communicato parabant in Capitolio Kalendis Januariis L. Cottam et L.
Torquatum consules[107] interficere, ipsi fascibus correptis Pisonem cum
exercitu ad obtinendas duas Hispanias[108] mittere. Ea re cognita, rursus
in Nonas Februarias consilium caedis transtulerant. Jam tum non
consulibus modo, sed plerisque senatoribus perniciem machinabantur.
Quodni[109] Catilina maturasset pro curia signum sociis dare, eo die post
conditam urbem Romam pessimum facinus patratum foret. Quia nondum
frequentes armati convenerant, ea res consilium diremit.

[100] _Antea_. Sallust, who has commenced speaking of the conspiracy
entered into in the year B. C. 64, considers it necessary, before
relating its progress, to go back to an earlier conspiracy, which
failed, and in which Catiline had likewise taken an active part. This
earlier conspiracy the author relates in chaps. 19 and 20.
[101] _Qua_; supply _conjuratione_, which is to be taken from the verb
_conjuravere_. This is an irregularity arising from the desire to be
brief and concise.
[102] That is, in the year B. C. 66, or 688 after the building of the
city.
[103] _Interrogati_--that is, _accusati_, 'taken to account by accusers,'
because the beginning of all such accusations consisted in the
accused being asked whether they owned having done this or that thing
forbidden by law.
[104] _Post paulo_ is less common than _paulo post_.
[105] _Repetundarum reus_, 'accused of extortion.' _Res repetundae_, in
legal phraseology, signifies the things or money which had been
illegally taken by public officers from those subject to their
authority; for such citizens or subjects had a right, after the
expiration of the official year of their ruler, to reclaim
(_repetere_) their property in a court of law. Those officers who