y lay no appeal from
them to the community, but their sentences were as little subject to
be annulled by the community as those of the long-established civil
jurymen. In the burgess-tribunals it had, especially in strictly
political processes, no doubt long been the rule that the accused
remained at liberty during his trial, and was allowed by
surrendering his burgess-rights to save at least life and freedom;
for the fine laid on property, as well as the civil condemnation,
might still affect even the exiled. But preliminary arrest and
complete execution of the sentence remained in such cases at least
legally possible, and were still sometimes carried into effect even
against persons of rank; for instance, Lucius Hostilius Tubulus,
praetor of 612, who was capitally impeached for a heinous crime,
was refused the privilege of exile, arrested, and executed. On the
other hand the judicial commissions, which originated out of the civil
procedure, probably could not at the outset touch the liberty or
life of the citizen, but at the most could only pronounce sentence
of exile; this, which had hitherto been a mitigation of punishment
accorded to one who was found guilty, now became for the first time a
formal penalty This involuntary exile however, like the voluntary, left
to the person banished his property, so far as it was not exhausted
in satisfying claims for compensation and money-fines. Lastly, in
the matter of debt Gaius Gracchus made no alteration; but very
respectable authorities assert that he held out to those in debt the
hope of a diminution or remission of claims--which, if it is correct,
must likewise be reckoned among those radically popular measures.

Elevation of the Equestrian Order

While Gracchus thus leaned on the support of the multitude, which
partly expected, partly received from him a material improvement
of its position, he laboured with equal energy at the ruin of the
aristocracy. Perceiving clearly how insecure was the rule of the
head of the state built merely on the proletariate, he applied himself
above all to split the aristocracy and to draw a part of it over to
his interests. The elements of such a rupture were already in
existence. The aristocracy of the rich, which had risen as one man
against Tiberius Gracchus, consisted in fact of two essentially
dissimilar bodies, which may be in some measure compared to the
peerage and the city aristocracy of England. The one embraced the
prac