V. We are astonished to see personages such as Pompey and Cæsar protecting men who seem to have borne such bad character as Gabinius; but, to judge with impartiality the men of that period, we must not forget, in the first place, that there were very few without blemish, and, further, that the political parties never hesitated in throwing upon their adversaries the most odious calumnies. Gabinius, belonging to the popular faction, and the partisan of Pompey, had incurred the hatred of the aristocracy and of the farmers of the revenues. The nobles never pardoned him for being the author of the law which had entrusted to Pompey the command of the expedition against the pirates, and for having shown, during his proconsulship in Syria, want of deference in regard to the Senate. So that assembly refused, in 698, to order thanksgivings for his victories.[691] The farmers of the revenues bore ill-will towards him on account of his decrees against usury,[692] and his solicitude for the interests of his province.[693] This proconsul, who is represented as an adventurer pillaging those under his administration, appears to have governed Judæa with justice, and to have restored with skill, on his return from Egypt, the order which had been disturbed during his absence. His military capacity cannot be called in doubt. In speaking of him, the historian Josephus closes with these words his account of the battle against the Nabathæi: “This great captain, after so many exploits, returned to Rome, and Crassus succeeded him in the government of Syria.”[694] Nevertheless, it is very probable that Gabinius was not more scrupulous than the other proconsuls in matter of probity; for, if corruption then displayed itself with impudence in the provinces, it was perhaps still more shameless in Rome. The following is a striking example. Two candidates for the consulship, Domitius Calvinus and Memmius Gemellus, united their clients and resources of all kinds to obtain the first magistracy. In their desire to procure the support of Ahenobarbus and Claudius Pulcher, the consuls in office, they engaged by writing to secure for them, on their quitting office, the provinces they desired, and that by a double fraud: they promised first to bring three augurs to affirm the existence of a supposititious curiate law, and then to find two consulars who would declare that they had assisted at the regulation relative to the distribution of the provinces; in case of non-performance, there was stipulated, for the profit of the consuls, 400,000 sestertii.[695] This shameless traffic and others of the same kind, in which were compromised Æmilius Scaurus and Valerius Messala, had caused the interest of money to be doubled.[696] The bargain would probably have been carried out, if, in consequence of a quarrel between the two consuls, Memmius had not denounced the convention in full Senate, and produced the contract. The scandal was enormous, but it