Quintus Hortensius
Appius quickly returned the favour in political life. A promising young orator, the same year he agreed to prosecute A. Terentius Varro (praetor 77), recently returned from his Asian command. Varro was a close friend and relative of Lucullus and of the chief advocate of his defence Quintus Hortensius, Rome's leading orator at the time. But Varro was apparently so guilty that Hortensius resorted to dirty tricks which involved marking the ballots of the judges he had bribed, which caused a public scandal.