Pro S. Roscio Amerino

28 CICBRO
was when you were his supporters, wlien you were conducting
his case, that Sextus Eoscius several times demanded
from liis opponents two of his father'8 slaves for tortui-e :
do you remember that Titus Eoscius refused? Why?
Where are those slaves ? They are in the retinue of
Chrysogonus, gentlemen : with him they are honoured and
valued. Even now 1 demand that they be examined, my
client entreats and beseeches it.
78. What are you doing ? Why do you refuse ? Now
be uncertain, gentlemen, if you can, by whom Sextus
Roscius was murdered, whether it was by him who through
his death now lives in the midst of poverty and conspiracies,
who is not even allowed an opportunity of making an
inquiry about his father's death, or by those who shirk an
inquiry, and retain possession of the property, and live
amidst bloodshed and by bloodshed. All the details in this
case, gentlemen, are deplorable and shameful, yet nothing
can be brought forward that is more exasperating and unfair
than this : a son cannot examine his father's slaves
about his father'8 death. Can he not be master of his own
slaves even for as long as it would take to examine them
with regard to his father's death ? I will come to this
point just a little later on : for the whole of these statements
aftect the Eoscii, about whose reckless daring I promised
I would speak, when I had dispersed the charges of Erucius.
Now, Erucius, I come to you.
79. K my client is really implicated inthis crime, I must
agree with you either that he did it with his own hand,
which you deny, or that he did it by means of certain free
men or slaves. Free meu ? When he cannot show how he
can have met with them, nor in what way he can have
persuaded them, nor where, nor through whom, nor vdth
what hope, nor for what bribe. I, on the contrary, prove
that Sextus Eoscius not only did none of those acts, but
that he could not have done so, because he had not been
in Eome for several years, and had never left his estates
without due cause. There apparently remained to you
the mention of slaves, to which you could fiy as to a haven
when driven back from your other attempts at raising suspicion,
but where you strike upon a rock so dangerous