[79] Assassins--_Parricidae_. "Not only he who had killed his father was called a _parricide_, but he who had killed any man; as is evident from a law of Numa Pompilius: If any one unlawfully and knowingly bring a free man to death, let him be _a parricide_." _Festus_ sub voce _Parrici_. [80] Than from any evidence of the fact--_Quam quod cuiquam id compertum foret_. [81] XV. With a virgin of noble birth--_Cum virgine nobili_. Who this was is not known. The name may have been suppressed from respect to her family. If what is found in a fragment of Cicero be true, Catiline had an illicit connection with some female, and afterward married the daughter who was the fruit of the connection: _Ex eodem stupro et uxorem et filiam invenisti_; Orat. in Tog. Cand. (Oration xvi., Ernesti's edit.) On which words Asconius Pedianus makes this comment: "Dicitur Catilinam adulterium commisisse cum ea quae ci postea socrus fuit, et ex eo stupro duxisse uxorem, cum filia ejus esset. Haec Lucceius quoque Catilinae objecit in orationibus, quas in eum scripsit. Nomina harum mulierum nondum inveni." Plutarch, too (Life of Cicero, c. 10), says that Catiline was accused of having corrupted his own daughter. [82] With a priestess of Vesta--_Cum sacerdote Vestae_. This priestess of Vesta was Fabia Terentia, sister to Terentia, Cicero's wife, whom Sallust, after she was divorced by Cicero, married. Clodius accused her, but she was acquitted, either because she was thought innocent, or because the interest of Catulus and others, who exerted themselves in her favor, procured her acquittal. See Orosius, vi. 3; the Oration of Cicero, quoted in the preceding note; and Asconius's commentary on it. [83] Aurelia Orestilla--See c. 35. She was the sister or daughter, as De Brosses thinks, of Cneius Aurelius Orestis, who had been praetor, A.U.C. 677. [84] A grown-up step-son--_Privignum adulta aetate_. A son of Catiline's by a former marriage. [85] Desolate his tortured spirit--_Mentem exciteam vastabat_. "Conscience desolates the mind, when it deprives it of its proper power and tranquillity, and introduces into it perpetual disquietude." _Cortius_. Many editions have _vexabat_. [86] XVI. He furnished false witnesses, etc. _Testis signatoresque falsos commodare_. "If any one wanted any such character, Catiline was ready to supply him from among his troop."_Bernouf_. [87] Inoffensive persons, etc.--_Insontes, sicuti sontes._ Most translators have rendered these words "innocent" and "guilty," terms which suggest nothing satisfactory to the English reader. The _insontes_ are those who had given Catiline no cause of offens; the _sontes_ those who had in some way incurred his displeasure, or become objects of his rapacity.