the plebs. XT. As chance would have it, Cnaeus Trebomus was tribune of the plebs that year, and he came forward as a champion ofthe Trebonian Law, as a duty apparently to his family and thename he bore. He declared in excited tones that the positionwhich the senate had assailed, though they had been repulsedin their first attack, had been at last carried by the consulartribunes. The Trebonian Law had been set aside and the tribunes of the plebs had not been elected by the vote of the pe州e, but co-opted at the command of the pat10叫tins;matters liad now come to this bass. that thev must have ether jDatricnans 二X.‘--.-.‘.一， or the.n. w卿gers-on to patricians as势bunes of毕e plebs. The Sacred。 laws were being wrested. ..trom them, the power终C1 authority. oar their tribunes was being. torn. away.。 This,.he contended, was done through the craft and cunning of the patricians and戮ous villainy of his colleagues.The flame of popular indignation was now beginning toscorch not only the senate,, but even the tribunes of the plebs,co-opted and co-opters alike, when three members of thet 'bunitian college-P;} Curatius, M. Metilius, and M. A2inucius--trembling for 本L h e r 0W，n safety, instituted proceedings against Sergius and Ver ginrus, the consular tribunes of the preceding year. .or their trial they diverted from themselves。 They reminded the people， that those who had felt the burden ofv 7 . 1 7 ^I I" 1 . the levy, the war-tax, and the long duration of the， war, those"Y Y 7 P 7 "ti' Y . . . 1 who were distressed at the defeat sustained at v eiz, those whose homes were in mourning for the loss of children, brothers, and reiazaons, .nau every wit;}risit upon two guilty heapthe whole State. The nrested on Sergius and Vproved by the prosecutorwhilst both were guilty,Verginius denouncing thtreachery of Verginius. }推邢娜 Judgment少d already. been passed upon,1 F户e accused.by the senate, the Roman people, and their own colleagues, for it was a vote of the senate which remove叹them from office, it was their own colleagues who upon their refusal to resign, compelled themw +.+.+. w 41 old .-Vti to do so by the threat of a Dictator, whilst it was the people who had elected consular tribunes to enter upon office, not on the usual day, December‘3, but immediately after their election, on October x，for the republic could no longer be safe if these men remained in office. And yet, shattered as they were by so many adverse verdicts, and condemned beforehand, Were p resenting themselves for trial, and fancying that they had Purged t粤eir夕n弓那e and，sure移a an. adequate punrstxment because they had been relegated to private rite two months before the time. They did not understand that this was not the infliction of a penalty, but simply the depriving them. O勺 .沛从0 power to do further mischief, since their colleagues also had resign, and they, at all events, had committed no offence. The tribunes continued: " Recall the feelings, Quirites, with whichyou heard of the disaster which we sustained and watched thearmy staggering through the gates, panic-stricken fugitives,covered with wounds, accusing not Fortune or any of thegods, but these generals of theirs. We are confident that thereis not a man in this Assembly who did not on that day call downcurses on the persons and homes and fortunes of X.,. Verginiusand Manius "ergius. It would be utterly inconsistent for younot to use your power, when; it is your right and duty to do so,against the men on whom each of you has called down the wrathof heaven.