ommons as being idle; the tribunes of the
commons complained sometimes of the fraud, at other times of the
negligence of the consuls. At length the commons prevailed, without
opposition on the part of the senate, that Lucius Minutius should be
appointed president of the market; doomed to be more successful in that
office in preserving liberty than in the discharge of his own peculiar
province: although in the end he bore away the well-earned gratitude of
the people as well as the glory of having lowered the price of
provisions. When he had made but slight advance in relieving the markets
by sending embassies around the neighbouring states by land and sea to
no purpose, except that an inconsiderable quantity of corn was imported
from Etruria, and applying himself to the careful dispensations of their
scanty stock, by obliging persons to show their supply, and to sell
whatever was over and above a month's provision, and by depriving the
slaves of one half of their daily allowance; then by censuring and
holding up to the resentment of the people the corn-hoarders, he rather
discovered the great scarcity of grain than relieved it by this rigorous
inquisition. Many of the commons, all hope being lost, rather than be
tortured by dragging out existence, muffled up their heads and
precipitated themselves into the Tiber.

13. Then Spurius Maelius, of the equestrian order, extremely rich
considering these times, set about a project useful in itself, but
having a most pernicious tendency, and a still more pernicious motive.
For having, by the assistance of his friends and clients, bought up corn
from Etruria at his private expense, (which very circumstance, I think,
had been an impediment in the endeavour to reduce the price of corn by
the exertions of the state,) he set about giving out largesses of corn:
and having won over the commons by this munificence, he drew them with
him wherever he went, conspicuous and consequential beyond the rank of a
private citizen, insuring to him as undoubted the consulship by the
favour (they manifested towards him) and the hopes (they excited in
him.) He himself, as the mind of man is not to be satiated with that
which fortune holds out the hope of, began to aspire to things still
higher, and altogether unwarrantable; and since even the consulship
would have to be taken from the patricians against their will, he began
to set his mind on kingly power;--that that would be the only prize
worthy of