1After the king had finished speaking, Jugurtha's envoys, relying more on bribery than on their case, reply briefly: Hiempsal had been killed by the Numidians because of his cruelty; Adherbal had made war unprovoked and, after he had been beaten, was complaining because he had been unable to do wrong. 1Jugurtha asked the senate not to think him a different man from the one he had been known to be at Numantia, and not to put the words of an enemy before his deeds. 2Then both parties leave the senate house. 2The senate is at once consulted. 2The supporters of the envoys, and besides a large part of the senate corrupted by influence, scorned what Adherbal had said and extolled Jugurtha's merit with praises; 2by influence, by speech, in short by every means they exerted themselves on behalf of another man's crime and disgrace, as if for their own glory.
3But on the other side a few, to whom the good and the just were dearer than riches, proposed that help should be given to Adherbal and Hiempsal's death severely avenged; but above all of them Aemilius Scaurus, a nobleman, energetic, factious, greedy for power, office and wealth, but cunningly concealing his vices. 5When he saw that the king's bribery was notorious and shameless, fearing, as usually happens in such a case, that unbridled corruption might kindle resentment, he held his mind back from its usual greed.