Livy's History of Rome: Book 3:
The Decemvirate
3.1
For
the year following the capture of Antium, Titus
Aemilius and Quinctius Fabius were made consuls.
This was the Fabius who was the sole survivor of the
extinction of his house at the Cremera. Aemilius had
already in his former consulship advocated the grant
of land to the plebeians. As he was now consul for
the second time, the agrarian party entertained
hopes that the Law would be carried out; the
tribunes took the matter up in the firm expectation
that after so many attempts they would gain their
cause now that one consul, at all events, was
supporting them; the consul's views on the question
remained unchanged. Those in occupation of the land
-the majority of the patricians -complained that
the head of the State was adopting the methods of
the tribunes and making himself popular by giving
away other people's property, and in this way they
shifted all the odium from the tribunes on to the
consul. There was every prospect of a serious
contest, had not Fabius smoothed matters by a
suggestion acceptable to both sides, namely, that as
there was a considerable quantity of land which had
been taken from the Volscians the previous year,
under the auspicious generalship of T. Quinctius, a
colony might be settled at Antium, which, as a
seaport town, and at no great distance from Rome,
was a suitable city for the purpose. This would
allow the plebeians to enter on public land without
any injustice to those in occupation, and so harmony
would be restored to the State. This suggestion was
adopted. He appointed as the three commissioners for
the distribution of the land, T. Quinctius, A.
Verginius,. and P. Furius. Those who wished to
receive a grant were ordered to give in their names.
As usual, abundance produced disgust, and so few
gave in their names that the number was made up by
the addition of Volscians as colonists. The rest of
the people preferred to ask for land at Rome rather
than accept it elsewhere. The Aequi sought for peace
from Q. Fabius, who had marched against them, but
they broke it by a sudden incursion into Latin
territory.
3.2
In the following year, Q.
Servilius -for he was consul with Sp. Postumius -was sent against the Aequi, and fixed his entrenched
camp on Latin territory. His army was attacked by an
epidemic and compelled to remain inactive. The war
was protracted into the third year, when Quinctius
Fabius and T. Quinctius were the consuls. As Fabius
after his victory had granted peace to the Aequi,
they were by special edict assigned to him as his
sphere of operation. He set out in the firm belief
that the renown of his name would dispose them to
peace; accordingly he sent envoys to their national
council who were instructed to carry a message from
Q. Fabius the consul to the effect that as he had
brought peace from the Aequi to Rome, so now he was
bringing war from Rome to the Aequi, with the same
right hand, now armed, which he had formerly given
to them as a pledge of peace. The gods were now the
witnesses and would soon be the avengers of those
through whose perfidy and perjury this had come
about. In any case, however, he would rather that
the Aequi should repent of their own accord than
suffer at the hands of an enemy; if they did repent
they could safely throw themselves on the clemency
they had already experienced, but if they found
pleasure in perjuring themselves, they would be
warring more against the angered gods than against
earthly foes.
These words, however, had so little effect
that the envoys barely escaped maltreatment, and an
army was despatched to Mount Algidus against the
Romans. On this being reported at Rome, feelings of
indignation rather than apprehension of danger
hurried the other consul out of the City. So two
armies under the command of both consuls advanced
against the enemy in battle formation, to bring
about an immediate engagement. But, as it happened,
not much daylight remained, and a soldier called out
from the enemies' outposts: "This, Romans, is making
a display of war, not waging it. You form your line
when night is at hand; we need more daylight for the
coming battle. When tomorrow's sun is rising, get
into line again. There will be an ample opportunity
of fighting, do not fear! "Smarting under these
taunts the soldiers were marched back into camp, to
wait for the next day. They thought the coming night
a long one, as it delayed the contest; after
returning to camp they refreshed themselves with
food and sleep. When the next day dawned the Roman
line was formed some time before that of the enemy.
At length the Aequi advanced. The fighting was
fierce on both sides; the Romans fought in an angry
and bitter temper; the Aequi, conscious of the
danger in which their misdoing had involved them,
and hopeless of ever being trusted in the future,
were compelled to make a desperate and final effort.
They did not, however, hold their ground against the
Roman army, but were defeated and forced to retire
within their frontiers. The spirit of the rank and
file of the army was unbroken and not a whit more
inclined to peace. They censured their generals
because they staked all on one pitched battle, a
mode of fighting in which the Romans excelled,
whereas the Aequi, they said, were better at
destructive forays and raids; numerous bands acting
in all directions would be more successful than if
massed in one great army.
3.3
Accordingly, leaving a
detachment to guard the camp, they sallied forth,
and made such devastating forays in the Roman
territory that the terror they caused extended even
to the City. The alarm was all the greater because
such proceedings were quite unexpected. For nothing
was less to be feared than that an enemy who had
been defeated and almost surrounded in his camp
should think of predatory incursions, whilst the
panic-stricken country people, pouring in at the
gates and exaggerating everything in their wild
alarm, exclaimed that they were not mere raids or
small bodies of plunderers, entire armies of the
enemy were near, preparing to swoop down on the City
in force. Those who were nearest carried what they
heard to others, and the vague rumours became still
more exaggerated and false. The running and clamour
of men shouting "To arms!" created nearly as great a
panic as though the City was actually taken.
Fortunately the consul Quinctius had returned to
Rome from Algidus. This relieved their fears, and
after allaying the excitement and rebuking them for
being afraid of a defeated enemy, he stationed
troops to guard the gates. The senate was then
convened, and on their authority he proclaimed a
suspension of all business; after which he set out
to protect the frontier, leaving Q. Servilius as
prefect of the City. He did not, however, find the
enemy. The other consul achieved a brilliant
success. He ascertained by what routes the parties
of the enemy would come, attacked each while laden
with plunder and therefore hampered in their
movements, and made their plundering expeditions
fatal to them. Few of the enemy escaped, all the
plunder was recovered. The consul's return put an
end to the suspension of business, which lasted four
days. Then the census was made and the "lustrum "
closed by Quinctius. The numbers of the census are
stated to have been one hundred and four thousand
seven hundred and fourteen, exclusive of widows and
orphans. Nothing further of any importance occurred
amongst the Aequi. They withdrew into their towns
and looked on passively at the rifling and burning
of their homesteads. After repeatedly marching
through the length and breadth of the enemies'
territory and carrying destruction everywhere, the
consul returned to Rome with immense glory and
immense spoil.
3.4
The next consuls were A.
Postumius Albus and Sp. Furius Fusus. Some writers
call the Furii, Fusii. I mention this in case any
one should suppose that the different names denote
different people. It was pretty certain that one of
the consuls would continue the war with the Aequi.
They sent, accordingly, to the Volscians of Ecetra
for assistance. Such was the rivalry between them as
to which should show the most inveterate enmity to
Rome, that the assistance was readily granted, and
preparations for war were carried on with the utmost
energy. The Hernici became aware of what was going
on and warned the Romans that Ecetra had revolted to
the Aequi. The colonists of Antium were also
suspected, because on the capture of that town a
large number of the inhabitants had taken refuge
with the Aequi, and they were the most efficient
soldiers throughout the war. When the Aequi were
driven into their walled towns, this body was broken
up and returned to Antium. There they found the
colonists already disaffected, and they succeeded in
completely alienating them from Rome. Before matters
were ripe, information was laid before the senate
that a revolt was in preparation, and the consuls
were instructed to summon the chiefs of the colony
to Rome and question them as to what was going on.
They came without any hesitation, but after being
introduced by the consuls to the senate, they gave
such unsatisfactory replies that heavier suspicion
attached to them on their departure than on their
arrival. War was certain. Sp. Furius, the consul to
whom the conduct of the war had been assigned,
marched against the Aequi and found them committing
depredations in the territory of the Hernici.
Ignorant of their strength, because they were
nowhere all in view at once, he rashly joined battle
with inferior forces. At the first onset he was
defeated, and retired into his camp, but he was not
out of danger there. For that night and the next day
the camp was surrounded and attacked with such
vigour that not even a messenger could be despatched
to Rome. The news of the unsuccessful action and the
investment of the consul and his army was brought by
the Hernici, and created such an alarm in the senate
that they passed a decree in a form which has never
been used except under extreme emergencies They
charged Postumius to "see that the commonwealth
suffered no hurt." It was thought best that the
consul himself should remain in Rome to enrol all
who could bear arms, whilst T. Quinctius was sent as
his representative to relieve the camp with an army
furnished by the allies. This force was to be made
up of the Latins and the Hernici, whilst the colony
at Antium was to supply "subitary" troops -a
designation then applied to hastily raised auxiliary
troops.
3.5
Numerous maneuvers and
skirmishes took place during these days, because the
enemy with his superior numbers was able to attack
the Romans from many points and so wear out their
strength, as they were not able to meet them
everywhere. Whilst one part of their army attacked
the camp, another was sent to devastate the Roman
territory, and, if a favourable opportunity arose,
to make an attempt on the City itself. L. Valerius
was left to guard the City, the consul Postumius was
sent to repel the raids on the frontier. No
precaution was omitted, no exertion spared;
detachments were posted in the City, bodies of
troops before the gates, veterans manned the walls,
and as a necessary measure in a time of such
disturbance, a cessation of public business was
ordered for some days. In the camp, meanwhile, the
consul Furius, after remaining inactive during the
first days of the siege, made a sortie from the
"decuman" gate and surprised the enemy, and though
he could have pursued him, he refrained from doing
so, fearing lest the camp might be attacked from the
other side. Furius, a staff officer and brother of
the consul, was carried too far in the charge, and
did not notice, in the excitement of the pursuit,
that his own men were returning and that the enemy
were coming upon him from behind. Finding himself
cut off, after many fruitless attempts to cut his
way back to camp, he fell fighting desperately. The
consul, hearing that his brother was surrounded,
returned to the fight, and whilst he plunged into
the thick of the fray was wounded, and with
difficulty rescued by those round him. This incident
damped the courage of his own men and raised that of
the enemy, who were so inspirited by the death of a
staff officer and the wound of the consul that the
Romans, who had been driven back to their camp and
again besieged, were no longer a match for them
either in spirits or fighting strength. Their utmost
efforts failed to keep the enemy in check, and they
would have been in extreme danger had not T.
Quinctius come to their assistance with foreign
troops, an army composed of Latin and Hernican
contingents. As the Aequi were directing their whole
attention to the Roman camp and exultingly
displaying the staff officer's head he attacked them
in rear, whilst at a signal given by him a sortie
was made simultaneously from the camp and a large
body of the enemy were surrounded.
Amongst the Aequi who were in the Roman
territory there was less loss in killed and wounded,
but they were more effectually scattered in flight.
Whilst they were dispersed over the country with
their plunder, Postumius attacked them at various
points where he had posted detachments. Their army
was thus broken up into scattered bodies of
fugitives, and in their flight they fell in with
Quinctius, returning from his victory, with the
wounded consul. The consul's army fought a brilliant
action and avenged the wounds of the consuls and the
slaughter of the staff officer and his cohorts.
During those days great losses were inflicted and
sustained by both sides. In a matter of such
antiquity it is difficult to make any trustworthy
statement as to the exact number of those who fought
or those who fell. Valerius of Antium, however,
ventures to give definite totals. He puts the Romans
who fell in Hernican territory at 5800, and the
Antiates who were killed by A. Postumius whilst
raiding the Roman territory at 2400. The rest who
fell in with Quinctius whilst carrying off their
plunder got off with nothing like so small a loss;
he gives as the exact number of their killed, 4230.
On the return to Rome, the order for the cessation
of all public business was revoked. The sky seemed
to be all on fire, and other portents were either
actually seen, or people in their fright imagined
that they saw them. To avert these alarming omens,
public intercessions were ordered for three days,
during which all the temples were filled with crowds
of men and women imploring the protection of the
gods. After this the Latin and Hernican cohorts
received the thanks of the senate for their services
and were dismissed to their homes. The thousand
soldiers from Antium who had come after the battle,
too late to help, were sent back almost with
ignominy.
3.6
Then the elections were
held, and L. Aebutius and P. Servilius were chosen
as consuls; they entered upon office on August 1,
which was then the commencement of the consular
year. The season was a trying one, and that year
happened to be a pestilential one both for the City
and the rural districts, for the flocks and herds
quite as much as for human beings. The violence of
the epidemic was aggravated by the crowding into the
City of the country people and their cattle through
fear of raids. This promiscuous collection of
animals of all kinds became offensive to the
citizens, through the unaccustomed smell, and the
country people, crowded as they were into confined
dwellings, were distressed by the oppressive heat
which made it impossible to sleep. Their being
brought into contact with each other in ordinary
intercourse helped to spread the disease. Whilst
they were hardly able to bear up under the pressure
of this calamity, envoys from the Hernici announced
that the Aequi and Volscians had united their
forces, had entrenched their camp within their
territory, and were ravaging their frontier with an
immense army. The allies of Rome not only saw in the
thinly-attended senate an indication of the
widespread suffering caused by the epidemic, but
they had also to carry back the melancholy reply
that the Hernici must, in conjunction with the
Latins, undertake their own defence. Through a
sudden visitation of the angry gods, the City of
Rome was being ravaged by pestilence; but if any
respite from the evil should come, then she would
send succour to her allies as she had done the year
before and on all previous occasions. The allies
departed, carrying home in answer to the gloomy
tidings they had brought a still more gloomy
response, for they had in their own strength to
sustain a war which they had hardly been equal to
when supported by the power of Rome. The enemy no
longer confined himself to the country of the
Hernici, he went on to destroy the fields of Rome,
which were already lying waste without having
suffered the ravages of war. He met no one, not even
an unarmed peasant, and after over running the
country, abandoned as it was by its defenders and
even devoid of all cultivation, he reached the third
milestone from Rome on the Gabian road. Aebutius,
the consul, was dead, his colleague Servilius was
still breathing, with little hope of recovery, most
of the leading men were down, the majority of the
senators, nearly all the men of military age, so
that not only was their strength unequal to an
expeditionary force such as the position of affairs
required, but it hardly allowed of their mounting
guard for home defence. The duty of sentinel was
discharged in person by those of the senators whose
age and health allowed them to do so; the aediles of
the plebs were responsible for their inspection. On
these magistrates had devolved the consular
authority and the supreme control of affairs.
3.7
The helpless commonwealth,
deprived of its head and all its strength, was saved
by its guardian deities and the fortune of the City,
who made the Volscians and Aequi think more of
plunder than of their enemy. For they had no hope of
even approaching the walls of Rome, still less of
effecting its capture. The distant view of its
houses and its hills, so far from alluring them
repelled them. Everywhere throughout their camp
angry remonstrances arose: "Why were they idly
wasting their time in a waste and deserted land amid
plague-stricken beasts and men while they could find
places free from infection in the territory of
Tusculum with its abundant wealth?" They hastily
plucked up their standards, and by cross-marches
through the fields of Labici they reached the hills
of Tusculum. All the violence and storm of war was
now turned in this direction. Meantime the Hernici
and Latins joined their forces and proceeded to
Rome. They were actuated by a feeling not only of
pity but also of the disgrace they would incur if
they had offered no opposition to their common foe
while he was advancing to attack Rome, or had
brought no succour to those who were their allies.
Not finding the enemy there, they followed up their
traces from the information supplied them, and met
them as they were descending from the hills of
Tusculum into the valley of Alba. Here a very
one-sided action was fought, and their fidelity to
their allies met with little success for the time.
The mortality in Rome through the epidemic was not
less than that of the allies through the sword. The
surviving consul died; amongst other illustrious
victims were M. Valerius and T. Verginius Rutilus,
the augurs, and Ser. Sulpicius, the "Curio Maximus."
Amongst the common people the violence of the
epidemic made great ravage. The senate, deprived of
all human aid, bade the people betake themselves to
prayers; they with their wives and children were
ordered to go as suppliants and entreat the gods to
be gracious. Summoned by public authority to do what
each man's misery was constraining him to do, they
crowded all the temples. Prostrate matrons, sweeping
with their dishevelled hair the temple floors, were
everywhere imploring pardon from offended heaven,
and entreating that an end might be put to the
pestilence.
3.8
Whether it was that the
gods graciously answered prayer or that the
unhealthy season had passed, people gradually threw
off the influence of the epidemic and the public
health became more satisfactory. Attention was once
more turned to affairs of State, and after one or
two interregna had expired, P. Valerius Publicola,
who had been interrex for two days, conducted the
election of L. Lucretius Tricipitinus and T.
Veturius Geminus -or Vetusius -as consuls. They
entered office on August 11, and the State was now
strong enough not only to defend its frontiers, but
to take the offensive. Consequently, when the
Hernici announced that the enemy had crossed their
frontiers, help was promptly sent. Two consular
armies were enrolled. Veturius was sent to act
against the Volsci, Tricipitinus had to protect the
country of the allies from predatory incursions, and
did not advance beyond the Hernican frontier. In the
first battle Veturius defeated and routed the enemy.
Whilst Lucretius lay encamped amongst the Hernici, a
body of plunderers evaded him by marching over the
mountains of Praeneste, and descending into the
plains devastated the fields of the Praenestines and
Gabians, and then turned off to the hills above
Tusculum. Great alarm was felt in Rome, more from
the surprising rapidity of the movement than from
insufficiency of strength to repel any attack.
Quintus Fabius was prefect of the City. By arming
the younger men and manning the defences, he
restored quiet and security everywhere. The enemy
did not venture to attack the City, but returned by
a circuitous route with the plunder they had secured
from the neighbourhood. The greater their distance
from the City the more carelessly they marched, and
in this state they fell in with the consul
Lucretius, who had reconnoitred the route they were
taking and was in battle formation, eager to engage.
As they were on the alert and ready for the enemy,
the Romans, though considerably fewer in numbers,
routed and scattered the vast host, whom the
unexpected attack had thrown into confusion, drove
them into the deep valleys and prevented their
escape. The Volscian nation was almost wiped out
there. I find in some of the annals that 13,470 men
fell in the battle and the pursuit, and 1750 were
taken prisoners, whilst twenty-seven military
standards were captured. Although there may be some
exaggeration, there certainly was a great slaughter.
The consul, after securing enormous booty, returned
victorious to his camp. The two consuls then united
their camps; the Volscians and Aequi also
concentrated their shattered forces. A third battle
took place that year; again fortune gave the victory
to the Romans, the enemy were routed and their camp
taken.
