[188] Cp. Juvenal, iii, 21 sq.; 162 sq.
[189] For the history of the practice, see the article "Frumentariae Leges," in Smith's Dictionary of Antiquities.
[190] The first step by Gracchus does not seem to have been much resisted (Merivale, Fall of the Roman Republic, p. 22; but cp. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, i, 262), such measures having been for various reasons resorted to at times in the past (Pliny, Hist. Nat. xviii, 1; Livy, ii, 34); but in the reaction which followed, the process was for a time restricted (Merivale, p. 34).
[191] It seems to have been he who, as consul, first caused the distribution to be made gratuitous. See Cicero, ad Attic. ii, 19, and De Domo Sua, cc. 10, 15. The Clodian law, making the distribution gratuitous, was passed next year.
[192] Suetonius, Julius, c. 41.
[193] Dio Cassius, xliii, 24.
[194] It must have been the relative dearness of land transport that kept the price of corn so low in Cisalpine Gaul in the time of Polybius, who describes a remarkable abundance (ii, 15).
[195] Suetonius, Aug. cc. 40, 41.
[196] Hist. Nat. xviii, 7 (6).
[197] Cp. his Economicus, chs. 5, 9, 11, 20, etc.