cracy, under the name of the equestrian order, began at this time to
have political influence. Originally, the equestrians were a burgess
cavalry; but gradually all who possessed estates of four hundred thousand
sesterces were liable to cavalry service, and became enrolled in the
order, which thus comprehended the whole senatorial and non-senatorial
noble society of Rome. In process of time, the senators were exempted from
cavalry service, and were thus marked off from the list of those liable to
do cavalry service. The equestrian order then, at last, comprehended the
aristocracy of rich men, in contradistinction from the Senate. And a
natural antipathy accordingly grew up between the old senatorial
aristocracy and the men to whom money had given rank. The ruling lords
stood aloof from the speculators; and were better friends of the people
than the new moneyed aristocrats, since they, brought directly in contact
with the people, oppressed them, and their greediness and injustice were
not usually countenanced by the Senate. The two classes of nobles had
united to put down Tiberius Gracchus; but a deep gulf still yawned between
them, for no class of aristocrats was ever more exclusive than the
governing class at Rome, confined chiefly to the Senate. The Roman Senate
was like the House of Peers in England, when the peers had a
preponderating political power, and whose property lay in landed estates.

(M948) Gracchus raised the power of the equestrians by a law which
provided that the farming of the taxes raised in the provinces should be
sold at auction at Rome. A gold mine was thus opened for the speculators.
He also caused a law to be passed which required the judges of civil and
criminal cases to be taken from the equestrians, a privilege before
enjoyed by the Senate. And thus a senator, impeached for his conduct as
provincial governor, was now tried, not as before, by his peer, but by
merchants and bankers.

(M949) Gracchus, by the aid of the proletarians and the mercantile class,
then proceeded to the overthrow of the ruling aristocracy, especially in
the functions of legislation, which had belonged to the Senate. By means
of comitial laws and tribunician dictation, he restricted the business of
the Senate. He meddled with the public chest by distributing corn at half
its value; he meddled with the domains by sending colonies by decrees of
the people; he meddled with provincial administration by overturning the
regula