killed, either legally or illegally. The third
was his exile, in which he himself was driven out of Rome. The fourth
was a driving out, too, though of a more honorable kind, when he was
compelled, much against his will, to undertake the government of a
province. The fifth was Caesar's passing of the Rubicon, the battle of
Pharsalia, and his subsequent adherence to Caesar. The last was his
internecine combat with Antony, which produced the Philippics, and that
memorable series of letters in which he strove to stir into flames the
expiring embers of the Republic. The literary work with which we are
acquainted is spread, but spread very unequally, over his whole life. I
have already told the story of Sextus Roscius Amerinus, having taken it
from his own words. From that time onward he wrote continually; but the
fervid stream of his eloquence came forth from him with unrivalled
rapidity in the twenty last miserable months of his life.

We have now come to the first of those episodes, and I have to tell the
way in which Cicero struggled with Verres, and how he conquered him. In
74 B.C. Verres was Praetor in Rome. At that period of the Republic there
were eight Praetors elected annually, two of whom remained in the city,
whereas the others were employed abroad, generally with the armies of
the Empire. In the next year, 73 B.C., Verres went in due course to
Sicily with proconsular or propraetorial authority, having the government
assigned to him for twelve months. This was usual and constitutional,
but it was not unusual, even if unconstitutional, that this period
should be prolonged. In the case of Verres it was prolonged, so that he
should hold the office for three years. He had gone through the other
offices of the State, having been Quaestor in Asia and AEdile afterward in
Rome, to the great misfortune of all who were subjected to his handling,
as we shall learn by-and-by. The facts are mentioned here to show that
the great offices of the Republic were open to such a man as Verres.
They were in fact more open to such a candidate than they would be to
one less iniquitous--to an honest man or a scrupulous one, or to one
partially honest, or not altogether unscrupulous. If you send a dog into
a wood to get truffles, you will endeavor to find one that will tear up
as many truffles as possible. A proconsular robber did not rob only for
himself; he robbed more or less for all Rome. Verres boasted that with
his three years of rule