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Hortensius, the great advocate of the day, was not only engaged on behalf of Verres, but he was already chosen as Consul for the next year. Metellus, who was elected Prætor for the next year, was hot in defence of Verres. Indeed, there were three Metelluses among the friends of the accused, who had also on his side the Scipio of the day.
In the September following an old gentleman named Sextus Roscius was murdered in the streets of Rome as he was going home from supper one night, attended by two slaves. By whom he was murdered, probably more than one or two knew then, but nobody knows now. He was a man of reputation, well acquainted with the Metelluses and Messalas of the day, and passing rich.
If courtesy to Cæsar, if provinces given up here and there to Antonys and Metelluses, if flattery lavished on Pompey could avail anything, he could not afford to dispense with such aids. It all availed nothing. From this time forward, for the twenty years which were to run before his death, his life was one always of trouble and doubt, often of despair, and on many occasions of actual misery.
He is always nicknaming Pompey, who during his Eastern campaign had taken Jerusalem, and who now parodies the Africanus, the Asiaticus, and the Macedonicus of the Scipios and Metelluses. "If that Hierosolymarian candidate for popularity does not keep his word with me, I shall be delighted.
In this way the trial would be thrown over into the next year, when Hortensius and one Metellus would be Consuls, and another Metellus would be the Prætor, controlling the judgment-seats. Glabrio was the Prætor for this present year. In Glabrio Cicero could put some trust. With Hortensius and the two Metelluses in power, Verres would be as good as acquitted.
"We have murdered the man and taken his money under the false plea that his goods had been confiscated. Friends, we find, are interfering these Metellas and Metelluses, probably. There is a son who is the natural heir. Let us say that he killed his own father.
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