3.9
Matters at home drifted
back to their old state; the successes in the war
forthwith evoked disorders in the City. Gaius
Terentilius Harsa was a tribune of the plebs that
year. Thinking that the absence of the consuls
afforded a good opportunity for tribunitian
agitation, he spent several days in haranguing the
plebeians on the overbearing arrogance of the
patricians. In particular he inveighed against the
authority of the consuls as excessive and
intolerable in a free commonwealth, for whilst in
name it was less invidious, in reality it was almost
more harsh and oppressive than that of the kings had
been, for now, he said, they had two masters instead
of one, with uncontrolled, unlimited powers, who,
with nothing to curb their licence, directed all the
threats and penalties of the laws against the
plebeians. To prevent this unfettered tyranny from
lasting for ever, he said he would propose an
enactment that a commission of five should be
appointed to draw up in writing the laws which
regulated the power of the consuls. Whatever
jurisdiction over themselves the people gave the
consul, that and that only was he to exercise; he
was not to regard his own licence and caprice as
law. When this measure was promulgated, the
patricians were apprehensive lest in the absence of
the consuls they might have to accept the yoke. A
meeting of the senate was convened by Q. Fabius, the
prefect of the City. He made such a violent attack
upon the proposed law and its author, that the
threats and intimidation could not have been greater
even if the two consuls had been standing by the
tribune, threatening his life. He accused him of
plotting treason, of seizing a favourable moment for
compassing the ruin of the commonwealth. "Had the
gods," he continued, "given us a tribune like him
last year, during the pestilence and the war,
nothing could have stopped him. After the death of
the two consuls, whilst the State was lying
prostrate, he would have passed laws, amid the
universal confusion, to deprive the commonwealth of
the power of the consuls, he would have led the
Volscians and Aequi in an attack on the City. Why,
surely it is open to him to impeach the consuls for
whatever tyranny or cruelty they may have been
guilty of towards any citizen, to bring them to
trial before those very judges, one of whom had been
their victim. His action was making -not the
authority of the consuls, but -the power of the
tribunes odious and intolerable, and after being
exercised peaceably and in harmony with the
patricians, that power was now reverting to its old
evil practices." As to Terentilius, he would not
dissuade him from continuing as he began. "As to
you," said Fabius, "the other tribunes, we beg you
to reflect that in the first instance your power was
conferred upon you for the assistance of individual
citizens, not for the ruin of all; you have been
elected as the tribunes of the plebs, not as the
enemies of the patricians. To us it is distressing,
to you it is a source of odium that the commonwealth
should be thus attacked while it is without its
head. You will not impair your rights, but you will
lessen the odium felt against you if you arrange
with your colleague to have the whole matter
adjourned till the arrival of the consuls. Even the
Aequi and Volscians, after the consuls had been
carried off by the epidemic last year, did not
harass us with a cruel and ruthless war." The
tribunes came to an understanding with Terentilius
and the proceedings were ostensibly adjourned, but,
as a matter of fact, abandoned. The consuls were
immediately summoned home.
3.10
Lucretius returned with
an immense amount of booty, and with a still more
brilliant reputation. This prestige he enhanced on
his arrival by laying out all the booty in the
Campus Martius for three days, that each person
might recognise and take away his own property. The
rest, for which no owners appeared, was sold. By
universal consent a triumph was due to the consul,
but the matter was delayed through the action of the
tribune, who was pressing his measure. The consul
regarded this as the more important question. For
some days the subject was discussed both in the
senate and the popular assembly. At last the tribune
yielded to the supreme authority of the consul and
dropped his measure. Then the consul and his army
received the honour they deserved; at the head of
his victorious legions he celebrated his triumph
over the Volscians and Aequi. The other consul was
allowed to enter the City without his troops and
enjoy an ovation. The following year the new
consuls, P. Volumnius and Ser. Sulpicius, were
confronted by the proposed law of Terentilius, which
was now brought forward by the whole college of
tribunes. During the year, the sky seemed to be on
fire; there was a great earthquake; an ox was
believed to have spoken -the year before this
rumour found no credence. Amongst other portents it
rained flesh, and an enormous number of birds are
said to have seized it while they were flying about;
what fell to the ground lay about for several days
without giving out any bad smell. The Sibylline
Books were consulted by the "duumviri," and a
prediction was found of dangers which would result
from a gathering of aliens, attempts on the highest
points of the City and consequent bloodshed. Amongst
other notices, there was a solemn warning to abstain
from all seditious agitations. The tribunes alleged
that this was done to obstruct the passing of the
Law, and a desperate conflict seemed imminent.
As though to show how events revolve in the
same cycle year by year, the Hernici reported that
the Volscians and Aequi, in spite of their
exhaustion, were equipping fresh armies. Antium was
the centre of the movement; the colonists of Antium
were holding public meetings in Ecetra, the capital,
and the main strength of the war. On this
information being laid before the senate, orders
were given for a levy. The consuls were instructed
to divide the operations between them; the Volscians
were to be the province of the one, the Aequi of the
other. The tribunes, even in face of the consuls,
filled the Forum with their shouts declaring that
the story of a Volscian war was a prearranged
comedy, the Hernici had been prepared beforehand for
the part they were to play; the liberties of the
Roman were not being repressed by straightforward
opposition, but were being cunningly fooled away. It
was impossible to persuade them that the Volscians
and Aequi, after being almost exterminated, could
themselves commence hostilities; a new enemy,
therefore, was being sought for; a colony which had
been a loyal neighbour was being covered with
infamy. It was against the unoffending people of
Antium that war was declared; it was against the
Roman plebs that war was really being waged. After
loading them with arms they would drive them in hot
haste out of the City, and wreak their vengeance on
the tribunes by sentencing their fellow-citizens to
banishment. By this means -they might be quite
certain -the Law would be defeated; unless, while
the question was still undecided, and they were
still at home, still unenrolled, they took steps to
prevent their being ousted from their occupation of
the City, and forced under the yoke of servitude. If
they showed courage, help would not be wanting, the
tribunes were unanimous. There was no cause for
alarm, no danger from abroad. The gods had taken
care, the previous year, that their liberties should
be safely protected.
3.11
Thus far the tribunes.
The consuls at the other end of the Forum, however,
placed their chairs in full view of the tribunes and
proceeded with the levy. The tribunes ran to the
spot, carrying the Assembly with them. A few were
cited, apparently as an experiment, and a tumult
arose at once. As soon as any one was seized by the
consuls' orders, a tribune ordered him to be
released. None of them confined himself to his legal
rights; trusting to their strength they were bent
upon getting what they set their minds upon by main
force. The methods of the tribunes in preventing the
enrolment were followed by the patricians in
obstructing the Law, which was brought forward every
day that the Assembly met. The trouble began when
the tribunes had ordered the people to proceed to
vote -the patricians refused to withdraw. The older
members of the order were generally absent from
proceedings which were certain not to be controlled
by reason, but given over to recklessness and
licence; the consuls, too, for the most part kept
away, lest in the general disorder the dignity of
their office might be exposed to insult. Caeso was a
member of the Quinctian house, and his noble descent
and great bodily strength and stature made him a
daring and intrepid young man. To these gifts of the
gods he added brilliant military qualities and
eloquence as a public speaker, so that no one in the
State was held to surpass him either in speech or
action. When he took his stand in the middle of a
group of patricians, conspicuous amongst them all,
carrying as it were in his voice and personal
strength all dictatorships and consulships combined,
he was the one to withstand the attacks of the
tribunes and the storms of popular indignation.
Under his leadership the tribunes were often driven
from the Forum, the plebeians routed and chased
away, anybody who stood in his way went off stripped
and beaten. It became quite clear that if this sort
of thing were allowed to go on, the Law would be
defeated. When the other tribunes were now almost in
despair, Aulus Verginius, one of the college,
impeached Caeso on a capital charge. This procedure
inflamed more than it intimidated his violent
temper; he opposed the Law and harassed the
plebeians more fiercely than ever, and declared
regular war against the tribunes. His accuser
allowed him to rush to his ruin and fan the flame of
popular hatred, and so supply fresh material for the
charges to be brought against him. Meantime he
continued to press the Law, not so much in the hope
of carrying it as in order to provoke Caeso to
greater recklessness. Many wild speeches and
exploits of the younger patricians were fastened on
Caeso to strengthen the suspicions against him.
Still the opposition to the Law was kept up. A.
Verginius frequently said to the plebeians, "Are you
now aware, Quirites, that you cannot have the Law
which you desire, and Caeso as a citizen, together?
Yet, why do I talk of the Law? He is a foe to
liberty, he surpasses all the Tarquins in tyranny.
Wait till you see the man who now, in private
station, acts the king in audacity and violence -wait till you see him made consul, or dictator." His
words were endorsed by many who complained of having
been beaten, and the tribune was urged to bring the
matter to a decision.
3.12
The day of trial was now
at hand, and it was evident that men generally
believed that their liberty depended upon the
condemnation of Caeso. At last, to his great
indignation, he was constrained to approach
individual members of the plebs; he was followed by
his friends, who were amongst the foremost men of
the State. Titus Quinctius Capitolinus, who had
three times been consul, after recounting his own
numerous distinctions and those of his family,
asserted that neither in the Quinctian house nor in
the Roman State did there exist another such example
of personal merit and youthful courage. He had been
the foremost soldier in his army; he had often
fought under his own eyes. Sp. Furius said that
Caeso had been sent by Quinctius Capitolinus to his
assistance when in difficulties, and that no single
person had done more to retrieve the fortunes of the
day. L. Lucretius, the consul of the previous year,
in the splendour of his newly-won glory, associated
Caeso with his own claim to distinction, enumerated
the actions in which he had taken part, recounted
his brilliant exploits on the march and in the
field, and did his utmost to persuade them to retain
as their own fellow-citizen a young man furnished
with every advantage that nature and fortune could
give, who would be an immense power in any state of
which he became a member, rather than drive him to
an alien people. As to what had given such offence -his hot temper and audacity -these faults were
being continually lessened; what was wanting in him
-prudence -was increasing day by day. As his
faults were decaying and his virtues maturing, they
ought to allow such a man to live out his years in
the commonwealth. Among those who spoke for him was
his father, L. Quinctius Cincinnatus. He did not go
over all his merits again, for fear of aggravating
the feeling against him, but he pleaded for
indulgence to the errors of youth; he himself had
never injured any one either by word or deed, and
for his own sake he implored them to pardon his son.
Some refused to listen to his prayers, lest they
should incur the displeasure of their friends;
others complained of the maltreatment they had
received, and by their angry replies showed
beforehand what their verdict would be.
3.13
Over and above the
general exasperation, one charge in particular
weighed heavily against him. M. Volscius Fictor, who
had some years previously been tribune of the plebs,
had come forward to give evidence that not long
after the epidemic had visited the City, he had met
some young men strolling in the Suburra. A quarrel
broke out and his elder brother, still weak from
illness, was knocked down by a blow from Caeso's
fist, and carried home in a critical condition, and
afterwards died, he believed, in consequence of the
blow. He had not been allowed by the consuls, during
the years that had elapsed, to obtain legal redress
for the outrage. Whilst Volscius was telling this
story in a loud tone of voice, so much excitement
was created that Caeso was very near losing his life
at the hands of the people. Verginius ordered him to
be arrested and taken to prison. The patricians met
violence by violence. T. Quinctius called out that
when the day of trial has been fixed for any one
indicted on a capital charge and is near at hand,
his personal liberty ought not to be interfered with
before the case is heard and sentence given. The
tribune replied that he was not going to inflict
punishment upon a man not yet found guilty; but he
should keep him in prison till the day of the trial,
that the Roman people might be in a position to
punish one who has taken a man's life. The other
tribunes were appealed to, and they saved their
prerogative by a compromise; they forbade him to be
cast into prison, and announced as their decision
that the accused should appear in court, and if he
failed to do so, he should forfeit a sum of money to
the people. The question was, what sum would it be
fair to fix? The matter was referred to the senate,
the accused was detained in the Assembly whilst the
senators were deliberating. They decided that he
should give sureties, and each surety was bound in
3000 "ases" It was left to the tribunes to decide
how many should be given; they fixed the number at
ten. The prosecutor released the accused on that
bail. Caeso was the first who gave securities on a
state trial. After leaving the Forum, he went the
following night into exile amongst the Tuscans. When
the day for the trial came, it was pleaded in
defence of his non-appearance that he had changed
his domicile by going into exile. Verginius,
nevertheless, went on with the proceedings, but his
colleagues, to whom an appeal was made, dismissed
the Assembly. The money was unmercifully extorted
from the father, who had to sell all his property
and live for some time like a banished man in an
out-of-the-way hut on the other side of the Tiber.
3.14
This trial and the
discussions on the Law kept the State employed;
there was a respite from foreign troubles. The
patricians were cowed by the banishment of Caeso,
and the tribunes, having, as they thought, gained
the victory, regarded the Law as practically
carried. As far as the senior senators were
concerned, they abandoned the control of public
affairs, but the younger members of the order,
mostly those who had been Caeso's intimates, were
more bitter than ever against the plebeians, and
quite as aggressive. They made much more progress by
conducting the attack in a methodical manner. The
first time that the Law was brought forward after
Caeso's flight they were organised in readiness, and
on the tribunes furnishing them with a pretext, by
ordering them to withdraw, they attacked them with a
huge army of clients in such a way that no single
individual could carry home any special share of
either glory or odium. The plebeians complained that
for one Caeso thousands had sprung up. During the
intervals when the tribunes were not agitating the
Law, nothing could be more quiet or peaceable than
these same men; they accosted the plebeians affably,
entered into conversation with them, invited them to
their houses, and when present in the Forum even
allowed the tribunes to bring all other questions
forward without interrupting them. They were never
disagreeable to any one either in public or private,
except when a discussion commenced on the Law; on
all other occasions they were friendly with the
people. Not only did the tribunes get through all
their other business quietly, but they were even
re-elected for the following year, without any
offensive remark being made, still less any violence
being offered. By gentle handling they gradually
made the plebs tractable, and through these methods
the Law was cleverly evaded throughout the year.
3.15
The new consuls, C.
Claudius, the son of Appius, and P. Valerius
Publicola, took over the State in a quieter
condition than usual. The new year brought nothing
new. Political interest centered in the fate of the
Law. The more the younger senators ingratiated
themselves with the plebeians, the fiercer became
the opposition of the tribunes. They tried to arouse
suspicion against them by alleging that a conspiracy
had been formed; Caeso was in Rome, and plans were
laid for the assassination of the tribunes and the
wholesale massacre of the plebeians, and further
that the senior senators had assigned to the younger
members of the order the task of abolishing the
tribunitian authority so that the political
conditions might be the same as they were before the
occupation of the Sacred Hill. War with the
Volscians and Aequi had become now a regular thing
of almost annual recurrence, and was looked forward
to with apprehension. A fresh misfortune happened
nearer home. The political refugees and a number of
slaves, some 2500 in all, under the leadership of
Appius Herdonius the Sabine, seized the Capitol and
Citadel by night. Those who refused to join the
conspirators were instantly massacred, others in the
confusion rushed in wild terror down to the Forum;
various shouts were heard: "To arms!" "The enemy is
in the City." The consuls were afraid either to arm
the plebeians or to leave them without arms.
Uncertain as to the nature of the trouble which had
overtaken the City, whether it was caused by
citizens or by foreigners, whether due to the
embittered feelings of the plebs or to the treachery
of slaves, they tried to allay the tumult, but their
efforts only increased it; in their terrified and
distracted state the population could not be
controlled. Arms were, however, distributed, not
indiscriminately, but only, as it was an unknown
foe, to secure protection sufficient for all
emergencies. The rest of the night they spent in
posting men in all the convenient situations in the
City, while their uncertainty as to the nature and
numbers of the enemy kept them in anxious suspense.
Daylight at length disclosed the enemy and their
leader. Appius Herdonius was calling from the
Capitol to the slaves to win their liberty, saying
that he had espoused the cause of all the wretched
in order to restore the exiles who had been
wrongfully banished and remove the heavy yoke from
the necks of the slaves. He would rather that this
be done at the bidding of the Roman people, but if
that were hopeless, he would run all risks and rouse
the Volscians and Aequi.
3.16
The state of affairs
became clearer to the senators and consuls. They
were, however, apprehensive lest behind these openly
declared aims there should be some design of the
Veientines or Sabines, and whilst there was this
large hostile force within the City the Etruscan and
Sabine legions should appear, and then the Volscians
and Aequi, their standing foes, should come, not
into their territory to ravage, but into the City
itself, already partly captured. Many and various
were their fears. What they most dreaded was a
rising of the slaves, when every man would have an
enemy in his own house, whom it would be alike
unsafe to trust and not to trust, since by
withdrawing confidence he might be made a more
determined enemy. Such threatening and overwhelming
dangers could only be surmounted by unity and
concord, and no fears were felt as to the tribunes
or the plebs. That evil was mitigated, for as it
only broke out when there was a respite from other
evils, it was believed to have subsided now in the
dread of foreign aggression. Yet it, more than
almost anything else, helped to further depress the
fortunes of the sinking State. For such madness
seized the tribunes that they maintained that it was
not war but an empty phantom of war which had
settled in the Capitol, in order to divert the
thoughts of the people from the Law. Those friends,
they said, and clients of the patricians would
depart more silently than they had come if they
found their noisy demonstration frustrated by the
passing of the Law. They then summoned the people to
lay aside their arms and form an Assembly for the
purpose of carrying the Law. Meantime the consuls,
more alarmed at the action of the tribunes than at
the nocturnal enemy, convened a meeting of the
senate.
3.17
When it was reported that
arms were being laid aside and men were deserting
their posts, P. Valerius left his colleague to keep
the senate together and hurried to the tribunes at
the templum. "What," he asked, "is the meaning of
this, tribunes? Are you going to overthrow the State
under the leadership of Appius Herdonius? Has the
man whose appeals failed to rouse a single slave
been so successful as to corrupt you? Is it when the
enemy is over our heads that you decide that men
shall lay down their arms and discuss laws?" Then
turning to the Assembly he said, "If, Quirites, you
feel no concern for the City, no anxiety for
yourselves, still show reverence for your gods who
have been taken captive by an enemy! Jupiter Optimus
Maximus, Queen Juno and Minerva, with other gods and
goddesses, are being besieged; a camp of slaves
holds the tutelary deities of your country in its
power. Is this the appearance which you think a
State in its senses ought to present -a large
hostile force not only within the walls, but in the
Citadel, above the Forum, above the Senate-house,
whilst meantime the Assembly is being held in the
Forum, the senate are in the Senate-house, and as
though peace and quiet prevailed, a senator is
addressing the House, whilst the Quirites in the
Assembly are proceeding to vote? Would it not be
more becoming for every man, patrician and plebeian
alike, for the consuls and tribunes, for gods and
men, to come, one and all, to the rescue with their
arms, to run to the Capitol and restore liberty and
calm to that most venerable abode of Jupiter Optimus
Maximus? O, Father Romulus, grant to shine offspring
that spirit in which thou didst once win back from
these same Sabines the Citadel which had been
captured with gold! Bid them take the road on which
thou didst lead shine army. Behold, I, the consul,
will be the first to follow thee and thy footsteps
as far as mortal man can follow a god." He ended his
speech by saying that he was taking up arms, and he
summoned all the Quirites to arms. If any one tried
to obstruct, he should now ignore the limits set to
his consular authority, the power of the tribunes,
and the laws which made them inviolable, and whoever
or wherever he might be, whether in the Capitol or
the Forum, he should treat him as a public enemy.
