SCIRE FACIAS SCOLITHUS 695 ganized troops into a proper state of discipline, he took Numantia in 133, after a memorable siege and desperate defence, ending in the self- immolation of nearly all its inhabitants; for this he received the surname of Numantinus. During this time the civil troubles in Kome had culminated in the murder of Tiberius Grac- chus, whose sister Scipio had married ; a deed which he approved, notwithstanding their re- lationship. The people were consequently es- tranged from him, and in 129, on the day fol- lowing his speech against the agrarian law, he was found dead in his chamber. He was one of the most accomplished literary men of his time, well acquainted with Greek philosophy and literature, and the friend and patron of the historian Polybius, the philosopher Pansetius, and the poets Lucilius and Terence. III. Quin- tns Csei'ilins Metellns Pins, a Roman general, killed himself in 46 B. 0. He was the son of P. Cor- nelius Scipio Nasica and the adopted son of Metellus Pius, and in consequence he has been called P. Scipio Nasica, or Q. Metellus Scipio. In 63 B. C. he came to Cicero by night to in- form him of the conspiracy of Catiline. He became tribune in 60, was accused of bribery by his opponent and defended by Cicero, and in 53 was a candidate for the consulship and one of the leaders of the Clodian mob opposed to Milo. When the senate allowed Pompey to be made sole consul, that leader, who was his son-in-law, chose him (August, 52) as his col- league. He labored assiduously to destroy the power of Caosar, and the breach between the aristocratic and democratic parties at Rome and the civil war were largely due to him. He grossly misgoverned the province of Syria, as- signed to him, joined Pompey in Greece after Cesar's repulse at Dyrrachium, and after the battle of Pharsalia fled to Africa, where he took command of the army of Attius Varus, and where he also practised extortion and op- pression. In December, 47, Csesar crossed the Mediterranean, and in April, 46, routed the forces of Scipio and Juba, king of Numidia, at the battle of Thapsus; and Scipio stabbed him- self and sprang into the sea to escape capture. SCIRE FACIAS, in law, a judicial writ founded upon some record, and requiring the person against whom it is brought to show cause why the person bringing it should not have the ad- vantage of such record, or (in the case of a scire facias to repeal letters patent) why the record should not be annulled and vacated. It is so called from the words of the writ (when in Latin, as all writs originally were) to the sheriff: Quod scire facias prcefato, &c., and can only issue from the court having the rec- ord upon which it is founded. It is most com- monly used for the purpose of reviving a judg- ment after the lapse of a certain time, or on a change of parties, or otherwise to have execu- tion of the judgment, in which cases it is mere- ly a continuation of the original action. It is used more rarely as a method of proceeding against a debtor's bail, when the original debt- or has absconded, commanding them to show cause why the plaintiff should not have exe- cution against them for his debt or damages and costs; -and also on a recognizance to the commonwealth, as well as to obtain execution against the indorser of an original writ, in case of the avoidance or inability of the plaintiff to pay the costs recovered against him by the defendant. It also lies where an execution has been returned into court as satisfied by means of a levy, but it afterward appears that the lands levied upon did not belong to the judg- ment debtor, or the levy was otherwise imper- fect or insufficient ; and in England it may be obtained by the patron or owner of an advow- son for the purpose of removing a usurper's clerk improperly admitted by the bishop. It is further used as a means of repealing letters patent which have been obtained by fraud or issued improvidently, and in this case it is an original proceeding or action. The action of scire facias is the proper method of proceeding to ascertain judicially and enforce the forfei- ture of a charter by a corporation for default or abuse of power, when such corporation is a legally existing body capable of acting, but which has abused its power ; though when the corporation is a body de facto only, and on account of a defect in the charter or for any other reason cannot legally exercise its powers, the proceeding is by quo warranto. SCLOPIS DE SALERANO, Paolo Federigo, count, an Italian jurist, born in Turin in 1798. He studied law at the university of Turin, distin- guished himself in drawing up the Sardinian civil code of 1837 and in other departments of jurisprudence, became in 1848 minister of justice and ecclesiastical affairs, and presided over the committee for framing more liberal laws for the press ; but he soon exchanged his place in the cabinet for the chamber of depu- ties. At the close of 1849 he took his seat in the senate, of which he was president till 1861, and subsequently held the same office in the senate of Italy till 1864. In 1872 he was appointed by Victor Einanuel arbitrator at Geneva on the part of Italy under the treaty of Washington, and he was made president of the court of arbitra- tion. The American government sent him a service of silver plate in 1874. His principal work is a history of Italian legislation (3 vols., Turin, 1840-'57). MOLJTIHS, a sup- posed fossil burrowing worm of the arenico- la family, whose long vertical holes are very Scoiithus Hnearis. common in the Pots- dam sandstones, of the lower Silurian period. These holes, now filled with rocky material, were for a long time believed to be the re-
