the exhibition was a contest for favour, that reputations were being won
or lost on the merits of the show, and that the successful competitor
was laying up a store-house of gratitude which would materially aid his
ascent to the highest prizes in the State. The personal cost, if it
could not be wholly realised on the existing patrimony of the
magistrate, must be assisted by gifts from friends, by loans from
money-lenders at exorbitant rates of interest and, worst but readiest of
all methods, by contributions, nominally voluntary but really enforced,
from the Italian allies and the provincials. As early as the year 180
the senate had been forced to frame a strong resolution against the
extravagance that implied oppression;[60] but the resolution was really
a criticism of the new methods of government; the roots of the evil (the
burden on the magistracy, the increase in the number of the regularly
recurring festivals) they neither cared nor ventured to remove. The
aedileship was the particular magistracy which was saddled with this
expenditure on account of its traditional connection with the conduct of
the public games; and although it was neither in its curule nor plebeian
form an obligatory step in the scale of the magistracies, yet, as it was
held before the praetorship and the consulship, it was manifest that the
brilliant display given to the people by the occupant of this office
might render fruitless the efforts of a less wealthy competitor who had
shunned its burdens.[61] The games were given jointly by the respective
pairs of colleagues,[62] the _Ludi Romani_ being under the guidance of
the curule,[63] the _Ludi Plebeii_ under that of the plebeian
aediles.[64] Had these remained the only annual shows, the cost to the
exhibitor, although great, would have been limited, But other festivals,
which had once been occasional, had lately been made permanent. The
games to Ceres (_Cerialia_), the remote origins of which may have dated
back to the time of the monarchy, first appear as fully established in
the year 202;[65] the festival to Flora (_Floralia_) dates from but 238