young ward the son of C. Gallus Sulpicius his deceased friend, whose
orphan state and piercing cries, which were the more regarded for the sake
of his illustrious father, excited their pity in a wonderful manner;--and
thus (as Cato informs us in his History) he escaped the flames which would
otherwise have consumed him, by employing the children to move the
compassion of the people. I likewise find (what may be easily judged from
his Orations still extant) that his prosecutor Libo was a man of some
Eloquence."

As I concluded these remarks with a short pause;--"What can be the
reason," said Brutus, "if there was so much merit in the Oratory of Galba,
that there is no trace of it to be seen in his Orations;--a circumstance
which I have no opportunity to be surprized at in others, who have left
nothing behind them in writing."--"The reasons," said I, "why some have
not wrote any thing, and others not so well as they spoke, are very
different. Some of our Orators have writ nothing through mere indolence,
and because they were loath to add a private fatigue to a public one: for
most of the Orations we are now possessed of were written not before they
were spoken, but some time afterwards. Others did not choose the trouble
of improving themselves; to which nothing more contributes than frequent
writing; and as to perpetuating the fame of their Eloquence, they thought
it unnecessary; supposing that their eminence in that respect was
sufficiently established already, and that it would be rather diminished
than increased by submitting any written specimen of it to the arbitrary
test of criticism. Some also were sensible that they spoke much better
than they were able to write; which is generally the case of those who
have a great genius, but little learning, such as Servius Galba. When he
spoke, he was perhaps so much animated by the force of his abilities, and
the natural warmth and impetuosity of his temper, that his language was
rapid, bold, and striking; but afterwards, when he took up the pen in his