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The trial had not been long concluded when Cæsar was assassinated, and Sallust, being thus deprived of his patron, seems to have withdrawn entirely from public life. He purchased a large tract of ground on the Quirinal hill, where he erected a splendid mansion, and laid out those magnificent gardens of which so much has been related. Their extent must have been vast, if De Brosses, who visited the spot in 1739, obtained any just notion of it.De Brosses, Œuv. de Sall., vol. iii., p. 363. But some have thought them much smaller. He had also a country-house at Tibur, which had belonged to Julius Cæsar.Pseudo-Cic., c. 7.
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It was during this period of retirement, as is supposed, that he married Terentia, the divorced wife of Cicero, if, indeed, he married her at all; for their union rests on no very strong testimony.Hieronym. adv. Jovin., i. 48. Gerlach, vol. ii., p. 8. De Brosses, tom. iii. p. 355. Le Clerc, Vit. Sall.
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It was at this time, too, it would appear, that he commenced the composition of history, with a view to the perpetuation of his name; for he entered on it, lie says, when his mind was free from "hope, fear, or political partisanship;"Cat., c. 4. and to no other time of his life are such expressions applicable. Dion seems to have supposed that he appeared as a historian before he went to Numidia, but is in all probability mistaken.