life of Crassus, c. 12). Hortensius, the orator, defended Verres. The object of Hortensius and of these praetors was to prolong or defer the trial to the next year, for which Hortensius was elected consul.

There are extant seven orations of Cicero on the matter of Verres, of which two only were delivered; that against Cæcilius (De Divinatione), who claimed to conduct the prosecution, his object being to get Verres off, and the Actio Prima, which is an opening of the whole case. Before the other speeches were delivered, Verres gave up his defence and went into exile. Cicero, however, published the speeches, or probably even wrote them entire after the affair was over.

This Cæcilius was Q. Cæcilius Metellus, a Sicilian by birth, and probably the descendant of a freedman of one of the Metelli. It seems that he was suspected of being of Jewish origin. Cicero’s allusion to the hog, and many other passages in the Roman writers, show that the Jews were well known in Rome at this time.

[159] ἐντὸς θυρῶν, “within doors.” Kaltwasser has translated the passage: “So solltest du hinter der thür mit deinen söhnen schmälen.” The repartee does not admit or need explanation.

[160] The story of the monster sphinx and her ænigma which Œdipus solved is well known. This work of art was of metal, according to Pliny (Hist. Nat. 34. c. 18).

[161] There is probably some error in Plutarch as to the amount. In the Divinatio (c. 5) the peculations of Verres were estimated at “millies HS.,” or one hundred millions of sesterces; but in the Actio Prima (c. 18), which was spoken after Cicero had been in Sicily to collect evidence, he put the amount at forty millions of sesterces, or two-fifths of the first sum. If Plutarch’s drachmæ are Roman denarii, his 750,000 drachmæ will make only three millions of sesterces.

Verres continued in exile, and he remained quiet during the civil wars. Though an unprincipled scoundrel, he showed his taste in stealing: he had kept many valuable objects of art, and he would not part with them. The story is that M. Antonius put his name in the proscription list, B.C. 43, because he would not give up his Corinthian vessels. He was put to death, but he died, it is said, with great resolution; and he had the satisfaction of hearing that his old enemy Cicero had gone before him (Drumann, Tullii, p. 328). But all this story is very improbable.