The tribunes had better order arms to be taken up
against P. Valerius the consul, as they forbade them
to be used against Appius Herdonius. He would dare
to do in the case of the tribunes what the head of
his family had dared to do in the case of the kings.
There was every prospect of an appeal to force, and
of the enemy enjoying the spectacle of a riot in
Rome. However, the Law could not be voted upon, nor
could the consul go to the Capitol, for night put an
end to the threatened conflict. As night came on the
tribunes retired, afraid of the consul's arms. When
the authors of the disturbance were out of the way,
the senators went about amongst the plebeians, and
mingling with different groups pointed out the
seriousness of the crisis, and warned them to
reflect into what a dangerous position they were
bringing the State. It was not a contest between
patricians and plebeians; patricians and plebeians
alike, the stronghold of the City, the temples of
the gods, the guardian deities of the State and of
every home, were being surrendered to the enemy.
While these steps were being taken to lay the spirit
of discord in the Forum, the consuls had gone away
to inspect the gates and walls, in case of any
movement on the part of the Sabines or Veientines.
3.18
The same night messengers
reached Tusculum with tidings of the capture of the
Citadel, the seizure of the Capitol, and the
generally disturbed state of the City. L. Mamilius
was at that time Dictator of Tusculum. After
hurriedly convening the senate and introducing the
messengers, he strongly urged the senators not to
wait until envoys arrived from Rome begging for
help; the fact of the danger and the seriousness of
the crisis, the gods who watched over alliances, and
loyalty to treaties, all demanded instant action.
Never again would the gods vouchsafe so favourable
an opportunity for conferring an obligation on so
powerful a State or one so close to their own doors.
They decided that help should be sent, the men of
military age were enrolled, arms were distributed.
As they approached Rome in the early dawn, they
presented in the distance the appearance of enemies;
it seemed as though Aequi or Volscians were coming.
When this groundless alarm was removed they were
admitted into the City and marched in order into the
Forum, where P. Valerius, who had left his colleague
to direct the troops on guard at the gates, was
forming his army for battle. It was his authority
that had achieved this result; he declared that if,
when the Capitol was recovered and the City pacified
they would allow the covert dishonesty of the Law
which the tribunes supported to be explained to
them, he would not oppose the holding of a plebeian
Assembly, for he was not unmindful of his ancestors
or of the name he bore, which made the protection of
the plebs, so to speak, a hereditary care. Following
his leadership, amid the futile protests of the
tribunes, they marched in order of battle up the
Capitoline hill, the legion from Tusculum marching
with them. The Romans and their allies were striving
which should have the glory of recapturing the
Citadel. Each of the commanders were encouraging his
men. Then the enemy lost heart, their only
confidence was in the strength of their position;
whilst thus demoralised the Romans and allies
advanced to the charge. They had already forced
their way into the vestibule of the temple, when P.
Valerius, who was in the front, cheering on his men,
was killed. P. Volumnius, a man of consular rank,
saw him fall. Directing his men to protect the body,
he ran to the front and took the consul's place. In
the heat of their charge the soldiers were not aware
of the loss they had sustained; they gained the
victory before they knew that they were fighting
without a general. Many of the exiles defiled the
temple with their blood, many were taken prisoners,
Herdonius was killed. So the Capitol was recovered.
Punishment was inflicted on the prisoners according
to their condition whether slave or freeman; a vote
of thanks was accorded to the Tusculans; the Capitol
was cleansed and solemnly purified It is stated that
the plebeians threw quadrantes into the consul's
house that he might have a more splendid funeral.
3.19
No sooner were order and
quiet restored than the tribunes began to press upon
the senators the necessity of redeeming the promise
made by Publius Valerius; they urged Claudius to
free his colleague's manes from the guilt of
deception by allowing the Law to be proceeded with.
The consul refused to allow it until he had secured
the election of a colleague. The contest went on
till the election was held. In the month of
December, after the utmost exertions on the part of
the patricians, L. Quinctius Cincinnatus, the father
of Caeso, was elected consul, and at once took up
his office. The plebeians were dismayed at the
prospect of having as consul a man incensed against
them, and powerful in the warm support of the
senate, in his own personal merits, and in his three
children, not one of whom was Caeso's inferior in
loftiness of mind, while they were his superiors in
exhibiting prudence and moderation where necessary.
When he entered on his magistracy he continually
delivered harangues from the tribunal, in which he
censured the senate as energetically as he put down
the plebs. It was, he said, through the apathy of
that order that the tribunes of the plebs, now
perpetually in office, acted as kings in their
speeches and accusations, as though they were
living, not in the commonwealth of Rome, but in some
wretched ill-regulated family. Courage, resolution,
all that makes youth distinguished at home and in
the battle-field, had been expelled and banished
from Rome with his son Caeso. Loquacious agitators,
sowers of discord, made tribunes for the second and
third time in succession, were living by means of
infamous practices in regal licentiousness. "Did
that fellow," he asked, "Aulus Verginius, because he
did not happen to be in the Capitol, deserve less
punishment than Appius Herdonius? Considerably more,
by Jove, if any choose to form a true estimate of
the matter. Herdonius, if he did nothing else,
avowed himself an enemy and in a measure summoned
you to take up arms; this man, by denying the
existence of a war, deprived you of your arms, and
exposed you defenceless to the mercy of your slaves
and exiles. And did you -without disrespect to C.
Claudius and the dead P. Valerius, I would ask -did
you advance against the Capitol before you cleared
these enemies out of the Forum? It is an outrage on
gods and men, that when there were enemies in the
Citadel, in the Capitol, and the leader of the
slaves and exiles, after profaning everything, had
taken up his quarters in the very shrine of Jupiter
Optimus Maximus, it should be at Tusculum, not at
Rome, that arms were first taken up. It was doubtful
whether the Citadel of Rome would be delivered by
the Tusculan general, L. Mamilius, or by the
consuls, P. Valerius and C. Claudius. We, who had
not allowed the Latins to arm, even to defend
themselves against invasion, would have been taken
and destroyed, had not these very Latins taken up
arms unbidden. This, tribunes, is what you call
protecting the plebs, exposing it to be helplessly
butchered by the enemy! If the meanest member of
your order, which you have as it were severed from
the rest of the people and made into a province, a
State of your own -if such an one, I say, were to
report to you that his house was beset by armed
slaves, you would, I presume, think that you ought
to render him assistance; was not Jupiter Optimus
Maximus, when shut in by armed slaves and exiles,
worthy to receive any human aid? Do these fellows
demand that their persons shall be sacred and
inviolable, when the very gods themselves are
neither sacred nor inviolable in their eyes? But,
steeped as you are in crimes against gods and men,
you give out that you will carry your Law this year.
Then, most assuredly, if you do carry it; the day
when I was made consul will be a far worse day for
the State than that on which P. Valerius perished.
Now I give you notice, Quirites, the very first
thing that my colleague and myself intend to do is
to march the legions against the Volscians and
Aequi. By some strange fatality, we find the gods
more propitious when we are at war than when we are
at peace. It is better to infer from what has
occurred in the past than to learn by actual
experience how great the danger from those States
would have been had they known that the Capitol was
in the hands of exiles."
3.20
The consul's speech
produced an impression on the plebs; the patricians
were encouraged and regarded the State as
re-established. The other consul, who showed more
courage in supporting than in proposing, was quite
content for his colleague to take the first step in
a matter of such importance but in carrying it out
he claimed his full responsibility as consul. The
tribunes laughed at what they considered idle words;
and constantly asked, "By what method were the
consuls going to take out an army, when no one would
allow one to be levied?" "We do not," said
Quinctius, "require to make a levy. At the time when
P. Valerius supplied the people with arms for the
recovery of the Capitol, they all took the oath to
muster at the consul's orders, and not to disband
without his orders. We, therefore, issue an order
that all of you who took that oath appear under
arms, tomorrow, at Lake Regillus." Thereupon the
tribunes wanted to release the people from their
oath by raising a quibble. They argued that
Quinctius was not consul when the oath was taken.
But the neglect of the gods, which prevails in this
age, had not yet appeared, nor did every man
interpret oaths and laws in just the sense which
suited him best; he preferred to shape his own
conduct by their requirements. The tribunes, finding
any attempt at obstruction hopeless, set themselves
to delay the departure of the army. They were the
more anxious to do this as a report had got abroad
that the augurs had received instructions to repair
to Lake Regillus and set apart with the usual
augural formalities a spot where business could be
transacted by a properly constituted Assembly. This
would enable every measure which had been carried by
the violent exercise of the tribunitian authority to
be repealed by the regular Assembly of the Tribes.
All would vote as the consuls wished, for the right
of appeal did not extend beyond a mile from the
City, and the tribunes themselves, if they went with
the army, would be subject to the authority of the
consuls. These rumours were alarming; but what
filled them with the greatest alarm were the
repeated assertions of Quinctius that he should not
hold an election of consuls; the diseases of the
State were such that none of the usual remedies
could check them; the commonwealth needed a
Dictator, in order that any one who took steps to
disturb the existing constitution might learn that
from a Dictator there lay no appeal.
3.21
The senate was in the
Capitol. Thither the tribunes proceeded, accompanied
by the plebeians in a great state of consternation.
They loudly appealed for help, first to the consuls,
then to the senators, but they did not shake the
determination of the consul, until the tribunes had
promised that they would bow to the authority of the
senate. The consuls laid before the senate the
demands of the plebs and their tribunes, and decrees
were passed that the tribunes should not bring
forward their Law during the year, nor should the
consuls take the army out of the City. The senate
also judged it to be against the interests of the
State that a magistrate's tenure of office should be
prolonged, or that the tribunes should be
re-elected. The consuls yielded to the authority of
the senate, but the tribunes, against the protests
of the consuls, were re-elected. On this, the senate
also, to avoid giving any advantage to the plebs,
reappointed Lucius Quinctius as consul. Nothing
during the whole year roused the indignation of the
consul more than this proceeding of theirs. "Can I,"
he exclaimed, "be surprised, Conscript Fathers, if
your authority has little weight with the plebs? You
yourselves are weakening it. Because, forsooth, they
have disregarded the senatorial decree forbidding a
magistrate's continuance in office, you yourselves
wish it to be disregarded, that you may not be
behind the populace in headstrong thoughtlessness,
as though to possess more power in the State was to
show more levity and lawlessness. It is undoubtedly
a more idle and foolish thing to do away with one's
own resolutions and decrees than with those of
others. Imitate, Conscript Fathers, the
inconsiderate multitude; sin after the example of
others, you who ought to be an example to others,
rather than that others should act rightly after
your example, as long as I do not imitate the
tribunes or allow myself to be returned as consul in
defiance of the resolution of the senate. To you, C.
Claudius, I earnestly appeal, that you, too, will
restrain the Roman people from this lawlessness. As
to myself, rest assured that I will accept your
action in the firm belief that you have not stood in
the way of my advancement to honour, but that I have
gathered greater glory by rejecting it, and have
removed the odium which my continuance in office
would have provoked." Thereupon the two consuls
issued a joint edict that no one should make L.
Quinctius consul; if any one attempted it, they
would not allow the vote.
3.22
The consuls elected were
Q. Fabius Vibulanus, for the third time, and L.
Cornelius Maluginensis. In that year the census was
taken, and owing to the seizure of the Capitol and
the death of the consul, the "lustrum " was closed
on religious grounds. During their consulship
matters became disturbed at the very beginning of
the year. The tribunes began to instigate the plebs.
The Latins and Hernici reported that war on an
immense scale was commenced by the Volscians and
Aequi, the Volscian legions were already at Antium,
and there were grave fears of the colony itself
revolting. With great difficulty the tribunes were
induced to allow the war to take precedence of their
Law. Then their respective spheres of operation were
allotted to the consuls: Fabius was commissioned to
take the legions to Antium; Cornelius was to protect
Rome and prevent detachments of the enemy from
coming on marauding expeditions, as was the custom
with the Aequi. The Hernici and Latins were ordered
to furnish troops, in accordance with the treaty;
two-thirds of the army consisted of allies, the rest
of Roman citizens. The allies came in on the
appointed day, and the consul encamped outside the
Capene gate. When the lustration of the army was
completed, he marched to Antium and halted at a
short distance from the city and from the enemies'
standing camp. As the army of the Aequi had not
arrived, the Volscians did not venture on an
engagement, and prepared to act on the defensive and
protect their camp. The next day Fabius formed his
troops round the enemies' lines, not in one mixed
army of allies and citizens, but each nation in a
separate division, he himself being in the centre
with the Roman legions. He gave orders to carefully
observe his signals, that all might commence the
action and retire -should the signal for retirement
be sounded -at the same moment. The cavalry were
stationed behind their respective divisions. In this
triple formation he assaulted three sides of the
camp, and the Volscians, unable to meet the
simultaneous attack, were dislodged from the
breastworks. Getting inside their lines he drove the
panic-struck crowd, who were all pressing in one
direction, out of their camp. The cavalry, unable to
surmount the breastworks, had so far been merely
spectators of the fight, now they overtook the enemy
and cut them down as they fled in disorder over the
plain, and so enjoyed a share of the victory. There
was a great slaughter both in the camp and in the
pursuit, but a still greater amount of spoil, as the
enemy had hardly been able to carry away even their
arms. Their army would have been annihilated had not
the fugitives found shelter in the forest.
3.23
Whilst these events were
occurring at Antium, the Aequi sent forward some of
their best troops and by a sudden night attack
captured the citadel of Tusculum; the rest of the
army they halted not far from the walls, in order to
distract the enemy. Intelligence of this quickly
reached Rome, and from Rome was carried to the camp
before Antium, where it produced as much excitement
as if the Capitol had been taken. The service which
Tusculum had so recently rendered and the similar
character of the danger then and now, demanded a
similar return of assistance. Fabius made it his
first object to carry the spoil from the camp into
Antium; leaving a small force there he hastened by
forced marches to Tusculum. The soldiers were not
allowed to carry anything but their arms and
whatever baked bread was at hand, the consul
Cornelius brought up supplies from Rome. The
fighting went on for some months at Tusculum. With a
portion of his army the consul attacked the camp of
the Aequi, the rest he lent to the Tusculans for the
recapture of their citadel. This could not be
approached by direct assault. Ultimately, famine
compelled the enemy to evacuate it, and after being
reduced to the last extremities, they were all
stripped of their arms and clothes and sent under
the yoke. Whilst they were making their way home in
this ignominious plight, the Roman consul on Algidus
followed them up and slew them to a man. After this
victory he led his army back to a place called
Columen, where he fixed his camp. As the walls of
Rome were no longer exposed to danger after the
defeat of the enemy, the other consul also marched
out of the City. The two consuls entered the
enemies' territories by separate routes, and each
tried to outdo the other in devastating the Volscian
lands on the one side and those of the Aequi on the
other. I find it stated in the majority of
authorities that Antium revolted this year, but that
the consul L. Cornelius conducted a campaign and
recaptured the town, I would not venture to assert,
as there is no mention of it in the older writers.
3.24
When this war had been
brought to a close, the fears of the patricians were
aroused by a war which the tribunes commenced at
home. They exclaimed that the army was being
detained abroad from dishonest motives; it was
intended to frustrate the passing of the Law; all
the same they would carry through the task they had
begun. L. Lucretius, the prefect of the City,
succeeded, however, in inducing the tribunes to
defer action till the arrival of the consuls. A
fresh cause of trouble arose. A. Cornelius and Q.
Servilius, the quaestors, indicted M. Volscius on
the ground that he had given what was undoubtedly
false evidence against Caeso. It had become known
from many sources that after the brother of Volscius
first became ill, he had not only never been seen in
public, but had not even left his bed, and his death
was due to an illness of many months' standing. On
the date at which the witness fixed the crime, Caeso
was not seen in Rome, whilst those who had served
with him declared that he had constantly been in his
place in the ranks with them and had not had leave
of absence. Many people urged Volscius to institute
a private suit before a judge. As he did not venture
to take this course, and all the above-mentioned
evidence pointed to one conclusion, his condemnation
was no more doubtful than that of Caeso had been on
the evidence which he had given. The tribunes
managed to delay matters; they said they would not
allow the quaestors to bring the accused before the
Assembly unless it had first been convened to carry
the Law. Both questions were adjourned till the
arrival of the consuls. When they made their
triumphal entry at the head of their victorious
army, nothing was said about the Law; most people
therefore supposed that the tribunes were
intimidated. But it was now the end of the year and
they were aiming at a fourth year of office, so they
turned their activity from the Law to canvassing the
electors. Though the consuls had opposed the
tribunes' continuance in office as strenuously as if
the Law had been mooted solely to impair their
authority, the victory remained with the tribunes.
In the same year the Aequi sued for and obtained
peace. The census, commenced the previous year, was
completed, and the "lustrum," which was then closed,
is stated to have been the tenth since the beginning
of the City. The numbers of the census amounted to
117,319. The consuls in that year won a great
reputation both at home and in war, for they secured
peace abroad, and though there was not harmony at
home, the commonwealth was less disturbed than it
had been on other occasions.
3.25
The new consuls, L.
Minucius and C. Nautius, took over the two subjects
which remained from the previous year. As before,
they obstructed the Law, the tribunes obstructed the
trial of Volscius; but the new quaestors possessed
greater energy and greater weight. T. Quinctius
Capitolinus, who had been thrice consul, was
quaestor with M. Valerius, the son of Valerius and
grandson of Volesus. As Caeso could not be restored
to the house of the Quinctii, nor could the greatest
of her soldiers be restored to the State, Quinctius
was bound in justice and by loyalty to his family to
prosecute the false witness who had deprived an
innocent man of the power to plead in his own
defence. As Verginius, most of all the tribunes, was
agitating for the Law, an interval of two months was
granted the consuls for an examination of it, in
order that when they had made the people understand
what insidious dishonesty it contained, they might
allow them to vote upon it. During this interval
matters were quiet in the City. The Aequi, however,
did not allow much respite. In violation of the
treaty made with Rome the year before, they made
predatory incursions into the territory of Labici
and then into that of Tusculum. They had placed
Gracchus Cloelius in command, their foremost man at
that time. After loading themselves with plunder
they fixed their camp on Mount Algidus. Q. Fabius,
P. Volumnius, and A. Postumius were sent from Rome
to demand satisfaction, under the terms of the
treaty. The general's quarters were located under an
enormous oak, and he told the Roman envoys to
deliver the instructions they had received from the
senate to the oak under whose shadow he was sitting,
as he was otherwise engaged. As they withdrew, one
of the envoys exclaimed, "May this consecrated oak,
may each offended deity hear that you have broken
the treaty! May they look upon our complaint now,
and may they presently aid our arms when we seek to
redress the outraged rights of gods as well as men!"
On the return of the envoys, the senate ordered one
of the consuls to march against Gracchus on Algidus;
the other was instructed to ravage the territory of
the Aequi. As usual, the tribunes attempted to
obstruct the levy and probably would in the end have
succeeded, had there not been fresh cause for alarm.
