For you certainly will not say (what I wish you would say) that this quantity
never came to Apronius. So I will hold you here, not only by the public covenants
and letters, but also from the private ones of the cultivators, so as to let you
understand that you were not mere diligent in executing robberies, than I have been
in detecting them. Will you be able to bear this? Will any one defend you? Will
these men be able to endure this, if they are inclined to pronounce a sentence
favourable to you,—that Quintus Apronius, at one visit, out of one district,
(besides all the money which was paid him, and which I have mentioned,) should have
taken three hundred thousand modii of wheat, under
the name of a compliment?
What! are they the men of Aetna alone who
say this? Yes, the Centuripans also, who are in occupation of far the largest part
of the Aetnaean district, to whose ambassadors, most noble men, Andron and Artemon,
their senate gave commissions which had reference to their city in his public
capacity, concerning those injuries which the citizens of Centuripa sustained not in
their own territories, but in those of others. The senate and people of Centuripa
did not choose to send ambassadors; but the Centuripan cultivators of the soil,
which is the greatest body of such men in Sicily, a body of most honourable and most wealthy men, themselves
selected three ambassadors, fellow citizens of their own, in order that by their
evidence you might be made aware of the calamities, not of one district only, but of
almost all Sicily. For the Centuripans are
engaged as cultivators of the soil in almost every part of Sicily. And they are the more important and the more
trustworthy witnesses against you, because, the other cities ore influenced by their
own distresses alone, the Centuripans as they occupy land in almost every district,
have felt the injuries and wrongs of the other cities also.
But as I have said, the case of the men of Aetna is clear enough, and established both by public and by private
documents. The task allotted to my diligence is to be required of me rather in the
district of Leontini, for this reason, because the Leontini themselves have not
assisted me much by their public authority. Nor, in truth, while that fellow was
praetor, did these injuries of the farmers very greatly affect them, or rather, I
might say, they did them good. This may, perhaps, appear a marvellous or even an
incredible thing to you, that in such general distress of the cultivators of the
soil, the Leontini, who were the heads of the corn interest, should have been free
from injury and calamity. This is the reason, O judges, that in the territory of
Leontini, no one of the Leontini, with the exception of the single family of
Mnasistratus, occupies any land. And so, O judges, you shall hear the evidence of
Mnasistratus, a most honest and virtuous man. Do not expect to hear any others of
the Leontini, whom not only Apronius, but whom even a tempest in their fields could
not injure. They in truth not only suffered no inconvenience, but even in the rapine
of Apronius they found gain and advantage.
Wherefore, since the city and embassy of the Leontini has failed me on account of
the cause which I have mentioned, I must devise a plan and contrive a way for myself
by which I may get at the gain of Apronius, or even at his enormous and wicked
booty. The tenths of the Leontini territory were sold in the third year of Verres's
praetorship for thirty-six thousand medimni of
wheat; that is, for two hundred and twenty-six thousand modii of wheat. A great price, O judges, a great price; and I cannot
deny it. Therefore it is certain that there must have been a loss, or at all events
not a great gain to the farmers. For this very often happens to men who have taken a
contract at a high rate.
What will you think if I prove to you that, by this one purchase, there were made
a hundred thousand modii of profit? what if it was
two hundred thousand? what if three? what if four hundred thousand was the sum? Will
you still doubt for whom that immense booty was acquired? Will any one say that I am
unfair if from the mere magnitude of the gain made I form a conjecture as to the
direction of the stolen goods and plunder? What if I prove to you, O judges, that
those men who are making four hundred thousand modii of profit would have suffered a loss if your iniquity, O Verres,
if judges of your retinue had not stepped in? Can any one doubt, in a case of so
much gain and so much iniquity, that you made such immense profit by dishonest
means? that for such immense gains you were willing to be dishonest?
How then, O judges, am I to arrive at this knowledge of how much profit was made?
Not from the accounts of Apronius, for when I sought for them, I could not find
them, and when I brought him into court, I made him deny that he kept any accounts
at all. If he was telling lies, why did he remove them out of the way, if they were
likely to do you no harm? If he really had kept any accounts at all, does not that
alone prove plainly enough, that it was not his own business that he was conducting?
