Plutarch, Brutus  14(ca.  A.D. 100): A meeting of the Senate was now announced in which it was expected Caesar would attend, and the conspirators agreed to seize this opportunity for their attempt.  The occasion would enable them to muster their full strength without attracting suspicion; what was more, they would have all the men of the highest rank and character in the republic assembled in one place, and these, they hoped, once the great deed was accomplished, would immediately embrace the cause of liberty.  Besides, the very place of the meeting seemed to have been chosen by providence so as to favor their purpose, for the session was to be held in one of the porticoes adjoining the theater and containing a hall furnished with a number of benches in which stood a statue of Pompeius.  This had been erected at the public expense in Pompeius' honor, when he had adorned that quarter of the city with the porticoes and the theater.  Here the Senate was summoned for its meeting in the middle of March—the Romans call the day the Ides of March—and it seemed that some divine power was drawing Caesar to the place to meet his punishment for the death of Pompeius. When the day arrived, Brutus put on a dagger, unknown to anybody except his wife, and went out.  The rest of the conspirators met at Cassius's house and accompanied his son to the Forum, for the boy was due on that day to put on his manly gown or toga virilis, as the Romans call it.  From there they all hurried to Pompeius's portico, where they waited, expecting that Caesar would arrive immediately for the meeting of the Senate.  It was at this moment, above all, that anybody who knew what was about to happen would have been amazed at the unshakeable calm and presence of mind which these men displayed as the moment of crisis drew near.  Many of them were praetors who were obliged by virtue of their office to transact business, and they not only listened impassively to every application or dispute which was laid before them, as if they had no other preoccupation in the world, but they took infinite pains to pronounce an exact and considered judgment upon every case.  And when one of the litigants refused to accept Brutus's verdict, and began to protest loudly and to appeal to Caesar, Brutus looked round calmly at the bystanders and declared, "Caesar does not prevent me from acting in accordance with the laws, nor will he do so at any future time."  (I. Scott-Kilvert, trans.)