3.26
An immense body of
Sabines came in their ravages almost up to the walls
of the City. The fields were ruined, the City
thoroughly alarmed. Now the plebeians cheerfully
took up arms, the tribunes remonstrated in vain, and
two large armies were levied. Nautius led one of
them against the Sabines, formed an entrenched camp,
sent out, generally at night, small bodies who
created such destruction in the Sabine territory
that the Roman borders appeared in comparison almost
untouched by war. Minucius was not so fortunate, nor
did he conduct the campaign with the same energy;
after taking up an entrenched position not far from
the enemy, he remained timidly within his camp,
though he had not suffered any important defeat. As
usual, the enemy were emboldened by the lack of
courage on the other side. They made a night attack
on his camp, but as they gained little by a direct
assault they proceeded the following day to invest
it. Before all the exits were closed by the
circumvallation, five mounted men got through the
enemies' outposts and brought to Rome the news that
the consul and his army were blockaded. Nothing
could have happened so unlooked for, so undreamed
of; the panic and confusion were as great as if it
had been the City and not the camp that was
invested. The consul Nautius was summoned home, but
as he did nothing equal to the emergency, they
decided to appoint a Dictator to retrieve the
threatening position of affairs. By universal
consent L. Quinctius Cincinnatus was called to the
office.
It is worth while for those who despise all
human interests in comparison with riches, and think
that there is no scope for high honours or for
virtue except where lavish wealth abounds, to listen
to this story. The one hope of Rome, L. Quinctius,
used to cultivate a four-acre field on the other
side of the Tiber, just opposite the place where the
dockyard and arsenal are now situated; it bears the
name of the " Quinctian Meadows." There he was found
by the deputation from the senate either digging out
a ditch or ploughing, at all events, as is generally
agreed, intent on his husbandry. After mutual
salutations he was requested to put on his toga that
he might hear the mandate of the senate, and they
expressed the hope that it might turn out well for
him and for the State. He asked them, in surprise,
if all was well, and bade his wife, Racilia, bring
him his toga quickly from the cottage. Wiping off
the dust and perspiration, he put it on and came
forward, on which the deputation saluted him as
Dictator and congratulated him, invited him to the
City and explained the state of apprehension in
which the army were. A vessel had been provided for
him by the government, and after he had crossed
over, he was welcomed by his three sons, who had
come out to meet him. They were followed by other
relatives and friends, and by the majority of the
senate. Escorted by this numerous gathering and
preceded by the lictors, he was conducted to his
house. There was also an enormous gathering of the
plebs, but they were by no means so pleased to see
Quinctius; they regarded the power with which he was
invested as excessive, and the man himself more
dangerous than his power. Nothing was done that
night beyond adequately guarding the City.
3.27
The following morning the
Dictator went, before daylight, into the Forum and
named as his Master of the Horse, L. Tarquitius, a
member of a patrician house, but owing to his
poverty he had served in the infantry, where he was
considered by far the finest of the Roman soldiers.
In company with the Master of the Horse the Dictator
proceeded to the Assembly, proclaimed a suspension
of all public business, ordered the shops to be
closed throughout the City, and forbade the
transaction of any private business whatever. Then
he ordered all who were of military age to appear
fully armed in the Campus Martius before sunset,
each with five days' provisions and twelve
palisades. Those who were beyond that age were
required to cook the rations for their neighbours,
whilst they were getting their arms ready and
looking for palisades. So the soldiers dispersed to
hunt for palisades; they took them from the nearest
places, no one was interfered with, all were eager
to carry out the Dictator's edict. The formation of
the army was equally adapted for marching or, if
circumstances required, for fighting; the Dictator
led the legions in person, the Master of the Horse
was at the head of his cavalry. To both bodies words
of encouragement were addressed suitable to the
emergency, exhorting them to march at extra speed,
for there was need of haste if they were to reach
the enemy at night; a Roman army with its consul had
been now invested for three days, it was uncertain
what a day or a night might bring forth, tremendous
issues often turned on a moment of time. The men
shouted to one another, "Hurry on, standard-bearer!"
"Follow up, soldiers!" to the great gratification of
their leaders. They reached Algidus at midnight, and
on finding that they were near the enemy, halted.
3.28
The Dictator, after
riding round and reconnoitring as well as he could
in the night the position and shape of the camp,
commanded the military tribunes to give orders for
the baggage to be collected together and the
soldiers with their arms and palisades to resume
their places in the ranks. His orders were carried
out. Then, keeping the formation in which they had
marched, the whole army, in one long column,
surrounded the enemies' lines. At a given signal all
were ordered to raise a shout; after raising the
shout each man was to dig a trench in front of him
and fix his palisade. As soon as the order reached
the men, the signal followed. The men obeyed the
order, and the shout rolled round the enemies' line
and over them into the consul's camp. In the one it
created panic, in the other rejoicing. The Romans
recognised their fellow-citizens' shout, and
congratulated one another on help being at hand.
They even made sorties from their outposts against
the enemy and so increased their alarm. The consul
said there must be no delay, that shout meant that
their friends had not only arrived but were engaged,
he should be surprised if the outside of the
enemies' lines was not already attacked. He ordered
his men to seize their arms and follow him. A
nocturnal battle began. They notified the Dictator's
legions by their shouts that on their side too the
action had commenced. The Aequi were already making
preparations to prevent themselves from being
surrounded when the enclosed enemy began the battle;
to prevent their lines from being broken through,
they turned from those who were investing them to
fight the enemy within, and so left the night free
for the Dictator to complete his work. The fighting
with the consul went on till dawn. By this time they
were completely invested by the Dictator, and were
hardly able to keep up the fight against one army.
Then their lines were attacked by Quinctius' army,
who had completed the circumvallation and resumed
their arms. They had now to maintain a fresh
conflict, the previous one was in no way slackened.
Under the stress of the double attack they turned
from fighting to supplication, and implored the
Dictator on the one side and the consul on the other
not to make their extermination the price of
victory, but to allow them to surrender their arms
and depart. The consul referred them to the
Dictator, and he, in his anger, determined to
humiliate his defeated enemy. He ordered Gracchus
Cloelius and others of their principal men to be
brought to him in chains, and the town of Corbio to
be evacuated. He told the Aequi he did not require
their blood, they were at liberty to depart; but, as
an open admission of the defeat and subjugation of
their nation, they would have to pass under the
yoke. This was made of three spears, two fixed
upright in the ground, and the third tied to them
across the top. Under this yoke the Dictator sent
the Aequi.
3.29
Their camp was found to
be full of everything -for they had been sent away
with only their shirts on -and the Dictator gave
the whole of the spoil to his own soldiers alone.
Addressing the consul and his army in a tone of
severe rebuke, "You, soldiers," he said, "will go
without your share of the spoil, for you all but
fell a spoil yourselves to the enemy from whom it
was taken; and you, L. Minucius, will command these
legions as a staff officer, until you begin to show
the spirit of a consul." Minucius laid down his
consulship and remained with the army under the
Dictator's orders. But such unquestioning obedience
did men in those days pay to authority when ably and
wisely exercised, that the soldiers, mindful of the
service he had done them rather than of the disgrace
inflicted on them, voted to the Dictator a gold
crown a pound in weight, and when he left they
saluted him as their "patron." Quintus Fabius, the
prefect of the City, convened a meeting of the
senate, and they decreed that Quinctius, with the
army he was bringing home, should enter the City in
triumphal procession. The commanding officers of the
enemy were led in front, then the military standards
were borne before the general's chariot, the army
followed loaded with spoil. It is said that tables
spread with provisions stood before all the houses,
and the feasters followed the chariot with songs of
triumph and the customary jests and lampoons. On
that day the freedom of the City was bestowed on L.
Mamilius the Tusculan, amidst universal approval.
The Dictator would at once have laid down his office
had not the meeting of the Assembly for the trial of
M. Volscius detained him: fear of the Dictator
prevented the tribunes from obstructing it. Volscius
was condemned and went into exile at Lanuvium.
Quinctius resigned on the sixteenth day the
dictatorship which had been conferred upon him for
six months. During that period the consul Nautius
fought a brilliant action with the Sabines at
Eretum, who suffered a severe defeat, in addition to
the ravaging of their fields. Fabius Quintus was
sent to succeed Minucius in command at Algidus.
Towards the end of the year, the tribunes began to
agitate the Law, but as two armies were absent, the
senate succeeded in preventing any measure from
being brought before the plebs. The latter gained
their point, however, in securing the re-election of
the tribunes for the fifth time. It is said that
wolves pursued by dogs were seen in the Capitol;
this prodigy necessitated its purification. These
were the events of the year.
3.30
The next consuls were
Quintus Minucius and C. Horatius Pulvillus. As there
was peace abroad at the beginning of the year, the
domestic troubles began again; the same tribunes
agitating for the same Law. Matters would have gone
further -so inflamed were the passions on both
sides -had not news arrived, as though it had been
purposely arranged, of the loss of the garrison at
Corbio in a night attack of the Aequi. The consuls
summoned a meeting of the senate; they were ordered
to form a force of all who could bear arms and march
to Algidus. The contest about the Law was suspended,
and a fresh struggle began about the enlistment. The
consular authority was on the point of being
overborne by the interference of the tribunes when a
fresh alarm was created. A Sabine army had descended
on the Roman fields for plunder, and were
approaching the City. Thoroughly alarmed, the
tribunes allowed the enrolment to proceed; not,
however, without insisting on an agreement that
since they had been foiled for five years and but
slight protection to the plebeians had so far been
afforded, there should henceforth be ten tribunes of
the plebs elected. Necessity extorted this from the
senate, with only one condition, that for the future
they should not see the same tribunes in two
successive years. That this agreement might not,
like all the others, prove illusory, when once the
war was over, the elections for tribunes were held
at once. The office of tribune had existed for
thirty-six years when for the first time ten were
created, two from each class. It was definitely laid
down that this should be the rule in all future
elections. When the enrolment was completed Minucius
advanced against the Sabines, but did not find the
enemy. After massacring the garrison at Corbio, the
Aequi had captured Ortona; Horatius fought them on
Algidus, inflicting great slaughter, and drove them
not only from Algidus but also out of Corbio and
Ortona; Corbio he totally destroyed on account of
their having betrayed the garrison.
3.31
M. Valerius and Sp.
Vergilius were the new consuls. There was quiet at
home and abroad. Owing to excessive rain there was a
scarcity of provisions. A law was carried making the
Aventine a part of the State domain. The tribunes of
the plebs were re-elected. These men in the
following year, when T. Romilius and C. Veturius
were the consuls, were continually making the Law
the staple of all their harangues, and said that
they should be ashamed of their number being
increased to no purpose, if that matter made as
little progress during their two years of office as
it had made during the five preceding years. Whilst
the agitation was at its height, a hurried message
came from Tusculum to the effect that the Aequi were
in the Tusculan territory. The good services which
that nation had so lately rendered made the people
ashamed to delay sending assistance. Both consuls
were sent against the enemy, and found him in his
usual position on Algidus. An action was fought
there; above 7000 of the enemy were killed, the rest
were put to flight; immense booty was taken. This,
owing to the low state of the public treasury, the
consuls sold. Their action, however, created
ill-feeling in the army, and afforded the tribunes
material on which to base an accusation against
them. When, therefore, they went out of office, in
which they were succeeded by Spurius Tarpeius and A.
Aeternius, they were both impeached -Romilius by C.
Calvius Cicero, plebeian tribune, and Veturius by L.
Alienus, plebeian aedile. To the intense indignation
of the senatorial party, both were condemned and
fined; Romilius had to pay 10,000 "ases," and
Veturius 15,000. The fate of their predecessors did
not shake the resolution of the new consuls; they
said that while it was quite possible that they
might also be condemned, it was not possible for the
plebs and its tribunes to carry the Law. Through
long discussion it had become stale, the tribunes
now threw it over and approached the patricians in a
less aggressive spirit. They urged that an end
should be put to their disputes, and if they
objected to the measures adopted by the plebeians,
they should consent to the appointment of a body of
legislators, chosen in equal numbers from plebeians
and patricians, to enact what would be useful to
both orders and secure equal liberty for each. The
patricians thought the proposal worth consideration;
they said, however, that no one should legislate
unless he were a patrician, since they were agreed
as to the laws and only differed as to who should
enact them. Commissioners were sent to Athens with
instructions to make a copy of the famous laws of
Solon, and to investigate the institutions, customs,
and laws of other Greek States. Their names were
Spurius Postumius Albus, A. Manlius, P. Sulpicius
Camerinus.
3.32
As regards foreign war,
the year was a quiet one. The following one, in
which P. Curiatius and Sextus Quinctilius were
consuls, was still quieter owing to the continued
silence of the tribunes. This was due to two causes:
first, they were waiting for the return of the
commissioners who had gone to Athens, and the
foreign laws which they were to bring; and secondly,
two fearful disasters came together, famine and a
pestilence which was fatal to men and fatal to
cattle. The fields lay waste, the City was depleted
by an unbroken series of deaths, many illustrious
houses were in mourning. The Flamen Quirinalis,
Servius Cornelius, died, also the augur C. Horatius
Pulvillus, in whose place the augurs chose C.
Veturius, all the more eagerly because he had been
condemned by the plebs. The consul Quinctilius and
four tribunes of the plebs died. The year was a
gloomy one owing to the numerous losses. There was a
respite from external enemies. The succeeding
consuls were C. Menenius and P. Sestius Capitolinus.
This year also was free from war abroad, but
commotions began at home. The commissioners had now
returned with the laws of Athens; the tribunes, in
consequence, were more insistent that a commencement
should at last be made in the compilation of the
laws. It was decided that a body of Ten (hence
called the "Decemvirs") should be created, from whom
there should be no appeal, and that all other
magistrates should be suspended for the year. There
was a long controversy as to whether plebeians
should be admitted; at last they gave way to the
patricians on condition that the Icilian Law
concerning the Aventine and the other sacred laws
should not be repealed.
3.33
For the second time -in
the 301st year from the foundation of Rome -was the
form of government changed; the supreme authority
was transferred from consuls to decemvirs, just as
it had previously passed from kings to consuls. The
change was the less noteworthy owing to its short
duration, for the happy beginnings of that
government developed into too luxuriant a growth;
hence its early failure and the return to the old
practice of entrusting to two men the name and
authority of consul. The decemvirs were Appius
Claudius, T. Genucius, P. Sestius, L. Veturius, C.
Julius, A. Manlius, P. Sulpicius, P. Curiatius, T.
Romilius, and Sp. Postumius. As Claudius and
Genucius were the consuls designate, they received
the honour in place of the honour of which they were
deprived. Sestius, one of the consuls the year
before, was honoured because he had, against his
colleague, brought that subject before the senate.
Next to them were placed the three commissioners who
had gone to Athens, as a reward for their
undertaking so distant an embassage, and also
because it was thought that those who were familiar
with the laws of foreign States would be useful in
the compilation of new ones. It is said that in the
final voting for the four required to complete the
number, the electors chose aged men, to prevent any
violent opposition to the decisions of the others.
The presidency of the whole body was, in accordance
with the wishes of the plebs, entrusted to Appius.
He had assumed such a new character that from being
a stern and bitter enemy of the people he suddenly
appeared as their advocate, and trimmed his sails to
catch every breath of popular favour. They
administered justice each in turn, the one who was
presiding judge for the day was attended by the
twelve lictors, the others had only a single usher
each. Notwithstanding the singular harmony which
prevailed amongst them -a harmony which under other
circumstances might be dangerous to individuals -the most perfect equity was shown to others. It will
be sufficient to adduce a single instance as proof
of the moderation with which they acted. A dead body
had been discovered and dug up in the house of
Sestius, a member of a patrician family. It was
brought into the Assembly. As it was clear that an
atrocious crime had been committed, Caius Julius, a
decemvir, indicted Sestius, and appeared before the
people to prosecute in person, though he had the
right to act as sole judge in the case. He waived
his right in order that the liberties of the people
might gain what he surrendered of his power.
3.34
Whilst highest and lowest
alike were enjoying their prompt and impartial
administration of justice, as though delivered by an
oracle, they were at the same time devoting their
attention to the framing of the laws. These eagerly
looked for laws were at length inscribed on ten
tables which were exhibited in an Assembly specially
convened for the purpose. After a prayer that their
work might bring welfare and happiness to the State,
to them and to their children, the decemvirs bade
them go and read the laws which were exhibited. "As
far as the wisdom and foresight of ten men admitted,
they had established equal laws for all, for highest
and lowest alike; there was, however, more weight in
the intelligence and advice of many men. They should
turn over each separate item in their minds, discuss
them in conversations with each other, and bring
forward for public debate what appeared to them
superfluous or defective in each enactment. The
future laws for Rome should be such as would appear
to have been no less unanimously proposed by the
people themselves than ratified by them on the
proposal of others." When it appeared that they had
been sufficiently amended in accordance with the
expression of public opinion on each head, the Laws
of the Ten Tables were passed by the Assembly of
Centuries. Even in the mass of legislation today,
where laws are piled one upon another in a confused
heap, they still form the source of all public and
private jurisprudence. After their ratification, the
remark was generally made that two tables were still
wanting; if they were added, the body, as it might
be called, of Roman law would be complete. As the
day for the elections approached, this impression
created a desire to appoint decemvirs for a second
year. The plebeians had learnt to detest the name of
"consul" as much as that of "king," and now as the
decemvirs allowed an appeal from one of their body
to another, they no longer required the aid of their
tribunes.
3.35
But after notice had been
given that the election of decemvirs would be held
on the third market day, such eagerness to be
amongst those elected displayed itself, that even
the foremost men of the State began an individual
canvass as humble suitors for an office which they
had previously with all their might opposed, seeking
it at the hands of that very plebs with which they
had hitherto been in conflict. I think they feared
that if they did not fill posts of such great
authority, they would be open to men who were not
worthy of them. Appius Claudius was keenly alive to
the chance that he might not be re-elected, in spite
of his age and the honours he had enjoyed. You could
hardly tell whether to consider him as a decemvir or
a candidate. Sometimes he was more like one who
sought office than one who actually held it; he
abused the nobility, and extolled all the candidates
who had neither birth nor personal weight to
recommend them; he used to bustle about the Forum
surrounded by ex-tribunes of the Duellius and
Scilius stamp and through them made overtures to the
plebeians, until even his colleagues, who till then
had been wholly devoted to him, began to watch him,
wondering what he meant. They were convinced that
there was no sincerity about it, it was certain that
so haughty a man would not exhibit such affability
for nothing. They regarded this demeaning of himself
and hobnobbing with private individuals as the
action of a man who was not so keen to resign office
as to discover some way of prolonging it. Not
venturing to thwart his aims openly, they tried to
moderate his violence by humouring him. As he was
the youngest member of their body, they unanimously
conferred on him the office of presiding over the
elections. By this artifice they hoped to prevent
him from getting himself elected; a thing which no
one except the tribunes of the plebs had ever done,
setting thereby the worst of precedents. However, he
gave out that, if all went well, he should hold the
elections, and he seized upon what should have been
an impediment as a good opportunity for effecting
his purpose. By forming a coalition he secured the
rejection of the two Quinctii -Capitolinus and
Cincinnatus -his own uncle, C. Claudius, one of the
firmest supporters of the nobility, and other
citizens of the same rank. He procured the election
of men who were very far from being their equals
either socially or politically, himself amongst the
first, a step which respectable men disapproved of,
all the more because no one had supposed that he
would have the audacity to take it. With him were
elected M. Cornelius Maluginensis, M. Sergius, L.
