39
That I have, therefore, done no wrong to the defendant and that the suit is not admissible under the laws one may easily determine from a consideration of these points. So, as he had not a single valid argument to advance in support of his charges, but had even incorporated false statements in his complaint, and was bringing suit regarding claims for which he had given a release, last month, men of Athens, when I was on the point of entering the court, and the court-rooms had already been allotted to the jurymen, he came up to me and surrounded me with his minions (that gang of his fellow-conspirators), and did a most outrageous thing.
40
He read me a long challenge, demanding that a slave who, he claimed, was acquainted with the facts, should be put to the torture; and that, if the facts as alleged by him were true, I should have to pay him the damages charged without adjustment by the jury; but if they were false, Mnesicles, the torturer, should determine the value of the slave. When he had received sureties to this agreement from me and I had sealed the challenge (not that I thought it fair;
