Kitap 1
13
While this man was praetor the Sicilians enjoyed neither their own laws, nor the degrees of our senate, nor the common rights of every nation. Every one in Sicily has only so much left as either escaped the notice or was disregarded by the satiety of that most avaricious and licentious man. No legal decision for three years was given on any other ground but his will; no property was so secure to any man, even if it had descended to him from his father and grandfather, but he was deprived of it at his command; enormous sums of money were exacted from the property of the cultivators of the soil by a new and nefarious system. The most faithful of the allies were classed in the number of enemies. Roman citizens were tortured and put to death like slaves; the greatest criminals were acquitted in the courts of justice through bribery; the most upright and honourable men, being prosecuted while absent, were condemned and banished without being heard in their own defence; the most fortified harbours, the greatest and strongest cities, were laid open to pirates and robbers; The coast of Sicily being much infested by pirates, it was the custom of the praetors to fit out a fleet every year for the protection of trade. This fleet was provided by a contribution of the maritime towns, each of which usually furnished a ship, properly appointed with men and provisions; but Verres, for a sufficient bribe, often excused them from providing the ship, and always discharged as many men as were willing to pay for it. On one occasion a fleet was fitted out, and the command of it given, not to any Roman officer, but to Cleomenes, a Syracusan, who being both incapable, and also short of hands from the proceedings of Verres, was attacked in the port of Pachynus, two of his ships taken, and the rest burnt, after which the pirates sailed into the port of Syracuse, and returned back in safety; but Verres compelled all the captains of Cleomenes' fleet to sign a document testifying that this disaster had not happened through any deficiency in the equipment of their ships, which were fully provided with everything necessary, and then he put them to death. the sailors and soldiers of the Sicilians, our own allies and friends, died of hunger; the best built fleets on the most important stations were lost and destroyed, to the great disgrace of the Roman people.
