In C. Verrem

In the next place, as I said before on another occasion, what sort of a panegyric is that, when the chief men of the deputation commissioned to utter it, stated, both that a ship had been built for you at the public expense, and also that they themselves had been plundered and pillaged by you in respect of their private property? Lastly, what else is it that these people do, when they are the only people in all Sicily who praise you, beyond proving to us that you gave them everything of which you robbed our republic? What colony is there in Italy in possession of such privileges, what municipality is there enjoying such immunities, as to have had for all these years such a profitable exemption from all burdens, as the city of the Mamertines has had for three years? They alone have not given what they were bound to give according to the treaties; they alone, as long as that man was praetor, enjoyed immunity from all burdens; they alone under that man's authority lived in such a condition that they gave nothing to the Roman people, and refused nothing to Verres.

But to return to the fleet, from which topic I have been digressing; you accepted a ship from the Mamertines contrary to the laws; you granted them relaxation contrary to the treaties; so that you behaved like a rogue twice in the case of one city, as you both granted indulgences which you had no right to grant, and accepted what it was not lawful for you to accept. You ought to have exacted a ship from them fit to sail against robbers, not to carry off the produce of your robberies; one which might have defended the province from being despoiled, not one that was to bear away the fresh spoils of the province. The Mamertines gave you both a city to which you might carry all the plunder you amassed from all quarters, and also a ship, in which you might take it away. That town was a receptacle for your plunder, those men were the witnesses to and guardians of your plunder; they supplied to you both a repository for your thefts, and a conveyance for them. In consequence, even when you had lost a fleet by your own avarice and worthlessness, you did not venture to require a ship of the Mamertines, at a time when our want of ships was so excessive, and the distress of the province so great, that, even if it had been necessary to beg as supplicants for a ship, they would have granted it. But all your power either of commanding a vessel to be furnished, or of begging for one, was crippled, not by the bireme supplied to the Roman people, but by that splendid merchant vessel given to the praetor. That was the price of your authority, of the reinforcement they were bound to supply, of exemption from the requirements of law, and usage, and of the treaty.

You have now the case of the trusty assistance of one city lost to us and sold. Now listen to a new system of robbery first invented by Verres. Each city was always accustomed to give to its admiral the money necessary for the expense of the fleet, for provisions, for pay, and for all such things. The admiral did not dare to give the sailors any ground for accusing him, and was, besides, bound to render an account of the money to his fellow-citizens. In the whole business all the trouble and all the risk was his. This, I say, was the regular course not only in Sicily, but in every province, even in the case of the pay and expense of the Latin allies, at the time when we were accustomed to employ their assistance. Verres was the first man, ever since our dominion was established, who ordered that all that money should be paid to him by the cities, in order that whoever he chose to appoint might have the handling of that money.

Who can doubt why you were the first man to change the ancient custom of all your predecessors, to disregard the great advantage of having the money pass through the hands of others, and to undertake a work of such difficulty, so liable to accusation,—a task of such delicacy, inseparable from suspicion? After that, other sources of gain are established arising from this one article of the navy; just listen to their number, O judges;—he receives money from the cities to excuse them from furnishing sailors; the sailors that are furnished he releases for a bribe; he makes a profit of the whole of thee pay of those who are thus released; he does not pay the rest all that he ought to pay. All this you shall have proved to you by the evidence of the cities. Read the evidence of the cities. [The evidence of the cities is read.]

Did you ever hear of such a man? Did you ever hear, O judges, of such impudence? of such audacity? to impose on the cities the payment of a sum of money in proportion to the number of soldiers, and to fix a regular price, six hundred sesterces, for the discharge of each sailor! and as those who paid that sum were released from service for the whole summer, Verres pocketed all that he received both for their pay and for their maintenance. And by this means he made a double profit of the discharge of one person. And this most insane of men, at a time of frequent invasion of pirates, and of imminent danger to the province, did this so openly, that the pirates themselves were aware of it, and the whole province was a witness to it.

When, owing to this man's inordinate avarice, there was a fleet indeed in name in Sicily, but in reality empty ships, fit only to carry plunder for the praetor, not to strike terror into pirates; nevertheless, while Publius Caesetius and Publius Tadius were sailing about with these ten half-manned ships, they, I will not say took, but led away with them one ship, laden with the spoils of the pirates, evidently overwhelmed and sinking with the burden of its freight. That vessel was full of a number of most beautiful quilts, full of quantities of well-wrought plate, and of coined money; full of embroidered robes. This one vessel was not taken by our fleet, but was found at Megaris, a place not far from Syracuse. And when the news was brought to him, although he was lying in his tent on the shore, with a lot of women, drunk, still he roused himself, and immediately sent to the quaestor and to his own lieutenant many men to act as guards, in order that everything might be brought to him to see in an uninjured state, as soon as possible.

The vessel is brought to Syracuse. All expect that the pirates will be punished. He, as if it was not a case of pirates being taken, but of a booty being brought to him, considers all the prisoners who were old or ugly as enemies; those who had any beauty, or youth, or skill in anything, he takes away: some he distributed among his clerks, his retinue, and his son; six skillful musicians he sends to Rome as a present to some friend of his. All that night he spent in unloading the ship. No one sees the captain of the pirate vessel, who ought to have been executed. And to this very day every one believes, (how much truth there is in the belief, you also may be able to conjecture,) that Verres secretly took money of the pirates for the release of the captain of the pirates.

It is only a conjecture; but no one can be a good judge who is not influenced by such certain grounds of suspicion. You know the man, you know the custom of all men,—how gladly any one who has taken a chief of pirates or of the enemy, allows him to be seen openly by all men. But of all the body of citizens and settlers at Syracuse, I never saw one man, O judges, who said that he had seen that captain of the pirates who had been taken; though all men, as is the regular custom, flocked to the prison, asked for him, and were anxious to see him. What happened to make that man be kept so carefully out of sight, that no one was ever able to get a glimpse of him, even by accident? Though all the seafaring men at Syracuse, who had often heard of the name of that captain, who had often been alarmed by him, wished to feed their eyes on, and to gratify their minds with his torture and execution, yet no one was allowed even to see him.