Section 8.

[a] This want of decorum before the tribunals of justice would appear incredible, were it not well attested by the younger Pliny.  The audience, he says, was suited to the orators.  Mercenary wretches were hired to applaud in the courts, where they were treated at the expence of the advocate, as openly as if they were in a banqueting-room. Sequuntur auditores actoribus similes, conducti et redempti mancipes.  Convenitur in media basilica, ubi tam palam sportulae quam in triclinio dantur. Plin. lib, ii. epist. 14.  He adds in the same epistle, LARGIUS LICINIUS first introduced this custom, merely that he might procure an audience. Primus hunc audiendi morem induxit Largius Licinius, hactenus tamen ut auditores corrogaret.

[b] This anecdote is also related by Pliny, in the following manner:  Quintilian, his preceptor, told him that one day, when he attended Domitius Afer in a cause before the centumviri, a sudden and outrageous noise was heard from the adjoining court.  Afer made a pause; the disturbance ceased, and he resumed the thread of his discourse.  He was interrupted a second and a third time.  He asked, who was the advocate that occasioned so much uproar?  Being told, that Licinius was the person, he addressed himself to the court in these words:  Centumvirs! all true eloquence is now at an end.  Ex Quintiliano, praeceptore meo, audisse memini:  narrabat ille, Assectabar Domitium Afrum, cum apud centumviros diceret graviter et lente (hoc enim illi actionis genus erat), audiit ex proximo immodicum insolitumque clamorem; admiratus reticuit; ubi silentium factum est, repetit quod abruperat; iterum clamor, iterum reticuit; et post silentium, coepit idem tertio.  Novissime quis diceret quaesivit.  Responsum est, Licinius.  Tum intermissa causa, CENTUMVIRI, inquit, HOC ARTIFICIUM PERIIT.  Lib. ii. ep. 14.  Domitius Afer has been mentioned, s. xiii. note [d].  To what is there said of him may be added a fact related by Quintilian, who says that Afer, when old and superannuated, still continued at the bar, exhibiting the decay of genius, and every day diminishing that high reputation which he once possessed.  Hence men said of him, he had rather decline than desist. Malle eum deficere, quam desinere. Quint. lib. xii. cap. 11.

[c] The men who applauded for hire, went from court to court to bellow forth their venal approbation.  Pliny says, No longer ago than yesterday, two of my nomenclators, both about the age of seventeen, were bribed to play the part of critics.  Their pay was about three denarii:  that at present is the price of eloquence. Ex judicio in judicium pari mercede transitur.  Heri duo nomenclatores mei (habent sane aetatem eorum, qui nuper togas sumpserunt), ternis denariis ad laudandum trahebantur.  Tanti constat, ut sis disertus. Lib. ii. epist. 14.