on graceful; and with those advantages he
was able to conceal all other defects. _Cneius autem Lentulus multo
majorem opinionem dicendi actione faciebat, quam quanta in eo facultas
erat; qui cum esset nec peracutus (quamquam et ex facie et ex vultu
videbatur) nec abundans verbis, etsi fallebat in eo ipso; sed voce
suavi et canora calebat in agendo, ut ea, quae deerant, non
desiderarentur._ Cicero, _De Claris Oratoribus_, s. 234. Metellus,
Lucullus, and Curio, are mentioned by Cicero in the same work. Curio
was a senator of great spirit and popularity. He exerted himself with
zeal and ardour for the legal constitution and the liberties of his
country against the ambition of Julius Caesar, but afterwards sold
himself to that artful politician, and favoured his designs. The
calamities that followed are by the best historians laid to his
charge. Lucan says of him,

Audax venali comitatur Curio lingua;
Vox quondam populi, libertatemque tueri
Ausus, et armatos plebi miscere potentes.
Lib. i. ver. 269.

And again,

Momentumque fuit mutatus Curio rerum,
Gallorum captus spoliis, et Caesaris auro.
PHARSALIA, lib. iv. ver. 819.

[d] Demosthenes, when not more than seven years old, lost his father,
and was left under the care of three guardians, who thought an orphan
lawful prey, and did not scruple to embezzle his effects. In the mean
time Demosthenes pursued a plan of education, without the aid or
advice of his tutors. He became the scholar of Isocrates, and he was
the hearer of Plato. Under those masters his progress was such, that
at the age of seventeen he was able to conduct a suit against his
guardians. The young orator succeeded so well in that prelude to his
future fame, that the plunderers of the orphan's portion were
condemned to refund a large sum. It is said that Demosthenes,
afterwards, released the whole or the greatest part.

Section XXXVIII.

[a] The rule for allowing a limited space of time for the hearing of
causes, the extent of which could not be known, began, as Pliny the
younger informs us, under the emperors, and was fully established for
the reasons which he gives. The custom, he says, of allowing two
water-glasses (_i.e. two hour-glasses_) or only one, and sometimes
half a one, prevailed, because the advocates grew tired before the
business was explained, and the judges were ready to decide before
they understood the questio