Terentilius watched his opportunity and laid his project before the Tribes during the absence of both the Consuls; but their part was at once assumed by Quintus Fabius, the same previously mentioned, then Prefect of the city. Through his menaces, the other Tribunes were induced to stop all further proceedings of their colleague, until the Consuls could return; and when the first obstacle was removed, fresh ones were set in the way of Terentilius, who, with increasing spirit, overcame them all, and carried his bill triumphantly through the Tribes. But when brought up into the Senate for adoption, it stuck fast; nor could any efforts of the Tribes or the Tribunes dislodge it from its position as a useless bill, with which nothing could be done, until the Senate should pass it to the Curies, and the Curies give it back, as a law, to the people. It lay idle, therefore, through that year and the next, when, though presented anew by all the five Tribunes, it was received with ominous warnings from the Sibylline books, and again consigned to inactivity. Had the Patricians contented themselves with working upon the superstitious fears of the Plebeians, the designs of Terentilius might have been longer confounded; but the violent means they presently adopted only made the people more anxious and the Tribunes more resolute to obtain the law, whose necessity was daily proved.

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cians, chosen for life, under the title of the Duumviri Sacrorum, to keep, and, by the order of the Senate, to consult, the books in case of need.

It is more than history can do to describe the excesses of the faction for the time uppermost. Only some scattered instances are mentioned of wrongs so foul 65 as to imply the commission of other crimes less aggravated, but more numerous, against individuals, families, and classes of the weaker estate; and the imagination of the reader can alone set before him the scenes natural to a state of society, where contest was so frequent, and restraint upon the powerful so weak, as in that of Rome. One Patrician, Caso Quinctius, younger than many, is describ

ed as the most notorious of all for his wild and reckless ways. Stout in frame, and winning in address,66 he was at the head of a band as violent as himself, and liking nothing better than to be set against the multitude of the Forum. An affray was raised, one day, to hinder the proceedings of the Tribes, assembled, it is said, to take some measures in favor of the Terentilian bill. Caso Quinctius was, as usual, foremost; but when he and his companions were actually driving the Tribunes like sheep before them, one, named Virginius, turned like a man upon his pursuers, bidding Caso prepare himself to answer for his life, before the Tribes, on some future day. The trial came, and before judges who believed their freedom, as the historian writes, to be staked on Cæso's condemnation; 67 the prosecution being conducted under the Icilian law, recently described, for having mo

65 Liv., III. 13, 33. Dion. Hal., X. 25. Dion Cass., Fragm. Maii, XXII.

66 Dion. Hal., X. 5. Liv., III. 11. 67 Liv., III. 12.

lested the Tribunes in presence of the Tribes. Many of the most illustrious Patricians appeared in his defence; and his father, Quinctius Cincinnatus, a man remarkable for his unyielding temper, besought the pardon of his son. But as the trial continued, an individual, some time before a Tribune, came forward to accuse Cæso of having committed a murder for which he, the witness, had vainly entreated redress at the hands of the Consuls. The Plebeians heard his story with exasperation; and Caso would have been cut down where he stood, had not the Tribunes interfered and taken bail for his appearance on another day, to defend himself against the new and weightier charge. He fled forthwith into Etruria.

If the wind were changing, it still blew with boisterous blasts. A thousand Casos seemed to have risen up in the place of one; 6 and the Tribunes were again and again insulted, the Plebeians and the poor again and again aggrieved. A conspiracy was soon on foot between the fugitive" and his friends in Rome, to bring about his return; and the Plebeians, whose limbs and lives were not yet saved, awoke one night to hear the clash of arms and the cry that the Capitol was in the hands of strangers. The morning brought the report, that Appius Herdonius, a wellknown 70 Sabine, at the head of some exiles and slaves, had come in, of his or their own accord, to secure their return or their liberation; and procla

68 Liv., III. 14.

69 Dion. Hal., X. 10, 11.

70 Ibid., X. 14.

mation was made from the Capitol, that the slaves throughout the city should have their freedom, and the poor their rights, as soon as the enterprise of those in the citadel should succeed. One of the Consuls at the time was Valerius Publicola, a son of the old Patrician of that honorable name. While his colleague was consulting with the Senate, Valerius came forth to remonstrate with the Plebeians or their Tribunes, who, convinced that Caso Quinctius was with the exiles, and that the Patricians were all in the plot with him, were refusing to arm themselves for the recovery of the Capitol. It marks the idea which the Roman historians conceived, rather than the actual character of the Plebeians, that they should be described as endeavouring, while Herdonius or Caso was in the city, to pass their Terentilian bill, towards whose transformation into a law they could do no more than they had already done. Valerius, however, may very naturally have promised them that he would do his best to forward their favorite project as soon as the Capitol was cleared, at the same time that he assured them of the innocence of the Patricians of all participation in the return of the exiles, or the purposes which the Plebeians were no cowards to fear. His words persuaded the people, ready, indeed, as any, individually and collectively, to defend their homes against invasion; and, joined by a force sent in from Tusculum, they dashed up the hill and took the citadel by rapid assault. Herdonius was slain, and Cæso, if he was there; but the brave Valerius also fell, in the

moment of the victory he was foremost in winning."

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Year followed year, in which the traditions of wrong and bloodshed lie thick and gloomy; nor is it here necessary to grope amongst them for any further evidence of the circumstances in which the first works of the Tribunes were accomplished. Even the men most distinguished above the rest, like Quinctius Cincinnatus, the father of Cæso, were filled with a species of fury which might have made them warm Patricians, but which certainly excludes them from any prominent place in the history of patriotism or liberty. There are some things, however, to observe as signs of better times. The union between the Plebeians and their Tribunes appears to have been remarkably constant, considering the trials through which they toiled and the breaks that are apt to occur between any popular party and its leaders. For five years, the same Tribunes were elected and reëlected, to pursue the same measures in promotion of the lingering Terentilian bill;73 and it may very well have been, during these successive terms, that the supporters became the amenders of the project of their predecessor.

Some time or other before the bill prevailed, it was so enlarged as to propose the reformation, or, to speak

71 Liv., III. 15-18. Dion. Hal., all that sort of thing, scarcely agrees X. 14-17. A. C. 460. with the testimonies in history concerning him and his family.

72 Livy (III. 19, 20) describes the madman whom Christians have mistaken for a patriot. The story of Cincinnatus at the plough, and

73Iidem tribuni, eadem lex." Liv., III. 30.