law that he must not be absent more than ten days from Rome during his year of office[922] made him more of a distinctly civic official. The powers of the praetors, taken in their natural order, may be divided into (i.) their general administrative duties at Rome, and (ii.) the duties of their special departments. In the first of these spheres they acted in virtue of their own _imperium_ but _vice_ the consuls, and generally, therefore, when the consuls were absent from the city. If they acted when the consul was present, it was by authority of the Senate, and legally the consuls might prohibit this action.[923] Such an injunction by the Senate was a constitutional mode of coercing the consuls into doing their duty. In this way the praetors might summon the Senate,[924] propose a _rogatio_,[925] hold the levy,[926] and exercise criminal jurisdiction delegated by the people.[927] Usually, however, such duties were performed by them only in the absence of the consuls, and the _praetor urbanus_ generally took the lead,[928] although the summons of the Senate by both home praetors, and even by a provincial praetor, was not unknown.[929] The special functions of the praetors were always assigned by lot (_sortitio_). During the period when some of the praetors governed provinces, a regular sortition took the form of an assignment of the two urban _provinciae_ to two, and of the foreign provinces to two and afterwards to four members of the college.[930] But in the third and early part of the second centuries, before prorogation of command became the normal principle, and when Rome had few magistrates with _imperium_ at her disposal, this regular sortition could not always be observed. Sometimes the two urban praetorships were combined,[931] or the _praetor peregrinus_ might be given an Italian command, such as Cisalpine Gaul.[932] In this way a praetor could be spared for the command of the fleet or in Gaul (at Ariminum). This disturbance of the _sortitio_ and the appointment of a praetor _extra ordinem_[933] were naturally the work of the Senate. After Sulla the two civil and six of the criminal courts were assigned to the eight praetors by lot.