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A questor in ancient Rome was a receiver of taxes. A pre'tor was a sort of judge. Vĕr'rēs, against whom Cicero here utters his eloquent indignation, was questor over Sicily, B. C. 82. He was so rapacious that no class of citizens were exempt from his extortions. He accumulated an immense fortune, but was finally brought to trial, and Cicero conducted the prosecution. Verres, seeing that the case was going against him, escaped to Marseilles.

See in Index, OFFENSE or OFFENCE, CICERO. The members of the Senate of ancient Rome were called Patres Conscripti, or Conscript Fathers.

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1. AN opinion has long prevailed, Fathers, that, in public prosecutions, men of wealth, however clearly convicted, are always safe. This opinion, so injurious to your order, so detrimental to the state, it is now in your power to refute. A man is on trial before you who is rich, and who hopes his riches will secure his acquittal; but whose life and actions are his sufficient condemnation in the eyes of all candid men. I speak of Ca'ius Verres, who, if he now receives not the sentence his crimes deserve, it shall not be through lack of a criminal, nor of a prosecutor; but through the failure of the ministers of justice to do their duty.

2. Passing over the shameful irregularities of his youth, what does the questorship of Verres exhibit but one continued scene of villainies? The public treasure squandered, a Consul stripped and betrayed, an army deserted and reduced to want, a province robbed, the civil and religious rights of a people trampled on! But his pretorship in Sicily has crowned his career of wickedness, and completed the lasting monument of his infamy. His decisions have violated all law, all precedent, all right.

3. His extortions from the industrious poor have been beyond computation. Our most faithful allies' have been treated as enemies. Roman citizens have,

like slaves, been put to death with tortures. Men the most worthy have been condemned and banished without a hearing, while the most atrocious criminals have, with money, purchased exemption from the punishment due to their guilt.

4. I ask now, Verres, what have you to advance against these charges? Art thou not the tyrant prētor, who, at no greater distance than Sicily, within sight of the Italian coast, dared to put to an infamous death, on the cross, that ill-fated and innocent citizen, Publius Ga'vius Cosa'nus? And what was his offense? He had declared his intention of appealing to the justice of his country against your brutal persecutions! For this, when about to embark for home, he was seized, brought before you, charged with being a spy, scourged and tortured.

5. In vain did he exclaim: "I am a Roman citizen! I have served under Lucius Pre'tius, who is now at Panor'mus, and who will attest my innocence!" Deaf to all remonstrance, remorseless, thirsting for innocent blood, you ordered the savage punishment to be inflicted! While the sacred words, "I am a Roman citizen," were on his lips, words which, in the remotest regions, are a passport to protection, ordered him to death, to a death upon the cross!

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6. O liberty! O sound once delightful to every Roman ear! O sacred privilege of Roman citizenship! once sacred, now trampled on! Is it come to this? Shall an inferior magistrate, a governor, who holds his whole power from the Roman People, in a Roman province, within sight of Italy, bind, scourge, torture, and put to an infamous death, a Roman citizen?

7. Shall neither the cries of innocence, expiring in agony, the tears of pitying spectators, the majesty of the Roman com'monwealth, nor the fear of the justice of his country, restrain the merciless monster, who, in the confidence of his riches, strikes at the very root

of liberty, and sets mankind at defiance? And shall this man escape? Fathers, it must not be! It must not be, unless you would undermine the very foundations of social safety, strangle justice, and call down anarchy, massacre, and ruin, on the commonwealth!

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The incident here commemorated in enduring verse took place during the Crimean war, at the battle of Balaklava, October 25, 1854. A brigade of light-horse, under Captain Nolan, attached to the English army, charged on a Russian battery, and returned from the attack with only 150 men left out af 630. The charge was said to have been ordered under a mistake; but this has been disputed. That it was a desperate affair, the result proved. Heed the imitative measure of the first two lines. It is suggestive of the regular gallop of cavalry.

See in Index, HUNDRED, SABRE or SABER, TENNYSON.

I.

HALF a league, half a league,

Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns!" he said:
Into the valley of Death

Rode the six hundred.

II.

"Forward, the Light Brigade !"
Was there a man dismayed?
Not though the soldiers knew

Some one had blundered!
Theirs not to make reply,

Theirs not to reason why,

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VI.

When can their glory fade?
O, the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light Brigade,

Noble six hundred!

CXXXIII.

RETURN OF BRITISH FUGITIVES.

PATRICK HENRY.

The following remarks were made in 1782 when there was a question before the Virginia legislature of opposing the return of those refugees who had sided with the British government in our war of independence.

See in Index, EQUALED or EQUALLED, OFFENSE or OFFENCE, HENRY. Delivery. The style is somewhat declamatory, requiring considerable animation in the delivery, especially at the close.

1. I VENTURE to prophesy there are those now living who will see this favored land amongst the most powerful on earth,-able, sir, to take care of herself, without resorting to that policy, which is always so dangerous, though sometimes unavoidable, of calling in foreign aid. Yes, they will see her great in arts and in arms,— her golden harvests waving over fields of immeasurable extent, her commerce penetrating the most distant seas, and her cannon silencing the vain boasts of those who now proudly affect to rule the waves. But, sir, you must have men,-you cannot get along without them.

2. Those heavy forests of valuable timber, under which your lands are groaning, must be cleared away. Those vast riches which cover the face of your soil, as well as those which lie hid in its bosom, are to be developed and gathered only by the skill and enterprise Your timber must be worked up into ships,

of men.

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