Nobody ventured to oppose them; or, in case any one did, he became himself "hallowed." If, however, persons were condemned not by all the tribunes, they would call to their help those who had not concurred in the verdict, and so they went duly through the forms of court procedure before the tribunes themselves or before some arbiters or before the populace, and became the possession of the side that won. In the course of time the number of the tribunes was fixed at ten, [Sidenote: FRAG. 16^7] AND AS A RESULT OF THIS MOST OF THEIR POWER WAS OVERTHROWN. FOR AS THOUGH BY NATURE (BUT REALLY, OF COURSE, BY REASON OF JEALOUSY) FELLOW OFFICIALS INVARIABLY QUARREL; AND IT IS DIFFICULT FOR A NUMBER OF MEN, ESPECIALLY IN A POSITION OF INFLUENCE, TO ATTAIN HARMONY. No sooner did outsiders, planning to wreck their influence, raise factional issues to the end that dissension might make them weaker, than the tribunes actually attached themselves some to one party, some to another. [Sidenote: FRAG. 16^7] IF EVEN ONE OF THEM OPPOSED A MEASURE, he rendered the decisions of the rest null and void. Now at first they did not enter the senate-house, but sitting at the entrance watched proceedings, and in case aught failed to please them, they would show resistance. Next they were invited inside. Later, however, the ex-tribunes were numbered with the senators, and finally some of the senators actually were permitted to be tribunes, unless a man chanced to be a patrician. Patricians the people would not accept: having chosen the tribunes to defend them against the patricians, and having advanced them to so great power, they dreaded lest one of them might turn his strength to contrary purposes and use it against them. But if a man abjured the rank given him by birth and changed his social standing to that of a common citizen, they received him gladly. Many of the patricians whose position was unquestioned renounced their nobility through desire for the immense influence possible, and so became tribunes. Such was the growth of the domination of the tribunes. In addition to them the people chose two aediles, to be their assistants in the matter of documents. They took charge of everything that was submitted in writing to the plebs, to the populace, and to the senate, and kept it, so that nothing that was done escaped their notice. This and the trying of cases were the objects for which they were chosen anciently, but later they were charged with the supervision of buying and selling, whence they came to be called _agoranomoi_ ("clerks of the market") by those who put their name into Greek. _(BOOK 5, BOISSEVAIN.)_