It is almost certain that, as a provincial governor, Sallust was not more unscrupulous than others of his class; but wealth such as he possessed could not have been acquired except by extortion and maladministration. As a politician, he was equally unsatisfactory: he was a mere partisan of Cæsar, and therefore, a strenuous opponent of the higher classes as supporters of Pompey; but he was not an honest champion of popular rights, nor was he capable of understanding the meaning of patriotism. If, however, we make some allowance for the political bias of Sallust, which is evident throughout his works, his histories have not only the charms of the historical romance, but are also valuable political studies. His characters are vigorously and naturally drawn, as though he not only personally knew them, but accurately understood them. The more his histories are read the more will it be discovered that he always writes with an object. He eschews the very idea of a mere dry chronicle of facts, and uses his facts as the means of enforcing a great political lesson. For this reason, like Thucydides, whom he evidently took as his model, not only in style but in the use of his materials, his speeches are his own compositions. Even when he had an opportunity, as in the case of Cæsar’s and Cato’s speeches in the “_Bellum Catilinarium_,” he contented himself with giving the substance of them, clothed it in his own language, and imbodied in them his own sentiments. According to his own statement, there is one exception to his practice in this respect. He asserts that the speech of Memmius, the tribune of the people,[946] is the very one which he delivered. If this be really the case, it is a most valuable example of the style in which a popular leader addressed his audience. But it is to be feared that this is not strictly and literally true: the style is indeed somewhat different from that of the other speeches, but does not exhibit freedom enough to assure us that he has actually reported it as delivered. It may be only a specimen of that consummate skill which constitutes the principal charm of Sallust’s manner, and made him a complete master of composition. Sallust never attempted anything more than detached portions of Roman history. “I have determined,” he says, “to write only select portions of Roman history,” (carptim perscribere.[947]) He himself gives an explanation of his motives for so doing,[948] when he complains of the manner in which this department of literature was neglected. Wherever a satisfactory account existed, he thought it unnecessary to travel over the same ground a second time.