For it is a quality of tenths, that they cannot be managed without many papers; for
it is necessary to keep an account of, and to set down in books the names of all the
cultivators, and with each name the amount of their tenth. All the cultivators made
returns of their acres according to your command and regulation; I do not believe
that any one made a return of a smaller quantity than he had in cultivation, when
there were so many crosses, so many penalties, so many judges of that retinue before
his eyes. On an acre of Leontini ground about a medimnus of wheat is usually sown, according to the regular and
constant allowance of seed. The land returns about eightfold on a fair average, but
in an extraordinarily favourable season, about tenfold. And whenever that is the
case, it then happens that the tenth is just the same quantity as was sown; that is
to say, as many acres as are sown, so many medimni
are due.
As this was the case, I say first of all, that the tenths of the territory of
Leontini were sold for many more thousand medimni
than there were thousands of acres sown in the district of Leontini. But if it was
impossible for them to produce more than ten medimni on an acre, and if it was fair that a medimnus should be paid out of each acre liable to the payment of
tenths, when the land produced a tenfold crop, which however very seldom happened,
what was the calculation of the farmer if indeed it was the tenths of the cultivator
that were being sold, and no his whole property, when he bought the tenths for many
more medimni than there had been acres sown? In the
Lecutini district the list and return made of acres is not more than thirty
thousand. The tenths were
sold for thirty-six thousand medimni. Did Apronius
make a blunder, or rather was he mad? Yes, he would indeed have been mad if it had
been lawful for the cultivators to give only what was due from them, and had not
rather been compulsory on them to give whatever Apronius commanded.
If I prove that no man gave less for his tenths than three medimni to the acre, you will admit, I suppose, that, even supposing
the produce amounted to a tenfold crop, no one paid less than three tenths. And
indeed this was begged as a favour from Apronius, that they might be allowed to
compound at three medimni an acre. For, as four and
even five were exacted from many people, and as many had not only not a grain of
corn, but not even a wisp of straw left out of all their crop and after all their
year's labour; then the cultivators of Centuripa, which are the main body of
agriculturists in the Leontini district, assembled in one place. They sent as a
delegate to Apronius, Andron of Centuripa, a man among the first of his state for
honour and nobility, (the same man whom now the city of Centuripa has sent to this
trial as a deputy and as a witness,) in order that he might plead with him the cause
of the cultivators of the soil, and beg of him not to exact of the Centuripan
cultivators more than three medimni for each acre.
This request was with difficulty obtained from Apronius, as a most excessive
kindness to those men who were even then safe. And when this was obtained, this is
what was obtained, forsooth, that they might be allowed to pay three tenths instead
of one. But if your own interest had not been at stake in the matter, O Verres, they
would rather have entreated you not to be made to pay more than one tenth, than have
begged of a promise not to be made to pay more than three. Now, that at the present
time I may pass over those rules which Apronius, in a kingly, or rather in a
tyrannical spirit, made with respect to the cultivators, and that I may not at
present call those men from whom he took all their corn, and to whom he left nothing
not only of their corn, but nothing even of their property; just see how much gain
is made of these three medimni, which he considered
as a great favour and indulgence.
The return of acres in the district of Leontini is thirty thousand. This amounts
to ninety thousand medimni of wheat that is to say,
to five hundred and forty thousand modii of wheat.
Deduct two hundred and sixteen thousand modii of
wheat, being what the tenths were sold for, and there remain three hundred and
twenty-four thousand modii of wheat; add to the sum
total of five hundred and forty thousand modii
three fiftieths, that is to say, thirty-two thousand four hundred modii of wheat, (for three fiftieths besides were exacted
from every one;) this now amounts to three hundred and fifty-six thousand four
hundred modii of wheat. But I said that four
hundred thousand sesterces of profit had been made.
For I do not include in this calculation those who were not allowed to compound at
three medimni an acre. But that by this present
calculation I may make out the sum which I promised to do, many were compelled
besides to pay two sesterces, and many even five,
with each medimnus, and those who had to pay least
paid a sesterce with every medimnus. To take the
least of these sums, as we calculated there were ninety thousand medimni, we must add to that, according to this new and
infamous example here given, ninety thousand sesterces.
Will he now dare to tell me, that he sold the tenths at a high price, when he took
for himself more than twice as much as he sent to the Roman people out of the same
district? You sold the tenths of the Leontine district for two hundred and sixteen
thousand modii of wheat? If you did so according to
law, it was a fine price; if your caprice was the law, it was a low price; if you
sold them so that those were called tenths which were in reality a half, you sold
them at a very low price. For the yearly produce of all Sicily might be sold for much more, if that was what the senate or
people of Rome had desired you to do.
