Appreciating the great possibilities of the tribunate, the patricians attempted to fill the college with men of their own rank. If we are to trust our authorities, an effort was made in that direction immediately after the fall of the decemvirs, when it was agreed that the pontifex maximus should preside over the tribal comitia for the election of the first tribunes of the plebs under the restored constitution.[1720] Among the men chosen were some so closely attached to patrician interests that at the end of the year they secured the election of successors who coöpted into the college two patricians of consular rank.[1721] At this crisis there was great danger that the college of tribunes might become a possession of the patricians. It was averted, however, by a certain tribune, L. Trebonius, who succeeded in carrying a law that whoever presided over the comitia for the election of tribunes should continue till ten tribunes were elected, the object being to preclude coöptation. The tribune who violated this law was to be burned alive.[1722] That part of Livy’s account which assigns the author of the law to the year 448 is improbable. A half century later (401) he informs us, it happened that two places left vacant in the college were again filled by the coöptation of patricians and, by the strangest accident, a Cn. Trebonius was among their colleagues. His complaint that the Trebonian plebiscite and the leges sacratae were being violated had, in Livy’s opinion,[1723] no result. Probability greatly favors the later date for the law, especially as an instance of coöptation is mentioned between the two dates;[1724] the name of Trebonius or of one or more patricians in the college of 448[1725] was enough to lead the historian astray. The later date fits well the political condition of the time; the patricians, almost succeeding in monopolizing the military tribunate with consular power, proceeded to lay hands on the plebeian tribunate—a far more valuable prize. After 401, however, the Trebonian law proved effective in excluding patricians from the tribunate of the plebs. Henceforth all plebeian officials were elected by the tribes under tribunician presidency.[1726] In granting the tribal assembly a share in law-making the senate must have hoped to convert it into an organ of the patrician government. Shortly after the Valerian-Horatian legislation, accordingly, patrician magistrates began to convoke this assembly for the election of quaestors (447)—previously appointed by the chief magistrates[1727]—and afterward of curule aediles (367),[1728] military tribunes,[1729] and other minor officials.[1730] II. _Judicial_ _a._ TRIBUNICIAN