Minucius, Q. Fabius Vibulanus, Q. Poetilius, T.
Antonius Merenda, K. Duillius, Sp. Oppius Cornicen,
and Manlius Rabuleius.
3.36
This was the end of
Appius' assumption of a part foreign to his nature.
From that time his conduct was in accordance with
his natural disposition, and he began to mould his
new colleagues, even before they entered on office,
into the lines of his own character. They held
private meetings daily; then, armed with plans
hatched in absolute secrecy for exercising unbridled
power, they no longer troubled to dissemble their
tyranny, but made themselves difficult of access,
harsh and stern to those to whom they granted
interviews. So matters went on till the middle of
May. At that period, May 15, was the proper time for
magistrates to take up their office. At the outset,
the first day of their government was marked by a
demonstration which aroused great fears. For,
whereas the previous decemvirs had observed the rule
of only one having the "fasces" at a time and making
this emblem of royalty go to each in turn, now all
the Ten suddenly appeared, each with his twelve
lictors. The Forum was filled with one hundred and
twenty lictors, and they bore the axes tied up in
the "fasces." The decemvirs explained it by saying
that as they were invested with absolute power of
life and death, there was no reason for the axes
being removed. They presented the appearance of ten
kings, and manifold fears were entertained not only
by the lowest classes but even by the foremost of
the senators. They felt that a pretext for
commencing bloodshed was being sought for, so that
if any one uttered, either in the senate or amongst
the people, a single word which reminded them of
liberty, the rods and axes would instantly be made
ready for him, to intimidate the rest. For not only
was there no protection in the people now that the
right of appeal to them was withdrawn, but the
decemvirs had mutually agreed not to interfere with
each other's sentences, whereas the previous
decemvirs had allowed their judicial decisions to be
revised on appeal to a colleague, and certain
matters which they considered to be within the
jurisdiction of the people they had referred to
them. For some time they inspired equal terror in
all, gradually it rested wholly on the plebs. The
patricians were unmolested; it was the men in humble
life for whom they reserved their wanton and cruel
treatment. They were solely swayed by personal
motives, not by the justice of a cause, since
influence had with them the force of equity. They
drew up their judgments at home and pronounced them
in the Forum; if any one appealed to a colleague, he
left the presence of the one to whom he had appealed
bitterly regretting that he had not abided by the
first sentence. A belief, not traceable to any
authoritative source, had got abroad that their
conspiracy against law and justice was not for the
present only, a secret and sworn agreement existed
amongst them not to hold any elections, but to keep
their power, now they had once obtained it, by
making the decemvirate perpetual.
3.37
The plebeians now began
to study the faces of the patricians, to catch haply
some gleam of liberty from the men from whom they
had dreaded slavery and through that dread had
brought the commonwealth into its present condition.
The leaders of the senate hated the decemvirs, and
hated the plebs; they did not approve of what was
going on, but they thought that the plebeians
deserved all that they got, and refused to help men
who by rushing too eagerly after liberty had fallen
into slavery. They even increased the wrongs they
suffered, that through their disgust and impatience
at the present conditions they might begin to long
for the former state of things and the two consuls
as of old. The greater part of the year had now
elapsed; two tables had been added to the ten of the
previous year; if these additional laws were passed
by the "Comitia Centuriata" there was no reason why
the decemvirate should be any longer considered
necessary. Men were wondering how soon notice would
be given of the election of consuls; the sole
anxiety of the plebeians was as to the method by
which they could re-establish that bulwark of their
liberties, the power of the tribunes, which was now
suspended. Meantime nothing was said about any
elections. At first the decemvirs had bid for
popularity by appearing before the plebs, surrounded
by ex-tribunes, but now they were accompanied by an
escort of young patricians, who crowded round the
tribunals, maltreated the plebeians and plundered
their property, and being the stronger, succeeded in
getting whatever they had taken a fancy to. They did
not stop short of personal violence, some were
scourged, others beheaded, and that this brutality
might not be gratuitous, the punishment of the owner
was followed by a grant of his effects. Corrupted by
such bribes, the young nobility not only declined to
oppose the lawlessness of the decemvirs, but they
openly showed that they preferred their own freedom
from all restraints to the general liberty.
3.38
The fifteenth of May
arrived, the decemvirs' term of office expired, but
no new magistrates were appointed. Though now only
private citizens, the decemvirs came forward as
determined as ever to enforce their authority and
retain all the emblems of power. It was now in truth
undisguised monarchy. Liberty was looked upon as for
ever lost, none stood forth to vindicate it, nor did
it seem likely that any one would do so. Not only
had the people sunk into despondency themselves but
they were beginning to be despised by their
neighbours, who scorned the idea of sovereign power
existing where there was no liberty. The Sabines
made an incursion into Roman territory in great
force, and carrying their ravages far and wide,
drove away an immense quantity of men and cattle to
Eretum, where they collected their scattered forces
and encamped in the hope that the distracted state
of Rome would prevent an army from being raised. Not
only the messengers who brought the information but
the country people who were flying into the City
created a panic. The decemvirs, hated alike by the
senate and the plebs, were left without any support,
and whilst they were consulting as to the necessary
measures, Fortune added a fresh cause of alarm. The
Aequi, advancing in a different direction, had
entrenched themselves on Algidus, and from there
were making predatory incursions into the territory
of Tusculum. The news was brought by envoys from
Tusculum who implored assistance. The panic created
unnerved the decemvirs, and seeing the City
encompassed by two separate wars they were driven to
consult the senate. They gave orders for the
senators to be summoned, quite realising what a
storm of indignant resentment was awaiting them, and
that they would be held solely responsible for the
wasted territory and the threatening dangers. This,
they expected, would lead to an attempt to deprive
them of office, unless they offered a unanimous
resistance, and by a sharp exercise of authority on
a few of the most daring spirits repress the
attempts of the others.
When the voice of the crier was heard in the
Forum calling the patricians to the Senate-house to
meet the decemvirs, the novelty of it, after so long
a suspension of the meetings of the senate, filled
the plebeians with astonishment. "What," they asked,
"has happened to revive a practice so long disused?
We ought to be grateful to the enemy who are
menacing us with war, for causing anything to happen
which belongs to the usage of a free State." They
looked in every part of the Forum for a senator, but
seldom was one recognised; then they contemplated
the Senate-house and the solitude round the
decemvirs. The latter put it down to the universal
hatred felt for their authority, the plebeians
explained it by saying that the senators did not
meet because private citizens had not the right to
summon them. If the plebs made common cause with the
senate, those who were bent on recovering their
liberty would have men to lead them, and as the
senators when summoned would not assemble, so the
plebs must refuse to be enrolled for service. Thus
the plebeians expressed their opinions. As to the
senators, there was hardly a single member of the
order in the Forum, and very few in the City.
Disgusted with the state of matters they had retired
to their country homes and were attending to their
own affairs, having lost all interest in those of
the State. They felt that the more they kept away
from any meeting and intercourse with their
tyrannical masters the safer would it be for them.
As, on being summoned, they did not come, the ushers
were despatched to their houses to exact the
penalties for non-attendance and to ascertain
whether they absented themselves of set purpose.
They took back word that the senate was in the
country. This was less unpleasant for the decemvirs
than if they had been in the City and had refused to
recognise their authority. Orders were issued for
all to be summoned for the following day. They
assembled in greater numbers than they themselves
expected. This led the plebeians to think that their
liberty had been betrayed by the senate, since they
had obeyed men whose term of office had expired and
who, apart from the force at their disposal, were
only private citizens; thus recognising their right
to convene the senate.
3.39
This obedience, however,
was shown more by their coming to the Senate-house
than by any servility in the sentiments which we
understand that they expressed. It is recorded that
after the question of the war had been introduced by
Appius Claudius, and before the formal discussion
began, L. Valerius Potitus created a scene by
demanding that he should be allowed to speak on the
political question, and on the decemvirs forbidding
him in threatening tones to do so, he declared that
he would present himself before the people. Marcus
Horatius Barbatus showed himself an equally
determined opponent, called the decemvirs "ten
Tarquins," and reminded them that it was under the
leadership of the Valerii and the Horatii that
monarchy had been expelled from Rome. It was not the
name of "king" that men had now grown weary of, for
it was the proper title of Jupiter, Romulus the
founder of the City and his successors were called
"kings," and the name was still retained for
religious purposes. It was the tyranny and violence
of kings that men detested. If these were
insupportable in a king or a king's son, who would
endure them in ten private citizens? They should see
to it that they did not, by forbidding freedom of
speech in the House, compel them to speak outside
its walls. He could not see how it was less
permissible for him as a private citizen to convene
an Assembly of the people than for them to summon
the senate. They might find out whenever they chose
how much more powerful a sense of wrong is to
vindicate liberty than greedy ambition is to support
tyranny. They were bringing up the question of the
Sabine war as if the Roman people had any more
serious war to wage than one against men who,
appointed to draw up laws, left no vestige of law or
justice in the State; who had abolished the
elections, the annual magistrates, the regular
succession of rulers, which formed the sole
guarantee of equal liberty for all; who, though
simple citizens, still retained the fasces and the
power of despotic monarchs. After the expulsion of
the kings, the magistrates were patricians; after
the secession of the plebs, plebeian magistrates
were appointed. "What party did these men belong
to?" he asked. "The popular party? Why, what have
they ever done in conjunction with the people? The
nobility? What! these men, who have not held a
meeting of the senate for nearly a year, and now
that they are holding one, forbid any speaking on
the political situation? Do not place too much
reliance on the fears of others. The ills that men
are actually suffering from seem to them much more
grievous than any they may fear in the future."
3.40
Whilst Horatius was
delivering this impassioned speech, and the
decemvirs were in doubt how far they ought to go,
whether in the direction of angry resistance or in
that of concession, and unable to see what the issue
would be, C. Claudius, the uncle of the decemvir
Appius, made a speech more in the nature of entreaty
than of censure. He implored him by the shade of his
father to think rather of the social order under
which he had been born than of the nefarious compact
made with his colleagues. It was much more, he said,
for the sake of Appius than of the State that he
made this appeal, for the State would assert its
rights in spite of them, if it could not do so with
their consent. But great controversies generally
kindle great and bitter passions, and it was what
these might lead to that he dreaded. Though the
decemvirs forbade the discussion of any subject save
the one they had introduced, their respect for
Claudius prevented them from interrupting him, so he
concluded with a resolution that no decree should be
passed by the senate. This was universally taken to
mean that Claudius adjudged them to be private
citizens, and many of the consulars expressed their
concurrence. Another proposal, apparently more
drastic, but in reality less effective, was that the
senate should order the patricians to hold a special
meeting to appoint an "interrex." For by voting for
this, they decided that those who were presiding
over the senate were lawful magistrates, whoever
they were, whereas the proposal that no decree
should be passed made them private citizens.
The cause of the decemvirs was on the point
of collapsing, when L. Cornelius Maluginensis, the
brother of M. Cornelius the decemvir, who had been
purposely selected from among the consulars to wind
up the debate, undertook to defend his brother and
his brother's colleagues by professing great anxiety
about the war. He was wondering, he said, by what
fatality it had come about that the decemvirs should
be attacked by those who had sought the office or by
their allies or in particular by these men, or why,
during all the months that the commonwealth was
undisturbed, no one questioned whether those at the
head of affairs were lawful magistrates or not,
whereas now, when the enemy were almost at their
gates, they were fomenting civic discord -unless
indeed they supposed that the nature of their
proceeding would be less apparent in the general
confusion. No one was justified in importing
prejudice into a matter of such moment whilst they
were preoccupied with much more serious anxieties.
He gave it as his opinion that the point raised by
Valerius and Horatius, namely, that the decemvirs
had ceased to hold office by May 15, should be
submitted to the senate for decision after the
impending wars had been brought to a close and the
tranquillity of the State restored. And further,
that Ap. Claudius must at once understand that he
must be prepared to make a proper return of the
election which he held for the appointment of
decemvirs, stating whether they were elected only
for a year, or until such time as the laws which
were still required should be passed. In his opinion
every matter but the war should for the present be
laid aside. If they thought that the reports of it
which had got abroad were false, and that not only
the messengers which had come in but even the Tuscan
envoys had invented the story, then they ought to
send out reconnoitring parties to bring back
accurate information. If, however, they believed the
messengers and the envoys, a levy ought to be made
at the earliest possible moment, the decemvirs
should lead the armies in whatever direction each
thought best, and nothing else should take
precedence.
3.41
Whilst a division was
being taken and the younger senators were carrying
this proposition, Valerius and Horatius rose again
in great excitement and loudly demanded leave to
discuss the political situation. If, they said, the
faction in the senate prevented them, they would
bring it before the people, for private citizens had
no power to silence them either in the Senate-house
or in the Assembly, and they were not going to give
way before the fasces of a mock authority. Appius
felt that unless he met their violence with equal
audacity, his authority was practically at an end.
"It will be better," he said, "not to speak on any
subject but the one we are now considering," and as
Valerius insisted that he should not keep silent for
a private citizen, Appius ordered a lictor to go to
him. Valerius ran to the doors of the Senate-house
and invoked "the protection of the Quirites." L.
Cornelius put an end to the scene by throwing his
arms round Appius as though to protect Valerius, but
really to protect Appius from further mischief. He
obtained permission for Valerius to say what he
wanted, and as this liberty did not go beyond words,
the decemvirs achieved their purpose. The consulars
and senior senators felt that the tribunitian
authority, which they still regarded with
detestation, was much more eagerly desired by the
plebs than the restoration of the consular
authority, and they would almost rather have had the
decemvirs voluntarily resigning office at a
subsequent period than that the plebs should recover
power through their unpopularity. If matters could
be quietly arranged and the consuls restored without
any popular disturbance, they thought that either
the preoccupation of war or the moderate exercise of
power on the part of the consuls would make the
plebs forget all about their tribunes. The levy was
proclaimed without any protest from the senate. The
men of age for active service answered to their
names, as there was no appeal from the authority of
the decemvirs. When the legions were enrolled, the
decemvirs arranged among themselves their respective
commands. The prominent men amongst them were Q.
Fabius and Appius Claudius. The war at home
threatened to be more serious than the one abroad,
and the violent disposition of Appius was deemed
more fitted to repress commotions in the City,
whilst Fabius was looked upon as more inclined to
evil practices than to be any permanent good to
them. This man, at one time so distinguished both at
home and in the field, had been so changed by office
and the influence of his colleagues that he
preferred to take Appius as his model rather than be
true to himself. He was entrusted with the Sabine
war, and Manlius Rabuleius and Q. Poetilius were
associated with him in its conduct. M. Cornelius was
sent to Algidus, together with L. Minucius, T.
Antonius, Kaeso Duillius, and M. Sergius. It was
decreed that Sp. Oppius should assist Ap. Claudius
in the defence of the City, with an authority
co-ordinate with that of the other decemvirs.
3.42
The military operations
were not any more satisfactory than the domestic
administration. The commanders were certainly at
fault in having made themselves objects of
detestation to the citizens, but otherwise the whole
of the blame rested on the soldiers, who, to prevent
anything from succeeding under the auspices and
leadership of the decemvirs, disgraced both
themselves and their generals by allowing themselves
to be defeated. Both armies had been routed, the one
by the Sabines at Eretum, the other by the Aequi on
Algidus. Fleeing from Eretum in the silence of the
night, they had entrenched themselves on some high
ground near the City between Fidenae and
Crustumeria. They refused to meet the pursuing enemy
anywhere on equal terms, and trusted for safety to
their entrenchments and the nature of the ground,
not to arms or courage. On Algidus they behaved more
disgracefully, suffered a heavier defeat, and even
lost their camp. Deprived of all their stores, the
soldiers made their way to Tusculum, looking for
subsistence to the good faith and compassion of
their hosts, and their confidence was not misplaced.
Such alarming reports were brought to Rome that the
senate, laying aside their feeling against the
decemvirs, resolved that guards should be mounted in
the City, ordered that all who were of age to bear
arms should man the walls and undertake outpost duty
before the gates, and decreed a supply of arms to be
sent to Tusculum to replace those which had been
lost, whilst the decemvirs were to evacuate Tusculum
and keep their soldiers encamped. The other camp was
to be transferred from Fidenae on to the Sabine
territory, and by assuming the offensive deter the
enemy from any project of attacking the City.
3.43
To these defeats at the
hands of the enemy have to be added two infamous
crimes on the part of the decemvirs. L. Siccius was
serving in the campaign against the Sabines. Seeing
the bitter feeling against the decemvirs, he used to
hold secret conversations with the soldiery and
threw out hints about the creation of tribunes and
resorting to a secession. He was sent to select and
survey a site for a camp, and the soldiers who had
been told off to accompany him were instructed to
choose a favourable opportunity for attacking and
despatching him. They did not effect their purpose
with impunity, several of the assassins fell around
him whilst he was defending himself with a courage
equal to his strength, and that was exceptional. The
rest brought a report back to camp that Siccius had
fallen into an ambush and had died fighting bravely,
whilst some soldiers had been lost with him. At
first the informants were believed; but subsequently
a cohort which had gone out by permission of the
decemvirs to bury those who had fallen, found, when
they reached the spot, no corpse despoiled, but the
body of Siccius lying in the centre fully armed with
those around all turned towards him, whilst there
was not a single body belonging to the enemy nor any
trace of their having retired. They brought the body
back and declared that, as a matter of fact, he had
been killed by his own men. The camp was filled with
deep resentment, and it was decided that Siccius
should be forthwith carried to Rome. The decemvirs
anticipated this resolve by hastily burying him with
military honours at the cost of the State. The
soldiers manifested profound grief at his funeral,
and the worst possible suspicions were everywhere
entertained against the decemvirs.
3.44
This was followed by a
second atrocity, the result of brutal lust, which
occurred in the City and led to consequences no less
tragic than the outrage and death of Lucretia, which
had brought about the expulsion of the royal family.
Not only was the end of the decemvirs the same as
that of the kings, but the cause of their losing
their power was the same in each case. Ap. Claudius
had conceived a guilty passion for a girl of
plebeian birth. The girl's father, L. Verginius,
held a high rank in the army on Algidus; he was a
man of exemplary character both at home and in the
field. His wife had been brought up on equally high
principles, and their children were being brought up
in the same way. He had betrothed his daughter to L.
