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[33] Since Antony and Cassius, who succeeded Curio as tribunes, agreed with the latter in opinion, the Senate became more bitter than ever and declared Pompey's army the protector of Rome, and that of Cæsar a public enemy. The consuls, Marcellus and Lentulus, ordered Antony and his friends out of the Senate lest they should suffer some harm, although they were tribunes. Then Antony sprang from his chair in anger and with a loud voice called gods and men to witness the indignity put upon the sacred and inviolable office of tribune, saying that while they (the tribunes) were expressing the opinion which they deemed conducive to the public interest, they were driven out with contumely though they had wrought no murder or other outrage. Having spoken thus he rushed out like one possessed, predicting war, slaughter, proscription, banishment, confiscation, and various other impending evils, and invoking direful curses on the authors of them. Curio and Cassius rushed out with him, for a detachment of Pompey's army was already observed standing around the senate-house. The tribunes made their way to Cæsar the next night with the utmost speed, concealing themselves in a hired carriage, and disguised as slaves. Cæsar showed them in this condition to his army, whom he excited by saying that his soldiers, after all their great deeds, had been stigmatized as public enemies and that distinguished men like these, who had dared to speak out for them, had been thus driven with ignominy from the city.1

1 This speech is reported by Cæsar himself at considerable length in his Commentaries on the Civil War (i. 7). It was made to the thirteenth legion, the only one present. The soldiers cried out that they were ready to defend their general and the tribunes from all harm.

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