[12]
See how I am descending, O judges, how far I seem
to be departing from my ordinary habits, from my usual caution and diligence. Let one set of
accounts be produced, in which there is any trace whatever which gives the least hint of money
having been given to Fonteius; let them produce out of the whole body of traders, of
colonists, of publicans, of agriculturists, of graziers, but one witness, and I will allow
that this accusation is true. O ye immortal gods! what sort of a cause is this? what sort of a
defence? Marcus Fonteius was governor of the province of Gaul, which consists of those tribes of men and of cities, some of whom (to say
nothing of old times) have in the memory of the present generation carried on bitter and
protracted wars with the Roman people; some have been lately subdued by our generals, lately
conquered in war, lately made remarkable by the triumphs which we have celebrated over them,
and the monuments which we have erected, and lately mulcted, by the senate, of their lands and
cities: some, too, who have fought in battle against Marcus Fonteius himself, have by his toil
and labour been reduced under the power and dominion of the Roman people.
This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.