Icilius, who had been tribune, an active and
energetic man whose courage had been proved in his
battles for the plebs. This girl, now in the bloom
of her youth and beauty, excited Appius' passions,
and he tried to prevail on her by presents and
promises. When he found that her virtue was proof
against all temptation, he had recourse to
unscrupulous and brutal violence. He commissioned a
client, M. Claudius, to claim the girl as his slave,
and to bar any claim on the part of her friends to
retain possession of her till the case was tried, as
he thought that the father's absence afforded a good
opportunity for this illegal action. As the girl was
going to her school in the Forum -the grammar
schools were held in booths there -the decemvir's
pander laid his hand upon her, declaring that she
was the daughter of a slave of his, and a slave
herself. He then ordered her to follow him, and
threatened, if she hesitated, to carry her off by
force. While the girl was stupefied with terror, her
maid's shrieks, invoking "the protection of the
Quirites," drew a crowd together. The names of her
father Verginius and her betrothed lover, Icilius,
were held in universal respect. Regard for them
brought their friends, feelings of indignation
brought the crowd to the maiden's support. She was
now safe from violence; the man who claimed her said
that he was proceeding according to law, not by
violence, there was no need for any excited
gathering. He cited the girl into court. Her
supporters advised her to follow him; they came
before the tribunal of Appius. The claimant
rehearsed a story already perfectly familiar to the
judge as he was the author of the plot, how the girl
had been born in his house, stolen from there,
transferred to the house of Verginius and fathered
on him; these allegations would be supported by
definite evidence, and he would prove them to the
satisfaction of Verginius himself, who was really
most concerned, as an injury had been done to him.
Meanwhile, he urged, it was only right that a slave
girl should follow her master. The girl's advocates
contended that Verginius was absent on the service
of the State, he would be present in two days' time
if information were sent to him, and it was contrary
to equity that in his absence he should incur risk
with regard to his children. They demanded that he
should adjourn the whole of the proceedings till the
father's arrival, and in accordance with the law
which he himself had enacted, grant the custody of
the girl to those who asserted her freedom, and not
suffer a maiden of ripe age to incur danger to her
reputation before her liberty was imperilled.
3.45
Before giving judgment,
Appius showed how liberty was upheld by that very
law to which the friends of Verginia had appealed in
support of their demand. But, he went on to say, it
guaranteed liberty only so far as its provisions
were strictly adhered to as regarded both persons
and cases. For where personal freedom is the matter
of claim, that provision holds good, because any one
can lawfully plead, but in the case of one who is
still in her father's power, there is none but her
father to whom her master need renounce possession.
His decision, therefore, was that the father should
be summoned, and in the meanwhile the man who
claimed her should not forego his right to take the
girl and give security to produce her on the arrival
of her reputed father. The injustice of this
sentence called forth many murmurs, but no one
ventured on open protest, until P. Numitorius, the
girl's grandfather, and Icilius, her betrothed,
appeared on the scene. The intervention of Icilius
seemed to offer the best chance of thwarting Appius,
and the crowd made way for him. The lictor said that
judgment had been given, and as Icilius continued
loudly protesting he attempted to remove him. Such
rank injustice would have fired even a gentle
temper. He exclaimed, "I am, at your orders, Appius,
to be removed at the point of the sword, that you
may stifle all comment on what you want to keep
concealed. I am going to marry this maiden, and I am
determined to have a chaste wife. Summon all the
lictors of all your colleagues, give orders for the
axes and rods to be in readiness -the betrothed of
Icilius shall not remain outside her father's house.
Even if you have deprived us of the two bulwarks of
our liberty -the aid of our tribunes and the right
of appeal to the Roman plebs -that has given you no
right to our wives and children, the victims of your
lust. Vent your cruelty upon our backs and necks;
let female honour at least be safe. If violence is
offered to this girl, I shall invoke the aid of the
Quirites here for my betrothed, Verginius that of
the soldiers for his only daughter; we shall all
invoke the aid of gods and men, and you shall not
carry out that judgment except at the cost of our
lives. Reflect, Appius, I demand of you, whither you
are going! When Verginius has come, he must decide
what action to take about his daughter; if he
submits to this man's claim, he must look out
another husband for her. Meantime I will vindicate
her liberty at the price of my life, sooner than
sacrifice my honour."
3.46
The people were excited
and a conflict appeared imminent. The lictors had
closed round Icilius, but matters had not got beyond
threats on both sides when Appius declared that it
was not the defence of Verginia that was Icilius'
main object; a restless intriguer, even yet
breathing the spirit of the tribuneship, was looking
out for a chance of creating sedition. He would not,
however, afford him material for it that day, but
that he might know that it was not to his insolence
that he was making a concession, but to the absent
Verginius, to the name of father, and to liberty, he
would not adjudicate on that day, or issue any
decree. He would ask M. Claudius to forego his
right, and allow the girl to be in the custody of
her friends till the morrow. If the father did not
then appear, he warned Icilius and men of his stamp
that neither as legislator would he be disloyal to
his own law, nor as decemvir would he lack firmness
to execute it. He certainly would not call upon the
lictors of his colleagues to repress the ringleaders
of sedition, he should be content with his own. The
time for perpetrating this illegality was thus
postponed, and after the girl's supporters had
withdrawn, it was decided as the very first thing to
be done that the brother of Icilius and one of
Numitor's sons, both active youths, should make
their way straight to the gate and summon Verginius
from the camp with all possible speed. They knew
that the girl's safety turned upon her protector
against lawlessness being present in time. They
started on their mission, and riding at full speed
brought the news to the father. While the claimant
of the girl was pressing Icilius to enter his plea
and name his sureties, and Icilius kept asserting
that this very thing was being arranged, purposely
spinning out the time to allow of his messengers
getting first to the camp, the crowd everywhere held
up their hands to show that every one of them was
ready to be security for him. With tears in his
eyes, he said, "It is most kind of you. Tomorrow I
may need your help, now I have sufficient
securities." So Verginia was bailed on the security
of her relatives. Appius remained for some time on
the bench, to avoid the appearance of having taken
his seat for that one case only. When he found that
owing to the universal interest in this one case no
other suitors appeared, he withdrew to his home and
wrote to his colleagues in camp not to grant leave
of absence to Verginius, and actually to keep him
under arrest. This wicked advice came too late, as
it deserved to do; Verginius had already obtained
leave, and started in the first watch. The letter
ordering his detention was delivered the next
morning, and was therefore useless.
3.47
In the City, the citizens
were standing in the Forum in the early dawn, on the
tiptoe of expectation. Verginius, in mourning garb,
brought his daughter, similarly attired, and
accompanied by a number of matrons, into the Forum.
An immense body of sympathisers stood round him. He
went amongst the people, took them by the hand and
appealed to them to help him, not out of compassion
only but because they owed it to him; he was at the
front day by day, in defence of their children and
their wives; of no man could they recount more
numerous deeds of endurance and of daring than of
him. What good was it all, he asked, if while the
City was safe, their children were exposed to what
would be their worst fate if it were actually
captured? Men gathered round him, whilst he spoke as
though he were addressing the Assembly. Icilius
followed in the same strain. The women who
accompanied him made a profounder impression by
their silent weeping than any words could have made.
Unmoved by all this -it was really madness rather
than love that had clouded his judgment -Appius
mounted the tribunal. The claimant began by a brief
protest against the proceedings of the previous day;
judgment, he said, had not been given owing to the
partiality of the judge. But before he could proceed
with his claim or any opportunity was given to
Verginius of replying, Appius intervened. It is
possible that the ancient writers may have correctly
stated some ground which he alleged for his
decision, but I do not find one anywhere that would
justify such an iniquitous decision. The one thing
which can be propounded as being generally admitted
is the judgment itself. His decision was that the
girl was a slave. At first all were stupefied with
amazement at this atrocity, and for a few moments
there was a dead silence. Then, as M. Claudius
approached the matrons standing round the girl, to
seize her amidst their outcries and tears,
Verginius, pointing with outstretched arm to Appius,
cried, "It is to Icilius and not to you, Appius,
that I have betrothed my daughter; I have brought
her up for wedlock, not for outrage. Are you
determined to satisfy your brutal lusts like cattle
and wild beasts? Whether these people will put up
with this, I know not, but I hope that those who
possess arms will refuse to do so." Whilst the man
who claimed the maiden was being pushed back by the
group of women and her supporters who stood round,
the crier called for silence.
3.48
The decemvir, utterly
abandoned to his passion, addressed the crowd and
told them that he had ascertained not only through
the insolent abuse of Icilius on the previous day
and the violent behaviour of Verginius, which the
Roman people could testify to, but mainly from
certain definite information received, that all
through the night meetings had been held in the City
to organise a seditious movement. Forewarned of the
likelihood of disturbance, he had come down into the
Forum with an armed escort, not to injure peaceable
citizens, but to uphold the authority of the
government by putting down the disturbers of public
tranquillity. "It will therefore," he proceeded, "be
better for you to keep quiet. Go, lictor, remove the
crowd and clear a way for the master to take
possession of his slave." When, in a transport of
rage, he had thundered out these words, the people
fell back and left the deserted girl a prey to
injustice. Verginius, seeing no prospect of help
anywhere, turned to the tribunal. "Pardon me,
Appius, I pray you, if I have spoken disrespectfully
to you, pardon a father's grief. Allow me to
question the nurse here, in the maiden's presence,
as to what are the real facts of the case, that if I
have been falsely called her father, I may leave her
with the greater resignation." Permission being
granted, he took the girl and her nurse aside to the
booths near the temple of Venus Cloacina, now known
as the "New Booths," and there, snatching up a
butcher's knife, he plunged it into her breast,
saying, "In this the only way in which I can, I
vindicate, my child, thy freedom." Then, looking
towards the tribunal, "By this blood, Appius, I
devote thy head to the infernal gods." Alarmed at
the outcry which arose at this terrible deed, the
decemvir ordered Verginius to be arrested.
Brandishing the knife, he cleared the way before
him, until, protected by a crowd of sympathisers, he
reached the city gate. Icilius and Numitorius took
up the lifeless body and showed it to the people;
they deplored the villainy of Appius, the
ill-starred beauty of the girl, the terrible
compulsion under which the father had acted. The
matrons, who followed with angry cries, asked, "Was
this the condition on which they were to rear
children, was this the reward of modesty and
purity?" with other manifestations of that womanly
grief, which, owing to their keener sensibility, is
more demonstrative, and so expresses itself in more
moving and pitiful fashion. The men, and especially
Icilius, talked of nothing but the abolition of the
tribunitian power and the right of appeal and loudly
expressed their indignation at the condition of
public affairs.
3.49
.The people were excited
partly by the atrocity of the deed, partly by the
opportunity now offered of recovering their
liberties. Appius first ordered Icilius to be
summoned before him, then, on his refusal to come,
to be arrested. As the lictors were not able to get
near him, Appius himself with a body of young
patricians forced his way through the crowd and
ordered him to be taken to prison. By this time
Icilius was not only surrounded by the people, but
the people's leaders were there -L. Valerius and M.
Horatius. They drove back the lictors and said, if
they were going to proceed by law, they would
undertake the defence of Icilius against one who was
only a private citizen, but if they were going to
attempt force, they would be no unequal match for
him. A furious scuffle began, the decemvir's lictors
attacked Valerius and Horatius; their "fasces" were
broken up by the people; Appius mounted the
platform, Horatius and Valerius followed him; the
Assembly listened to them, Appius was shouted down.
Valerius, assuming the tone of authority, ordered
the lictors to cease attendance on one who held no
official position, on which Appius, thoroughly
cowed, and fearing for his life, muffled his head
with his toga and retreated into a house near the
Forum, without his adversaries perceiving his
flight. Sp. Oppius burst into the Forum from the
other side to support his colleague, and saw that
their authority was overcome by main force.
Uncertain what to do and distracted by the
conflicting advice given him on all sides, he gave
orders for the senate to be summoned. As a great
number of the senators were thought to disapprove of
the conduct of the decemvirs, the people hoped that
their power would be put an end to through the
action of the senate, and consequently became quiet.
The senate decided that nothing should be done to
irritate the plebs, and, what was of much more
importance, that every precaution should be taken to
prevent the arrival of Verginius from creating a
commotion in the army.
3.50
Accordingly, some of the
younger senators were sent to the camp, which was
then on Mount Vecilius. They informed the three
decemvirs who were in command that by every possible
means they were to prevent the soldiers from
mutinying. Verginius caused a greater commotion in
the camp than the one he had left behind in the
City. The sight of his arrival with a body of nearly
400 men from the City, who, fired with indignation,
had enlisted themselves as his comrades, still more
the weapon still clenched in his hand and his
blood-besprinkled clothes, attracted the attention
of the whole camp. The civilian garb seen in all
directions in the camp made the number of the
citizens who had accompanied him seem greater than
it was. Questioned as to what had happened,
Verginius for a long time could not speak for
weeping; at length when those who had run up stood
quietly round him and there was silence, he
explained everything in order just as it happened.
Then lifting up his hands to heaven he appealed to
them as his fellow-soldiers and implored them not to
attribute to him what was really the crime of
Appius, nor to look upon him with abhorrence as the
murderer of his children. His daughter's life was
dearer to him than his own, had she been allowed to
live in liberty and purity; when he saw her dragged
off as a slave-girl to be outraged, he thought it
better to lose his child by death than by dishonour.
It was through compassion for her that he had fallen
into what looked like cruelty, nor would he have
survived her had he not entertained the hope of
avenging her death by the aid of his
fellow-soldiers. For they, too, had daughters and
sisters and wives; the lust of Appius was not
quenched with his daughter's life, nay rather, the
more impunity it met with the more unbridled would
it be. Through the sufferings of another they had
received a warning how to guard themselves against a
like wrong. As for him, his wife had been snatched
from him by Fate, his daughter, because she could no
longer live in chastity, had met a piteous but an
honourable death. There was no longer in his house
any opportunity for Appius to gratify his lust, from
any other violence on that man's part he would
defend himself with the same resolution with which
he had defended his child; others must look out for
themselves and for their children.
To this impassioned appeal of Verginius the
crowd replied with a shout that they would not fail
him in his grief or in the defence of his liberty.
The civilians mingling in the throng of soldiers
told the same tragic story, and how much more
shocking the incident was to behold than to hear
about; at the same time they announced that affairs
were in fatal confusion at Rome, and that some had
followed them into camp with the tidings that Appius
after being almost killed had gone into exile. The
result was a general call to arms, they plucked up
the standards and started for Rome. The decemvirs,
thoroughly alarmed at what they saw and at what they
heard of the state of things in Rome, went to
different parts of the camp to try and allay the
excitement. Where they tried persuasion no answer
was returned, but where they attempted to exercise
authority, the reply was, "We are men and have
arms." They marched in military order to the City
and occupied the Aventine. Every one whom they met
was urged to recover the liberties of the plebs and
appoint tribunes; apart from this, no appeals to
violence were heard. The meeting of the senate was
presided over by Sp. Oppius. They decided not to
adopt any harsh measures, as it was through their
own lack of energy that the sedition had arisen.
Three envoys of consular rank were sent to the army
to demand in the name of the senate by whose orders
they had abandoned their camp, and what they meant
by occupying the Aventine in arms, and diverting the
war from foreign foes to their own country, which
they had taken forcible possession of. They were at
no loss for an answer, but they were at a loss for
some one to give it, since they had as yet no
regular leader, and individual officers did not
venture to expose themselves to the dangers of such
a position. The only reply was a loud and general
demand that L. Valerius and M. Horatius should be
sent to them, to these men they would give a formal
reply.
3.51
After the envoys were
dismissed, Verginius pointed out to the soldiers
that they had a few moments ago felt themselves
embarrassed in a matter of no great importance,
because they were a multitude without a head, and
the answer they had given, though it served their
turn, was the outcome rather of the general feeling
at the time than of any settled purpose. He was of
opinion that ten men should be chosen to hold
supreme command, and by virtue of their military
rank should be called tribunes of the soldiers. He
himself was the first to whom this distinction was
offered, but he replied, "Reserve the opinion you
have formed of me till both you and I are in more
favourable circumstances; so long as my daughter is
unavenged no honour can give me pleasure, nor in the
present disturbed state of the commonwealth is it
any advantage for those men to be at your head who
are most obnoxious to party malice. If I am to be of
any use, I shall be none the less so in a private
capacity." Ten military tribunes, accordingly, were
appointed. The army acting against the Sabines did
not remain passive. There, too, at the instigation
of Icilius and Numitorius, a revolt against the
decemvirs took place. The feelings of the soldiery
were roused by the recollection of the murdered
Siccius no less than by the fresh story of the
maiden whom it had been sought to make a victim of
foul lust. When Icilius heard that tribunes of the
soldiers had been elected on the Aventine, he
anticipated from what he knew of the plebs that when
they came. to elect their tribunes they would follow
the lead of the army and choose those who were
already elected as military tribunes. As he was
looking to a tribuneship himself, he took care to
get the same number appointed and invested with
similar powers by his own men, before they entered
the City. They made their entry through the Colline
gate in military order, with standards displayed,
and proceeded through the heart of the City to the
Aventine. There the two armies united, and the
twenty military tribunes were requested to appoint
two of their number to take the supreme direction of
affairs. They appointed M. Oppius and Sex. Manlius.
Alarmed at the direction affairs were talking, the
senate held daily meetings, but the time was spent
in mutual reproaches rather than in deliberation.
The decemvirs were openly charged with the murder of
Siccius, the profligacy of Appius, and the disgrace
incurred in the field. It was proposed that Valerius
and Horatius should go to the Aventine, but they
refused to go unless the decemvirs gave up the
insignia of an office which had expired the previous
year. The decemvirs protested against this attempt
to coerce them, and said that they would not lay
down their authority until the laws which they were
appointed to draw up were duly enacted.
3.52
M. Duillius, a former
tribune, informed the plebs that, owing to incessant
wranglings, no business was being transacted in the
senate. He did not believe that the senators would
trouble about them till they saw the City deserted;
the Sacred Hill would remind them of the firm
determination once shown by the plebs, and they
would learn that unless the tribunitian power was
restored there could be no concord in the State. The
armies left the Aventine and, going out by the
Nomentan -or, as it was then called, the Ficulan -road, they encamped on the Sacred Hill, imitating
the moderation of their fathers by abstaining from
all injury. The plebeian civilians followed the
army, no one whose age allowed him to go hung back.
Their wives and children followed them, asking in
piteous tones, to whom would they leave them in a
City where neither modesty nor liberty were
respected? The unwonted solitude gave a dreary and
deserted look to every part of Rome; in the Forum
there were only a few of the older patricians, and
when the senate was in session it was wholly
deserted. Many besides Horatius and Valerius were
now angrily asking, "What are you waiting for,
senators? If the decemvirs do not lay aside their
obstinacy, will you allow everything to go to wrack
and ruin? And what, pray; is that authority,
decemvirs, to which you cling so closely? Are you
going to administer justice to walls and roofs? Are
you not ashamed to see a greater number of lictors
in the Forum than of all other citizens put
together? What will you do if the enemy approach the
City? What if the plebs, seeing that their secession
has no effect, come shortly against us in arms? Do
you want to end your power by the fall of the City?
