After giving up hope of the special commission,? he announced his candidacy for the office of pontifex maximus, resorting to the most lavish bribery, Thinking on the enormous debt which he had thus contracted, declared to his mother on he is said to have the morning of the election, as she kissed him when he was starting for the polls, that he would never return except as pontifex. And in fact he so decisively defeated two very strong competitors (for they were greatly his superiors in age and rank), that he polled more votes in their tribes than were cast for both of them in all the tribes.