These powers were exercised chiefly in three spheres—military, administrative, and judicial. In a province that seethed with war the summer months were spent in camp, the winter in more peaceful duties; but in a settled district the governor could map out his circuits as he pleased, and devote some time to the ungenial task of inspecting the affairs of the municipalities under his control. Apart from the necessary diplomatic intercourse with neighbouring potentates or protected chiefs, the amount of administrative work which the governor undertook was as much or as little as he pleased. Its quantity depended on his view as to how far self-government was a symptom of health or of disease. That it sometimes had the latter character is shown by the startling discovery made by Cicero when he undertook an unexpected investigation into the financial affairs of his subject states. He found that the native Greek magistrates of Cilicia had been plundering their respective treasuries for the last ten years.[1530] But the possibility of such a discovery is itself a testimony to the best aspect of provincial rule in the Republic—its noble but sometimes misguided belief in the capacity of people to govern themselves. There was, however, one systematic function to which most of the governor’s energies were directed in time of peace, and that was jurisdiction, both civil and criminal. General regulations concerning jurisdiction were made in the charters of the provinces; but these could not be the same for every country, since the judicial machinery of some groups of states was far more perfect than that of others. Sicily, the only province the details of whose _lex_ are known, was peculiarly favoured, and its privileges may be taken as the best type of those offered by Rome. It was ordained that, in a suit between two citizens of the same state, the trial should be held in that state and according to its laws,[1531] a regulation which certainly guaranteed the native _judex_ and the native code, but which did not, perhaps, inhibit an appeal to the governor or take away his right of interpreting the law. The charter then provides for cases of inter-political jurisdiction. If a Sicilian of one state sues a Sicilian of another, the governor is to provide by lot the _judex_ or _judices_,[1532] who are perhaps in this case to be Roman citizens.[1533] When litigation arises between an individual and a community not his own, the Senate of some third state should be the judge, when either litigant has challenged one of three senatorial bodies proposed.[1534] In suits between Roman citizens and Sicilians the _judex_ was to be of the nationality of the defendant.[1535] In all other matters _judices_ chosen by the magistrate (_selecti_) were to be appointed from the Roman citizens dwelling within the assize.[1536]