Either you will have to do without the plebeians or
you will have to accept their tribunes; sooner than
they will go without their magistrates, we shall
have to go without ours. That power which they
wrested from our fathers, when it was an untried
novelty, they will not submit to be deprived of, now
that they have tasted the sweets of it, especially
as we are not making that moderate use of our power
which would prevent their needing its protection."
Remonstrances like these came from all parts of the
House; at last the decemvirs, overborne by the
unanimous opposition, asserted that since it was the
general wish, they would submit to the authority of
the senate. All they asked for was that they might
be protected against the popular rage; they warned
the senate against the plebs becoming by their death
habituated to inflicting punishment on the
patricians.
3.53
Valerius and Horatius
were then sent to the plebs with terms which it was
thought would lead to their return and the
adjustment of all differences; they were also
instructed to procure guarantees for the protection
of the decemvirs against popular violence. They were
welcomed in the camp with every expression of
delight, for they were unquestionably regarded as
liberators from the commencement of the disturbance
to its close. Thanks therefore were offered to them
on their arrival. Icilius was the spokesman. A
policy had been agreed upon before the arrival of
the envoys, so when the discussion of the terms
commenced, and the envoys asked what the demands of
the plebs were, Icilius put forward proposals of
such a nature as to show clearly that their hopes
lay in the justice of their cause rather than in an
appeal to arms. They demanded the re-establishment
of the tribunitian power and the right of appeal,
which before the institution of decemvirs had been
their main security. They also demanded an amnesty
for those who had incited the soldiers or the plebs
to recover their liberties by a secession. The only
vindictive demand made was with reference to the
punishment of the decemvirs. They insisted, as an
act of justice, that they should be surrendered, and
they threatened to burn them alive. The envoys
replied to these demands as follows: "The demands
you have put forward as the result of your
deliberations are so equitable that they would have
been voluntarily conceded, for you ask for them as
the safeguards of your liberties, not as giving you
licence to attack others. Your feelings of
resentment are to be excused rather than indulged;
for it is through hatred of cruelty that you are
actually hurrying into cruelty, and almost before
you are free yourselves you want to act the tyrant
over your adversaries. Is our State never to enjoy
any respite from punishments inflicted either by the
patricians on the Roman plebs, or by the plebs on
the patricians? You need the shield rather than the
sword. He is humble enough who lives in the State
under equal laws, neither inflicting nor suffering
injury. Even if the time should come when you will
make yourselves formidable, when, after recovering
your magistrates and your laws, you will have
judicial power over our lives and property -even
then you will decide each case on its merits, it is
enough now that your liberties are won back."
3.54
Permission having been
unanimously granted them to do as they thought best,
the envoys announced that they would return shortly
after matters were arranged. When they laid the
demands of the plebs before the senate, the other
decemvirs, on finding that no mention was made of
inflicting punishment on them, raised no objection
whatever. The stern Appius, who was detested most of
all, measuring the hatred of others towards him by
his hatred towards them, said, "I am quite aware of
the fate that is hanging over me. I see that the
struggle against us is only postponed till our
weapons are handed over to our opponents. Their rage
must be appeased with blood. Still, even I do not
hesitate to lay down my decemvirate." A decree was
passed for the decemvirs to resign office as soon as
possible, Q. Furius, the Pontifex Maximus, to
appoint tribunes of the plebs, and an amnesty to be
granted for the secession of the soldiers and the
plebs. After these decrees were passed, the senate
broke up, and the decemvirs proceeded to the
Assembly and formally laid down their office, to the
immense delight of all. This was reported to the
plebs on the Sacred Hill. The envoys who carried the
intelligence were followed by everybody who was left
in the City; this mass of people was met by another
rejoicing multitude who issued from the camp. They
exchanged mutual congratulations on the restoration
of liberty and concord. The envoys, addressing the
multitude as an Assembly, said, "Prosperity,
fortune, and happiness to you and to the State!
Return to your fatherland, your homes, your wives,
and your children! But carry into the City the same
self-control which you have exhibited here, where no
man's land has been damaged, notwithstanding the
need of so many things necessary for so large a
multitude. Go to the Aventine, whence you came;
there, on the auspicious spot where you laid the
beginnings of your liberty, you will appoint your
tribunes; the Pontifex Maximus will be present to
hold the election." Great was the delight and
eagerness with which they applauded everything. They
plucked up the standards and started for Rome,
outdoing those they met in their expressions of joy.
Marching under arms through the City in silence,
they reached the Aventine. There the Pontifex
Maximus at once proceeded to hold the election for
tribunes. The first to be elected was L. Verginius;
next, the organisers of the secession, L. Icilius
and P. Numitorius, the uncle of Verginius; then, C.
Sicinius, the son of the man who is recorded as the
first to be elected of the tribunes on the Sacred
Hill, and M. Duillius, who had filled that office
with distinction before the appointment of the
decemvirs, and through all the struggles with them
had never failed to support the plebs. After these
came M. Titinius, M. Pomponius, C. Apronius, Appius
Villius, and Caius Oppius, all of whom were elected
rather in hope of their future usefulness than for
any services actually rendered. When he had entered
on his tribuneship L. Icilius at once proposed a
resolution which the plebs accepted, that no one
should suffer for the secession. Marcus Duillius
immediately carried a measure for the election of
consuls and the right of appeal from them to the
people. All these measures were passed in a council
of the plebs which was held in the Flaminian
Meadows, now called the Circus Flaminius.
3.55
The election of consuls
took place under the presidency of an "interrex."
Those elected were L. Valerius and M. Horatius, and
they at once assumed office. Their consulship was a
popular one, and inflicted no injustice upon the
patricians, though they regarded it with suspicion,
for whatever was done to safeguard the liberties of
the plebs they looked upon as an infringement of
their own powers. First of all, as it was a doubtful
legal point whether the patricians were bound by the
ordinances of the plebs, they carried a law in the
Assembly of Centuries that what the plebs had passed
in their Tribes should be binding on the whole
people. By this law a very effective weapon was
placed in the hands of the tribunes. Then another
consular law, confirming the right of appeal, as the
one defence of liberty, which had been annulled by
the decemvirs, was not only restored but
strengthened for the future by a fresh enactment.
This forbade the appointment of any magistrate from
whom there was no right of appeal, and provided that
any one who did so appoint might be rightly and
lawfully put to death, nor should the man who put
him to death be held guilty of murder. When they had
sufficiently strengthened the plebs by the right of
appeal on the one hand and the protection afforded
by the tribunes on the other, they proceeded to
secure the personal inviolability of the tribunes
themselves. The memory of this had almost perished,
so they renewed it with certain sacred rites revived
from a distant past, and in addition to securing
their inviolability by the sanctions of religion,
they enacted a law that whoever offered violence to
the magistrates of the plebs, whether tribunes,
aediles, or decemviral judges, his person should be
devoted to Jupiter, his possessions sold and the
proceeds assigned to the temples of Ceres, Liber,
and Liberal Jurists say that by this law no one was
actually "sacrosanct," but that when injury was
offered to any of those mentioned above the offender
was "sacer." If an aedile, therefore, were arrested
and sent to prison by superior magistrates, though
this could not be done by law -for by this law it
would not be lawful for him to be injured -yet it
is a proof that an aedile is not held to be
"sacrosanct," whereas the tribunes of the plebs were
"sacrosanct" by the ancient oath taken by the
plebeians when that office was first created. There
were some who interpreted the law as including even
the consuls in its provisions, and the praetors,
because they were elected under the same auspices as
the consuls, for a consul was called a "judge." This
interpretation is refuted by the fact that in those
times it was the custom for a judge to be called not
"consul" but "praetor." These were the laws enacted
by the consuls. They also ordered that the decrees
of the senate, which used formerly to be suppressed
and tampered with at the pleasure of the consuls,
should henceforth be taken to the aediles at the
temple of Ceres. Marcus Duillius, the tribune, then
proposed a resolution which the plebs adopted, that
any one who should leave the plebs without tribunes,
or who should create a magistrate from whom there
was no appeal, should be scourged and beheaded. All
these transactions were distasteful to the
patricians, but they did not actively oppose them,
as none of them had yet been marked out for
vindictive proceedings.
3.56
The power of the tribunes
and the liberties of the plebs were now on a secure
basis. The next step was taken by the tribunes, who
thought the time had come when they might safely
proceed against individuals. They selected Verginius
to take up the first prosecution, which was that of
Appius. When the day had been fixed, and Appius had
come down to the Forum with a bodyguard of young
patricians, the sight of him and his satellites
reminded all present of the power he had used so
vilely. Verginius began: "Oratory was invented for
doubtful cases. I will not, therefore, waste time by
a long indictment before you of the man from whose
cruelty you have vindicated yourselves by force of
arms, nor will I allow him to add to his other
crimes an impudent defence. So I will pass over,
Appius Claudius, all the wicked and impious things
that you had the audacity to do, one after another,
for the last two years. One charge only will I bring
against you, that contrary to law you have adjudged
a free person to be a slave, and unless you name an
umpire before whom you can prove your innocence, I
shall order you to be taken to prison." Appius had
nothing to hope for in the protection of the
tribunes or the verdict of the people. Nevertheless
he called upon the tribunes, and when none
intervened to stay proceedings and he was seized by
the apparitor, he said, "I appeal." This single
word, the protection of liberty, uttered by those
lips which had so lately judicially deprived a
person of her freedom, produced a general silence.
Then the people remarked to one another that there
were gods after all who did not neglect the affairs
of men; arrogance and cruelty were visited by
punishments which, though lingering, were not light;
that man was appealing who had taken away the power
of appeal; that man was imploring the protection of
the people who had trampled underfoot all their
rights; he was losing his own liberty and being
carried off to prison who had sentenced a free
person to slavery. Amidst the murmur of the Assembly
the voice of Appius himself was heard imploring "the
protection of the Roman people."
He began by enumerating the services of his
ancestors to the State, both at home and in the
field; his own unfortunate devotion to the plebs,
which had led him to resign his consulship in order
to enact equal laws for all, giving thereby the
greatest offence to the patricians; his laws which
were still in force, though their author was being
carried to prison. As to his own personal conduct
and his good and evil deeds, however, he would bring
them to the test when he had the opportunity of
pleading his cause. For the present he claimed the
common right of a Roman citizen to be allowed to
plead on the appointed day and submit himself to the
judgment of the Roman people. He was not so
apprehensive of the general feeling against him as
to abandon all hope in the impartiality and sympathy
of his fellow-citizens. If he was to be taken to
prison before his case was heard, he would once more
appeal to the tribunes, and warn them not to copy
the example of those whom they hated. If they
admitted that they were bound by the same agreement
to abolish the right of appeal which they accused
the decemvirs of having formed, then he would appeal
to the people and invoke the laws which both consuls
and tribunes had enacted that very year to protect
that right. For if before the case is heard and
judgment given there is no power of appeal, who
would appeal ? What plebeian, even the humblest,
would find protection in the laws, if Appius
Claudius could not? His case would show whether it
was tyranny or freedom that was conferred by the new
laws, and whether the right of challenge and appeal
against the injustice of magistrates was only
displayed in empty words or was actually granted.
3.57
Verginius replied. Appius
Claudius, he said, alone was outside the laws,
outside all the bonds that held States or even human
society together. Let men cast their eyes on that
tribunal, the fortress of all villainies, where that
perpetual decemvir, surrounded by hangmen not
lictors, in contempt of gods and men alike, wreaked
his vengeance on the goods, the backs, and the lives
of the citizens, threatening all indiscriminately
with the rods and axes, and then when his mind was
diverted from rapine and murder to lust, tore a
free-born maiden from her father's arms, before the
eyes of Rome, and gave her to a client, the minister
of his intrigues -that tribunal where by a cruel
decree and infamous judgment he armed the father's
hand against the daughter, where he ordered those
who took up the maiden's lifeless body -her
betrothed lover and her grandfather -to be thrown
into prison, moved less by her death than by the
check to his criminal gratification. For him as much
as for others was that prison built which he used to
call "the domicile of the Roman plebs." Let him
appeal again and again, he (the speaker) would
always refer him to an umpire on the charge of
having sentenced a free person to slavery. If he
would not go before an umpire he should order him to
be imprisoned as though found guilty. He was
accordingly thrown into prison, and though no one
actually opposed this step, there was a general
feeling of anxiety, since even the plebeians
themselves thought it an excessive use of their
liberty to inflict punishment on so great a man. The
tribune adjourned the day of trial. During these
proceedings ambassadors came from the Latins and
Hernicans to offer their congratulations on the
restoration of harmony between the patriciate and
the plebs. As a memorial of it, they brought an
offering to Jupiter Optimus Maximus, in the shape of
a golden crown. It was not a large one, as they were
not wealthy States; their religious observances were
characterised by devotion rather than magnificence.
They also brought information that the Aequi and
Volscians were devoting all their energies to
preparing for war. The consuls were thereupon
ordered to arrange their respective commands. The
Sabines fell to Horatius, the Aequi to Valerius.
They proclaimed a levy for these wars, and so
favourable was the attitude of the plebs that not
only did the men liable for service promptly give in
their names, but a large part of the levy consisted
of men who had served their time and came forward as
volunteers. In this way the army was strengthened
not only in numbers but in the quality of the
soldiers, as veterans took their places in the
ranks. Before they left the City, the laws of the
decemvirs, known as the "Twelve Tables," were
engraved in brass and publicly exhibited; some
writers assert that the aediles discharged this task
under orders from the tribunes.
3.58
Caius Claudius, through
detestation of the crimes committed by the
decemvirs, and the anger which he, more than any
one, felt at the tyrannical conduct of his nephew,
had retired to Regillum, his ancestral home. Though
advanced in years, he now returned to the City, to
deprecate the dangers threatening the man whose
vicious practices had driven him into retirement.
Going down to the Forum in mourning garb,
accompanied by the members of his house and by his
clients, he appealed to the citizens individually,
and implored them not to stain the house of the
Claudii with such an indelible disgrace as to deem
them worthy of bonds and imprisonment. To think that
a man whose image would be held in highest honour by
posterity, the framer of their laws and the founder
of Roman jurisprudence, should be lying manacled
amongst nocturnal thieves and robbers! Let them turn
their thoughts for a moment from feelings of
exasperation to calm examination and reflection, and
forgive one man at the intercession of so many of
the Claudii, rather than through their hatred of one
man despise the prayers of many. So far he himself
would go for the honour of his family and his name,
but he was not reconciled to the man whose
distressed condition he was anxious to relieve. By
courage their liberties had been recovered, by
clemency the harmony of the orders in the State
could be strengthened. Some were moved, but it was
more by the affection he showed for his nephew than
by any regard for the man for whom he was pleading.
But Verginius begged them with tears to keep their
compassion for him and his daughter, and not to
listen to the prayers of the Claudii, who had
assumed sovereign power over the plebs, but to the
three tribunes, kinsmen of Verginia, who, after
being elected to protect the plebeians, were now
seeking their protection. This appeal was felt to
have more justice in it. All hope being now cut off,
Appius put an end to his life before the day of
trial came.
Soon after Sp. Oppius was arraigned by P.
Numitorius. He was only less detested than Appius,
because he had been in the City when his colleague
pronounced the iniquitous judgment. More
indignation, however, was aroused by an atrocity
which Oppius had committed than by his not having
prevented one. A witness was produced, who after
reckoning up twenty-seven years of service, and
eight occasions on which he had been decorated for
conspicuous bravery, appeared before the people
wearing all his decorations. Tearing open his dress
he exhibited his back lacerated with stripes. He
asked for nothing but a proof on Oppius' part of any
single charge against him; if such proof were
forthcoming, Oppius, though now only a private
citizen, might repeat all his cruelty towards him.
Oppius was taken to prison and there, before the day
of trial, he put an end to his life. His property
and that of Claudius were confiscated by the
tribunes. Their colleagues changed their domicile by
going into exile; their property also was
confiscated. M. Claudius, who had been the claimant
of Verginia, was tried and condemned; Verginius
himself, however, refused to press for the extreme
penalty, so he was allowed to go into exile to
Tibur. Verginia was more fortunate after her death
than in her lifetime; her shade, after wandering
through so many houses in quest of expiatory
penalties, at length found rest, not one guilty
person being now left.
3.59
Great alarm seized the
patricians; the looks of the tribunes were now as
menacing as those of the decemvirs had been. M.
Duillius the tribune imposed a salutary check upon
their excessive exercise of authority. "We have
gone," he said, "far enough in the assertion of our
liberty and the punishment of our opponents, so for
this year I will allow no man to be brought to trial
or cast into prison. I disapprove of old crimes,
long forgotten, being raked up, now that the recent
ones have been atoned for by the punishment of the
decemvirs. The unceasing care which both the consuls
are taking to protect your liberties is a guarantee
that nothing will be done which will call for the
power of the tribunes." This spirit of moderation
shown by the tribune relieved the fears of the
patricians, but it also intensified their resentment
against the consuls, for they seemed to be so wholly
devoted to the plebs, that the safety and liberty of
the patricians were a matter of more immediate
concern to the plebeian than they were to the
patrician magistrates. It seemed as though their
adversaries would grow weary of inflicting
punishment on them sooner than the consuls would
curb their insolence. It was pretty generally
asserted that they had shown weakness, since their
laws had been sanctioned by the senate, and no doubt
was entertained that they had yielded to the
pressure of circumstances.
3.60
After matters had been
settled in the City and the position of the plebs
firmly assured, the consuls left for their
respective provinces. Valerius wisely suspended
operations against the combined forces of the Aequi
and Volscians. If he had at once hazarded an
engagement, I question whether, considering the
temper of both the Romans and the enemy after the
inauspicious leadership of the decemvirs, he would
not have incurred a serious defeat. Taking up a
position about a mile from the enemy, he kept his
men in camp. The enemy formed up for battle, and
filled the space between the camps, but their
challenge met with no response from the Romans.
Tired at last of standing and vainly waiting for
battle, and regarding victory as practically
conceded to them, the two nations marched away to
ravage the territories of the Hernici and Latins.
