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CHAPTER IV.

Increase of the Power of the Tribunes-They convoke an Assembly of the People-Coriolanus-Disputes on the Agrarian Law-Law of Volero-and change produced by it.

THE disorders which we have seen allayed by the creation of the tribunes of the people, were only quieted for a very short space of time. We shall see them immediately renewed, and continued, with very little interruption, till the people acquired an equal title with the patricians to all the offices and dignities of the commonwealth. Thus, for a period of almost two centuries, the history of Rome, during every succeeding year, presents almost the same scenes; an endless reiteration of complaints, on account of the same or similar grievances; opposed by the same spirit, resisted by similar arguments, and usually terminating in the same way, to the increase of the popular power. As our object is to give rather a just idea of the character and spirit of nations, than a scrupulous detail, or minute chronicle of events, we shall, in that period, touch only on such circumstances as, while they are illustrative of the genius of the people, are necessary to form a connected chain of the principal events which had their influence on the revolutions and fate of this Republic.

The first tribunes of the people were created

260 years after the foundation of Rome, and seventeen years after the abolition of the regal government. These magistrates were habited like simple citizens; they had no exterior ensigns of power; they had neither tribunal nor jurisdiction as judges; they had no guards nor attendants, unless a single domestic termed Viator or Apparitor. They stood without the senate-house, nor durst they enter it unless they were called in by the consuls: but possessing, as we have said, the power of suspending or annulling, by a single veto, the most solemn decrees of that body, their influence and authority were very great.

Every thing, for a little while, wore an appearance of tranquillity. The senators blindly applauded themselves on the success of their negociation, as they saw the people pleased, and could see nothing to fear from those rude and simple magistrates, who had not even the outward symbols of power. But this delusion was of short continuance.

It was in the beginning of spring, that the people had retreated to the Mons Sacer; at a time when it was customary to plough and sow the fields of the republic. As the lands had lain neglected during those commotions, it was not surprising that the following harvest should be a season of great scarcity. This, perhaps, the senate, by proper precautions, might have prevented. The tribunes accused that body of negligence, and of a design to raise a famine among the people, while the patricians, as they insinuated, had taken care of themselves, by laying in abundant supplies.

the senate.

The consuls assembled the people, and attempted to justify the senate; but being constantly interrupted by the tribunes, they could not make themselves be heard. They urged, that the tribunes having only the liberty of opposing, ought to be silent till a resolution was formed. The tribunes, on the other hand, contended that they had the same privileges in an assembly of the people, that the consuls had in a meeting of The dispute was running high, when one of the consuls rashly said, that if the tribunes had convoked the assembly, they, instead of interrupting them, would not even have taken the trouble of coming there; but that the consuls having called this assembly, they ought not to be interrupted. This imprudent speech was an acknowledgment of a power in the tribunes to convoke the public assemblies; a power which they themselves had never dreamt of. It may be believed they were not remiss in laying hold of the concession. They took the whole people to witness what had been said by the consuls, and an assembly of the people was summoned, by the tribunes, to meet the next day*.

The whole people assembled by daybreak. Icilius, one of the tribunes, urged that, in order that they might be in a capacity of effectually fulfilling their duty, in protecting and vindicating the rights of the people, they should have the power, not only of calling them together, but of haranguing them without being subject to any interruption. The people were unanimously of this opinion; and a

*Dion. Hal. 1. c. Liv. lib.ii. Plutarch in Coriol.

law to that purpose was instantly passed by general acclamation. The consuls would have rejected this law, on the score of the assembly's being held against all the established forms :—it had not been legally summoned, and there had been no consultation of the auspices; but the tribunes declared that they would pay no more regard to the decrees of the senate, than the consuls and the senate should pay to those of the people. The senate was forced to yield, and the new law was ratified by the consent of both orders. Thus there were now established in the republic two separate legislative powers, which maintained a constant opposition to each other.

There was but one method by which the senate might, perhaps, have recovered their power. This was, by exercising their authority with such moderation, and so much regard to the interests of the people, as to render the functions of the tribunes superfluous. But this was a difficult part to act. Being once supreme, they could not stoop to an abasement of power, and inflexibly struggling to maintain a prerogative which they wanted real strength to vindicate, they prepared for themselves only a greater humiliation.

One of the most violent of the senators was Caius Marcius, surnamed Coriolanus from a successful campaign he had made against the Volsci, in which he had taken Corioli, one of their principal towns. Coriolanus had aspired to the consulate, but the people fearing his high and arrogant spirit, had excluded him from that dignity. Incensed at this disappointment, he took every opportunity of expressing his resentment; and in

particular, declared openly in the senate, that the necessities of the people, occasioned by the present famine, furnished an opportunity which ought not to be neglected, of compelling them to relinquish all pretensions to authority, and to abolish their new magistrates.

The people, exasperated beyond measure, vowed vengeance against Coriolanus, and they summoned him to appear before them, and answer for his conduct. He refused, and the Ædiles had orders to arrest him, but were repulsed in the attempt by his partisans among the patricians. In a tumultuous assembly of the people, one of the tribunes proceeded, with a daring stretch of authority, to pronounce Coriolanus guilty of treason, and award a capital punishment: but the people themselves were sensible that this was going too far; they repealed this precipitate sentence; allowed him twenty-seven days to prepare his defence, and summoned him to appear before their assembly after the lapse of that term.

During this interval the consuls and the chief senators, who saw the dangerous consequences of violent measures, endeavoured, by persuasion, to operate a good understanding between the orders. They laboured to convince the tribunes that it had hitherto been the constant practice, and agreeable to the constitution of the republic, that every public measure should originate by a motion in the senate, and that till this body had given a decree no business of state could be agitated in the assembly of the people. The tribunes did not acquiesce in these propositions: they contended that the authority of the people was