Tiberius and Caius Gracchus

For he said that he had served in the army twelve years, although other men were required to serve there only ten, and that he had continued to serve as quaestor under his commander for more than two years, although the law permitted him to come back after a year. He was the only man in the army, he said, who had entered the campaign with a full purse and left it with an empty one; the rest had drunk up the wine which they took into Sardinia, and had come back to Rome with their wine-jars full of gold and silver.

After this, other fresh charges and indictments were brought against him, on the ground that he had caused the allies to revolt and had been privy to the conspiracy at Fregellae,[*](Fregellae revolted, and was destroyed in 125 B.C.) information of which was brought to Rome. But he cleared himself of all suspicion, and having established his entire innocence, immediately began a canvass for the tribuneship. All the men of note, without exception, were opposed to him, but so great a throng poured into the city from the country and took part in the elections that many could not be housed, and since the Campus Martius could not accommodate the multitude, they gave in their voices from the house-tops and tilings.

So far, however, did the nobility prevail against the people and disappoint the hopes of Caius that he was not returned first, as he expected, but fourth. But after entering upon his office[*](For the year 123 B.C., ten years after Tiberius had entered upon the same office.) he was at once first of all the tribunes, since he had an incomparable power in oratory, and his affliction gave him great boldness of speech in bewailing the fate of his brother.

For to this subject he would bring the people round on every pretext, reminding them of what had happened in the case of Tiberius, and contrasting the conduct of their ancestors, who went to war with the people of Falerii on behalf of Genucius, a tribune whom they had insulted, and condemned Caius Veturius to death because he was the only man who would not make way for a tribune passing through the forum. But before your eyes, he said, these men beat Tiberius to death with clubs, and his dead body was dragged from the Capitol through the midst of the city to be thrown into the Tiber; moreover, those of his friends who were caught were put to death without trial.

And yet it is ancient usage among us that if anyone who is arraigned on a capital charge does not answer to his summons, a trumpeter shall go to the door of this man’s house in the morning and summon him forth by sound of trumpet, and until this has been done the judges shall not vote on his case. So careful and guarded were the men of old in capital cases.