20.4
Marcus Cato, who tried to delay proceedings,By making a speech of several hours duration; Gell. 4. 10. 8.The senate arose in a body and escorted Cato to prison, and Caesar was forced to release him. was dragged from the House by a lictor at Caesar’s command and taken off to prison. When Lucius Lucullus was somewhat too outspoken in his opposition,he filled him with such fear of malicious prosecution, For his conduct during the war with Mithridates. that Lucullus actually fell on his knees before him. Because Cicero, while pleading in court, deplored the state of the times, Caesar transferred the orator’s enemy Publius Clodius that very same day from the patricians to the plebeians, a thing for which Clodius had for a long time been vainly striving; and that too at the ninth hour.That is, after the close of the business day, an indication of the haste with which the adoption was rushed through.
20.5
Finally taking action against all the opposition in a body, he bribed an informer to declare that he had been egged on by certain men to murder Pompey, and to come out upon the rostra and name the guilty parties according to a prearranged plot. But when the informer had named one or two to no purpose and not without suspicion of double-dealing, Caesar, hopeless of the success of his over-hasty attempt, is supposed to have had him taken off by poison.