Indeed, the tenths were often sold for as much, when they were sold according to the
law of Hiero, as they have been sold for now under the law of Verres. Let me have
the accounts of the sale of tenths under Caius Norbanus. [The account of the sale of
the tenths in the Leontine district under Caius Norbanus is read.] And yet, then, there were no trials about the return of acres; nor
was Artemidorus Cornelius a judge, nor did a Sicilian magistrate exact from a
cultivator whatever the farmer demanded; nor was it entreated as a favour from the
farmer to be allowed to compound at three medimni
an acre; nor was a cultivator obliged to give an additional present of money, nor to
add three-fiftieths of corn. And yet a area, quantity of corn was sent to the Roman
people.
But what is the meaning of these fiftieths? what is the meaning of these
additional presents of money? By what right, and, what is more, in what manner did
you do this The cultivator gave the money. How or whence did he get it? If he had
wished to be very liberal, he would have used a more heaped up measure, as men
formerly used to do in the matter of the tenths, when they were sold by fair laws,
and on fair terms. He gave the money. Where did he get it? from his corn? As if,
while you were praetor, he had anything to sell. Something, then, must be taken from
his principal, in order to add this pecuniary gratuity for Apronius to all the
profit which he derived from the lands. The next thing is, Did they give it
willingly or unwillingly? Willingly? They were very fond, I suppose, of Apronius.
Unwillingly? How, then, were they compelled to do so, except by violence and
ill-treatment? Again; that man, that most senseless man, in the selling of the
tenths, caused additional sums to be added to every tenth. It was not much; he added
two or three thousand sesterces. In the three years
he made about five hundred thousand sesterces. He
did this neither according to any precedent, nor by any right; nor did he make any
return of that money; nor can any man ever imagine how he is going to defend himself
against this petty charge.
And, as this is the case, do you dare to say that you sold
the tenths at a high price, when it is evident that you sold the property and
fortunes of the cultivators, not for the cake of the Roman people, but with a view
to your own gain. As if any steward, from a farm which had been used to produce ten
thousand sesterces, having cut down and sold the
trees, having taken away the buildings and the stock, and having driven off all the
cattle, sent his master twenty thousand sesterces
instead of ten, and made a hundred thousand more for himself. At first the master,
not knowing the injury that had been done to him, would be glad, and be delighted
with his steward, because he had got so much more profit out of the farm; but
afterwards, when he heard that all those things on which the profit and cultivation
of his farm depends have been removed and sold, he would punish his steward with the
greatest severity, and think himself very ill used. So also, the Roman people, when
it hears that Caius Verres has sold the tenths for more than that most innocent man,
Caius Sacerdos, whom he succeeded, thinks that it has got a good steward and
guardian over its lands and crops; but when it finds out that he has sold all the
stock of the cultivators, all the resources of the revenue, and has destroyed all
the hopes of their posterity by his avarice,—that he has devastated and drained the
allotments and the Lands subject to tribute,—that he has made himself most enormous
gain and booty,—it will perceive that it has been shamefully treated, and will think
that man worthy of the severest punishment.
By what, then, can this be made evident? Chiefly by this fact, that the land of
the province of Sicily liable to the
payment of tenths is deserted through the avarice of that man. Nor does it happen
only that those who have remained on their lands are now cultivating a smaller
number of acres, but also very many rich men, farmers on a large scale, and skillful
men, have deserted large and productive farms, and abandoned their whole allotments.
That may be very easily ascertained from the public documents of the states; because
according to the law of Hiero the number of cultivators is every year entered in the
books by public authority before the magistrates. Read now how many cultivators of
the Leontine district there were when Verres took the government. Eighty-three. And
how many made returns in his third year? Thirty-two. I see that there were fifty-one
cultivators so entirely got rid of that they had no successors. How many cultivators
were there of the district of Mutyca, when you arrived? Let us see from the public
documents. A hundred and eighty-eight. How many in your third year? A hundred and
one. That one district has to regret eighty-seven cultivators, owing to that man's
ill-treatment, and to that extent our republic has to regret the loss of so many
heads of families, and demands them back at his hand, since they are the real
revenues of the Roman people. The district of Herbita had in his first year two
hundred and fifty-seven cultivators; in his third, a hundred and twenty. From this
region a hundred and thirty-seven heads of families have fled like banished men. The
district of Agyrium—what men lived in that land! how honourable, how wealthy they
were? —had two hundred and fifty cultivators in the first year of your praetorship.
What had it in the third year? Eighty,—as you have heard the Agyrian deputies read
from their public documents.