[160] 'According to the means of every town.' As the Roman gladiators
might easily be tempted to join in conspiracies, they were quartered
at a distance from Rome, in the towns of a certain class of Roman
citizens (_municipia_); and the citizens of such places were
ordered to watch over those bands of gladiators, that they might not
make their escape. _Familiae_, in its proper sense, signifies the
whole body of slaves belonging to one master.
[161] _Minores magistratus_ are those officers who did not, by virtue
of their office, become members of the senate. The quaestors,
accordingly, did not belong to them, but they comprised the masters
of the mint, the superintendents of the paving of the roads, and
especially the superintendents of all matters connected with prisons,
and the _decemviri litibus judicandis_.

31. Quibus rebus permota civitas atque immutata urbis facies erat; ex
summa laetitia atque lascivia, quae diuturna quies pepererat, repente
omnes tristitia invasit; festinare, trepidare, neque loco neque homini
cuiquam satis credere, neque bellum gerere, neque pacem habere, suo
quisque metu pericula metiri. Ad hoc mulieres, quibus[162] rei publicae
magnitudine belli timor insolitus incesserat, afflictare sese,[163] manus
supplices ad coelum tendere, miserari parvos liberos, rogitare, omnia
pavere, superbia atque deliciis omissis sibi patriaeque diffidere. At
Catilinae crudelis animus eadem illa movebat, tametsi praesidia
parabantur et ipse lege Plautia[164] interrogatus erat ab L. Paullo.
Postremo dissimulandi causa aut sui expurgandi, sicuti[165] jurgio
lacessitus foret, in senatum venit. Tum M. Tullius consul, sive
praesentiam ejus timens sive ira commotus, orationem habuit luculentam
atque utilem rei publicae, quam postea scriptam edidit.[166] Sed ubi ille
assedit,[167] Catilina, ut erat paratus ad dissimulanda omnia, demisso
vultu, voce supplici postulare, 'Patres conscripti ne quid de se temere