At the expiration of his praetorship he obtained by lot the Farther-Spain, 1 and pacified his creditors, who were for detaining him, by finding sureties for his debts. 2 Contrary, however, to both law and custom, he took his departure before the usual equipage and outfit were prepared. It is uncertain whether this precipitancy arose from the apprehension of an impeachment, with which he was threatened on the expiration of his former office, or from his anxiety to lose no time in relieving the allies, who implored him to come to their aid. He had no sooner established tranquillity in the province, than, without waiting for the arrival of his successor, he returned to Rome, with equal haste, to sue for a triumph, 3 and the consulship. The day of election, however, being already fixed by proclamation, he could not legally be admitted a candidate, unless he entered the city as a private person.4 On this emergency he solicited a suspension of the laws in his favour; but such an indulgence being strongly opposed, he found himself under the necessity of abandoning all thoughts of a triumph, lest he should be disappointed of the consulship.
1 See before, p. 6. This was in A. u. c. 693.
2 Plutarch informs us, that Caesar, before he came into office, owed his creditors 1,300 talents, somewhat more than .565,ooo sterling. But his debts increased so much after this period, if we may believe Appian, that upon his departure for Spain, at the expiration of his praetorship, he is reported to have said, “Bis millies et quingenties centena millia sibi adesse aportere, ut nihil haberet”: i. e. That he was 2,000,000 and nearly 20,000 sesterces worse than penniless. Crassus became his security for 830 talents, about £871,500.
3 For his victories in Gallicia and Lusitania, having led his army to the shores of the ocean, which had not before been reduced to submission.
4 Caesar was placed in this dilemma, that if he aspired to a triumph, he must remain outside the walls until it took place, while as a candidate for the consulship, he must be resident in the city.
Suetonius: The Lives of the Twelve Caesars; An English Translation, Augmented with the Biographies of Contemporary Statesmen, Orators, Poets, and Other Associates. Suetonius. Publishing Editor. J. Eugene Reed. Alexander Thomson. Philadelphia. Gebbie & Co. 1889.
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