ossible,
might always preside: formerly some of the common people had also joined
with them in rendering decisions. The expenditures, moreover, of men of
means which had been rendered enormous by their licentiousness he not
only controlled by law but put a strong check upon them by practical
measures. There was, on account of the numbers of warriors that had
perished, a dangerous scarcity of population, as was proved both from
the censuses (which he attended to, among other things, as if he were
censor) and from actual observation, consequently he offered prizes for
large families of children. Again, because he himself as a result of
ruling the Gauls many years in succession had been attracted into a
desire for dominion and had by it increased the equipment of his force,
he limited by law the term of ex-praetors to one year, and that of
ex-consuls to two consecutive years, and enacted in general that no one
should be allowed to hold any office for a longer time.

[-26-] After the passage of these laws he also established in their
present fashion the days of the year (which were not definitely settled
among the people, since even at that time they regulated their months
according to the movements of the moon) by adding sixty-seven days, all
that were necessary to bring the year out even. In the past some have
declared that even more were interpolated, but the truth is as I have
stated it. He got this improvement from his stay in Alexandria, save in
so far as those people calculate their months as of thirty days each,
afterward annexing the five days to the entire year as a whole, whereas
Caesar distributed among seven months these five along with two other
days that he took away from one month.[93] The one day, however, which
is made up of four parts Caesar introduced every fourth year, so as to
have the annual seasons no longer differ at all except in the slightest
degree. In fourteen hundred and sixty-one years there is need of only
one (additional) intercalary day.[94]

[-27-] All these and other undertakings which he was planning for the
common weal he accomplished not by independent declaration nor by
independent cogitation, but he communicated everything in every instance
to the heads of the senate, sometimes even to the entire body And to
this practice most of all was due the fact that even when he passed some
rather harsh measures, he still succeeded in pleasing them. For these
actions he received praise; but in