The force left behind was sufficient to guard the
camp, but not to sustain an action. On seeing this
the consul made them in their turn feel the terror
which they had inspired, drew up his men in order of
battle and challenged them to fight. As, conscious
of their reduced strength, they declined an
engagement, the courage of the Romans at once rose,
and they looked upon the men who kept timidly within
their lines as already defeated. After standing the
whole day eager to engage, they retired at
nightfall; the enemy in a very different state of
mind sent men hurriedly in all directions to recall
the plundering parties; those in the neighbourhood
hastened back to camp, the more distant ones were
not traced. As soon as it grew light, the Romans
marched out, prepared to storm their camp if they
did not give them the chance of a battle. When the
day was far advanced without any movement on the
part of the enemy, the consul gave the order to
advance. As the line moved forward, the Aequi and
Volscians, indignant at the prospect of their
victorious armies being protected by earthworks
rather than by courage and arms, clamoured for the
signal for battle. It was given, and part of their
force had already emerged from the gate of the camp,
whilst others were coming down in order and taking
up their allotted positions, but before the enemy
could mass his whole strength in the field the Roman
consul delivered his attack. They had not all
marched out of the camp, those who had done so were
not able to deploy into line, and crowded together
as they were, they began to waver and sway. Whilst
they looked round helplessly at each other,
undecided what to do, the Romans raised their
war-cry, and at first the enemy gave ground, then,
when they had recovered their presence of mind and
their generals were appealing to them not to give
way before those whom they had defeated, the battle
was restored.
3.61
On the other side the
consul bade the Romans remember that on that day for
the first time they were fighting as free men on
behalf of a free Rome. It was for themselves that
they would conquer, the fruits of their victory
would not go to decemvirs. The battle was not being
fought under an Appius, but under their consul
Valerius, a descendant of the liberators of the
Roman people, and a liberator himself. They must
show that it was owing to the generals, not to the
soldiers, that they had failed to conquer in former
battles; it would be a disgrace if they showed more
courage against their own citizens than against a
foreign foe, or dreaded slavery at home more than
abroad. It was only Verginia whose chastity was
imperilled, only Appius whose licentiousness was
dangerous, in a time of peace, but if the fortune of
war should turn against them, every one's children
would be in danger from all those thousands of
enemies. He would not forebode disasters which
neither Jupiter nor Mars their Father would permit
to a City founded under those happy auspices. He
reminded them of the Aventine and the Sacred Hill,
and besought them to carry back unimpaired dominion
to that spot where a few months before they had won
their liberties. They must make it clear that Roman
soldiers possessed the same qualities now that the
decemvirs were expelled which they had before they
were created, and that Roman courage was not
weakened by the fact that the laws were equal for
all.
After this address to the infantry, he
galloped up to the cavalry. "Come, young men," he
shouted, "prove yourselves superior to the infantry
in courage, as you are superior to them in honour
and rank. They dislodged the enemy at the first
onset, do you ride in amongst them and drive them
from the field. They will not stand your charge,
even now they are hesitating rather than resisting."
With slackened rein, they spurred their horses
against the enemy already shaken by the infantry
encounter, and sweeping through their broken ranks
were carried to the rear. Some, wheeling round in
the open ground, rode across and headed off the
fugitives who were everywhere making for the camp.
The line of infantry with the consul in person and
the whole of the battle rolled in the same
direction; they got possession of the camp with an
immense loss to the enemy, but the booty was still
greater than the carnage. The news of this battle
was carried not only to the City, but to the other
army amongst the Sabines. In the City it was
celebrated with public rejoicings, but in the other
camp it fired the soldiers to emulation. By
employing them in incursions and testing their
courage in skirmishes, Horatius had trained them to
put confidence in themselves instead of brooding
over the disgrace incurred under the leadership of
the decemvirs, and this had gone far to make them
hope for ultimate success. The Sabines, emboldened
by their success of the previous year, were
incessantly provoking them and urging them to fight,
and wanting to know why they were wasting their time
in petty incursions and retreats like banditti, and
fettering away the effort of one decisive action in
a number of insignificant engagements. Why, they
tauntingly asked, did they not meet them in a
pitched battle and trust once for all to the fortune
of war?
3.62
The Romans had not only
recovered their courage, but they were burning with
indignation. The other army, they said, was about to
return to the City in triumph, whilst they were
exposed to the taunts of an insolent foe. When would
they ever be a match for the enemy if they were not
now? The consul became aware of these murmurings of
discontent and after summoning the soldiers to an
assembly, addressed them as follows: "How the battle
was fought on Algidus, soldiers, I suppose you have
heard. The army behaved as the army of a free people
ought to behave. The victory was won by the
generalship of my colleague and the bravery of his
soldiers. As far as I am concerned, I am ready to
adopt that plan of operations which you, my
soldiers, have the courage to execute. The war may
either be prolonged with advantage or brought to an
early close. If it is to be protracted I shall
continue the method of training which I have begun,
so that your spirits and courage may rise day by
day. If you want it brought to a decisive issue,
come now, raise such a shout as you will raise in
battle as a proof of your willingness and courage."
After they had raised the shout with great alacrity,
he assured them that, with the blessing of heaven,
he would comply with their wishes and lead them out
to battle on the morrow. The rest of the day was
spent in getting their armour and weapons ready. No
sooner did the Sabines see the Romans forming in
order of battle the next morning than they also
advanced to an engagement which they had long been
eager for. The battle was such as would be expected
between armies both of which were full of
self-confidence -the one proud of its old and
unbroken renown, the other flushed with its recent
victory. The Sabines called strategy to their aid,
for, after giving their line an extent equal to that
of the enemy, they kept 2000 men in reserve to make
an impression on the Roman left when the battle was
at its height. By this flank attack they had almost
surrounded and were beginning to overpower that
wing, when the cavalry of the two legions -about
600 strong -sprang from their horses and rushed to
the front to support their comrades who were now
giving way. They checked the enemy's advance and at
the same time roused the courage of the infantry by
sharing their danger, and appealing to their sense
of shame, by showing that whilst the cavalry could
fight either mounted or on foot, the infantry,
trained to fight on foot, were inferior even to
dismounted cavalry.
3.63
So they resumed the
struggle which they were giving up and recovered the
ground they had lost, and in a moment not only was
the battle restored but the Sabines on that wing
were even forced back. The cavalry returned to their
horses, protected by the infantry through whose
ranks they passed, and galloped off to the other
wing to announce their success to their comrades. At
the same time they made a charge on the enemy, who
were now demoralised through the defeat of their
strongest wing. None showed more brilliant courage
in that battle. The consul's eyes were everywhere,
he commended the brave, had words of rebuke wherever
the battle seemed to slacken. Those whom he censured
displayed at once the energy of brave men, they were
stimulated by a sense of shame, as much as the
others by his commendation. The battle-cry was again
raised, and by one united effort on the part of the
whole army they repulsed the enemy; the Roman attack
could no longer be withstood. The Sabines were
scattered in all directions through the fields, and
left their camp as a spoil to the enemy. What the
Romans found there was not the property of their
allies, as had been the case on Algidus, but their
own, which had been lost in the ravaging of their
homesteads. For this double victory, won in two
separate battles, the senate decreed thanksgivings
on behalf of the consuls, but their jealousy
restricted them to one day. The people, however,
without receiving orders, went on the second day
also in vast crowds to the temples, and this
unauthorised and spontaneous thanksgiving was
celebrated with almost greater enthusiasm than the
former.
The consuls had mutually agreed to approach
the City during these two days and convene a meeting
of the senate in the Campus Martius. Whilst they
were making their report there on the conduct of the
campaigns, the leaders of the senate entered a
protest against their session being held in the
midst of the troops, in order to intimidate them. To
avoid any ground for this charge the consuls
immediately adjourned the senate to the Flaminian
Meadows, where the temple of Apollo -then called
the Apollinare -now stands. The senate by a large
majority refused the consuls the honour of a
triumph, whereupon L. Icilius, as tribune of the
plebs, brought the question before the people. Many
came forward to oppose it, particularly C. Claudius,
who exclaimed in excited tones that it was over the
senate, not over the enemy, that the consuls wished
to celebrate their triumph. It was demanded as an
act of gratitude for a private service rendered to a
tribune, not as an honour for merit. Never before
had a triumph been ordered by the people, it had
always lain with the senate to decide whether one
was deserved or not; not even kings had infringed
the prerogative of the highest order in the State.
The tribunes must not make their power pervade
everything, so as to render the existence of a
council of State impossible. The State will only be
free, the laws equal, on condition that each order
preserves its own rights, its own power and dignity.
Much to the same effect was said by the senior
members of the senate, but the tribes unanimously
adopted the proposal. That was the first instance of
a triumph being celebrated by order of the people
without the authorisation of the senate.
3.64
This victory of the
tribunes and the plebs very nearly led to a
dangerous abuse of power. A secret understanding was
come to amongst the tribunes that they should all be
reappointed, and to prevent their factious purpose
from being too noticeable, they were to secure a
continuance of the consuls in office also. They
alleged as a reason the agreement of the senate to
undermine the rights of the plebs by the slight they
had cast on the consuls. "What," they argued, "would
happen if, before the laws were yet securely
established, the patricians should attack fresh
tribunes through consuls belonging to their own
party? For the consuls would not always be men of
the stamp of Valerius and Horatius, who subordinated
their own interests to the liberty of the plebs." By
a happy chance it fell to the lot of M. Duillius to
preside over the elections. He was a man of
sagacity, and foresaw the obloquy that would be
incurred by the continuance in office of the present
magistrates. On his declaring that he would accept
no votes for the former tribunes, his colleagues
insisted that he should either leave the tribes free
to vote for whom they chose, or else resign the
control of the elections to his colleagues, who
would conduct them according to law rather than at
the will of the patricians. As a contention had
arisen, Duillius sent for the consuls and asked them
what they intended to do about the consular
elections. They replied that they should elect fresh
consuls. Having thus gained popular supporters for a
measure by no means popular, he proceeded in company
with them into the Assembly. Here the consuls were
brought forward to the people and the question was
put to them, "If the Roman people, remembering how
you have recovered their liberty for them at home,
remembering, too, your services and achievements in
war, should make you consuls a second time, what do
you intend to do?" They declared their resolution
unchanged, and Duillius, applauding the consuls for
maintaining to the last an attitude totally unlike
that of the decemvirs, proceeded to hold the
election. Only five tribunes were elected, for owing
to the efforts of the nine tribunes in openly
pushing their canvass, the other candidates could
not get the requisite majority of votes. He
dismissed the Assembly and did not hold a second
election, on the ground that he had satisfied the
requirements of the law, which nowhere fixed the
number of tribunes, but merely enacted that the
office of tribune should not be left vacant. He
ordered those who had been elected to co-opt
colleagues, and recited the formula which governed
the case as follows: "If I require you to elect ten
tribunes of the plebs; if on this day you have
elected less than ten, then those whom they co-opt
shall be lawful tribunes of the plebs by the same
law, in like manner as those whom you have this day
made tribunes of the plebs." Duillius persisted in
asserting to the last that the commonwealth could
not possibly have fifteen tribunes, and he resigned
office, after having won the goodwill of patricians
and plebeians alike by his frustration of the
ambitious designs of his colleagues.
3.65
The new tribunes of the
plebs studied the wishes of the senate in co-opting
colleagues; they even admitted two patricians of
consular rank, Sp. Tarpeius and A. Aeternius. The
new consuls were Spurius Herminius and T. Verginius
Caelimontanus, who were not violent partisans of
either the patricians or the plebeians. They
maintained peace both at home and abroad. L.
Trebonius, a tribune of the plebs, was angry with
the senate because, as he said, he had been
hoodwinked by them in the co-optation of tribunes,
and left in the lurch by his colleagues. He brought
in a measure providing that when tribunes of the
plebs were to be elected, the presiding magistrate
should continue to hold the election until ten
tribunes were elected. He spent his year of office
in worrying the patricians, which led to his
receiving the nickname of "Asper " (i.e. "the
Cantankerous"). The next consuls were M. Geganius
Macerinus and C. Julius. They appeased the quarrels
which had broken out between the tribunes and the
younger members of the nobility without interfering
with the powers of the former or compromising the
dignity of the patricians. A levy had been decreed
by the senate for service against the Volscians and
Aequi, but they kept the plebs quiet by holding it
over, and publicly asserting that when the City was
at peace everything abroad was quiet, whereas civil
discord encouraged the enemy. Their care for peace
led to harmony at home. But the one order was always
restless when the other showed moderation. Whilst
the plebs was quiet it began to be subjected to acts
of violence from the younger patricians. The
tribunes tried to protect the weaker side, but they
did little good at first, and soon even they
themselves were not exempt from ill-treatment,
especially in the later months of their year of
office. Secret combinations amongst the stronger
party resulted in lawlessness, and the exercise of
the tribunitian authority usually slackened towards
the close of the year. Any hopes the plebeians might
place in their tribunes depended upon their having
men like Icilius; for the last two years they had
had mere names. On the other hand, the older
patricians realised that their younger members were
too aggressive, but if there were to be excesses
they preferred that their own side should commit
them rather than their opponents. So difficult is it
to observe moderation in the defence of liberty,
while each man under the presence of equality raises
himself only by keeping others down, and by their
very precautions against fear men make themselves
feared, and in repelling injury from ourselves we
inflict it on others as though there were no
alternative between doing wrong and suffering it.
3.66
T. Quinctius Capitolinus
and Agrippa Furius were the next consuls elected -the former for the fourth time. They found on
entering office no disturbances at home nor any war
abroad, though both were threatening. The
dissensions of the citizens could now no longer be
checked, as both the tribunes and the plebs were
exasperated against the patricians, owing to the
Assembly being constantly disturbed by fresh
quarrels whenever one of the nobility was
prosecuted. At the first bruit of these outbreaks,
the Aequi and Volscians, as though at a given
signal, took up arms. Moreover their leaders, eager
for plunder, had persuaded them that it had been
impossible to raise the levy ordered two years
previously, because the plebs refused to obey, and
it was owing to this that no armies had been sent
against them; military discipline was broken up by
insubordination; Rome was no longer looked upon as
the common fatherland; all their rage against
foreign foes was turned against one another. Now was
the opportunity for destroying these wolves blinded
by the madness of mutual hatred. With their united
forces they first completely desolated the Latin
territory; then, meeting with none to check their
depredations, they actually approached the walls of
Rome, to the great delight of those who had fomented
the war. Extending their ravages in the direction of
the Esquiline gate, they plundered and harried,
through sheer insolence, in the sight of the City.
After they had marched back unmolested with their
plunder to Corbio, the consul Quinctius convoked the
people to an Assembly.
3.67
I find that he spoke
there as follows: "Though, Quirites, my own
conscience is clear, it is, nevertheless, with
feelings of the deepest shame that I have come
before you. That you should know -that it will be
handed down to posterity -that the Aequi and
Volscians, who were lately hardly a match for the
Hernici, have in the fourth consulship of T.
Quinctius come in arms up to the walls of Rome with
impunity! Although we have long been living in such
a state, although public affairs are in such a
condition, that my mind augurs nothing good, still,
had I known that this disgrace was coming in this
year, of all others, I would have avoided by exile
or by death, had there been no other means of
escape, the honour of a consulship. So then, if
those arms which were at our gates had been in the
hands of men worthy of the name, Rome could have
been taken whilst I was consul! I had enough of
honours, enough and more than enough of life, I
ought to have died in my third consulship. Who was
it that those most dastardly foes felt contempt for,
us consuls, or you Quirites? If the fault is in us,
strip us of an office which we are unworthy to hold,
and if that is not enough, visit us with punishment.
If the fault is in you, may there be no one, either
god or man, who will punish your sins; may you
repent of them! It was not your cowardice that
provoked their contempt, nor their velour that gave
them confidence; they have been too often defeated,
put to flight, driven out of their entrenchments,
deprived of their territory, not to know themselves
and you. It is the dissensions between the two
orders, the quarrels between patricians and
plebeians that is poisoning the life of this City.
As long as our power respects no limits, and your
liberty acknowledges no restraints, as long as you
are impatient of patrician, we of plebeian
magistrates, so long has the courage of our enemies
been rising. What in heaven's name do you want? You
set your hearts on having tribunes of the plebs, we
yielded, for the sake of peace. You yearned for
decemvirs, we consented to their appointment; you
grew utterly weary of them, we compelled them to
resign. Your hatred pursued them into private life;
to satisfy you, we allowed the noblest and most
distinguished of our order to suffer death or go
into exile. You wanted tribunes of the plebs to be
appointed again; you have appointed them. Although
we saw how unjust it was to the patricians that men
devoted to your interests should be elected consuls,
we have seen even that patrician office conferred by
favour of the plebs. The tribunes' protective
authority, the right of appeal to the people, the
resolutions of the plebs made binding on the
patricians, the suppression of our rights and
privileges under the pretext of making the laws
equal for all -these things we have submitted to,
and do submit to. What term is there to be to our
dissensions? When shall we ever be allowed to have a
united City, when will this ever be our common
fatherland? We who have lost, show more calmness and
evenness of temper than you who have won. Is it not
enough that you have made us fear you? It was
against us that the Aventine was seized, against us
the Sacred Hill occupied. When the Esquiline is all
but captured and the Volscian is trying to scale the
rampart, no one dislodges him. Against us you show
yourselves men; against us you take up arms.
3.68
"Well, then, now that you
have beleaguered the Senate-house, and treated the
Forum as enemies' ground, and filled the prison with
our foremost men, display the same daring courage in
making a sortie from the Esquiline gate, or if you
have not the courage even for this, mount the walls
and watch your fields disgracefully laid waste with
fire and sword, plunder carried off and smoke rising
everywhere from your burning dwellings. But I may be
told it is the common interests of all that are
being injured by this; the land is burned, the City
besieged, all the honours of war rest with the
enemy. Good heavens! In what condition are your own
private interests? Every one of you will have losses
reported to him from the fields. What, pray, is
there at home from which to make them good? Will the
tribunes restore and repay you for what you have
lost? They will contribute any amount you like of
talk and words and accusations against the leading
men, and law after law, and meetings of the
Assembly. But from those meetings not a single one
of you will ever go home the richer. Who has ever
brought back to his wife and children anything but
resentment and hatred, party strife and personal
quarrels, from which you are to be protected not by
your own courage and honesty of purpose, but by the
help of others? But, let me tell you, when you were
campaigning under us your consuls, not under
tribunes, in the camp not in the Forum, and your
battle-cry appalled the enemy in the field, not the
patricians of Rome in the Assembly, then you
obtained booty, took territory from the enemy, and
returned to your homes and household gods in
triumph, laden with wealth and covered with glory
both for the State and for yourselves. Now you allow
the enemy to depart laden with your property. Go on,
stick to your Assembly meetings, pass your lives in
the Forum, still the necessity, which you shirk, of
taking the field follows you. It was too much for
you to go out against the Aequi and Volscians; now
the war is at your gates. If it is not beaten back,
it will be within the walls, it will scale the
Citadel and the Capitol and follow you into your
homes. It is two years since the senate ordered a
levy to be raised and an army led out to Algidus; we
are still sitting idly at home, wrangling with one
another like a troop of women, delighted with the
momentary peace, and shutting our eyes to the fact
that we shall very soon have to pay for our inaction
many times over in war.
"I know that there are other things
pleasanter to speak about than these, but necessity
compels me, even if a sense of duty did not, to say
what is true instead of what is agreeable. I should
only be too glad, Quirites, to give you pleasure,
but I would very much rather have you safe, however
you may feel towards me for the future. Nature has
so ordered matters that the man who addresses the
multitude for his own private ends is much more
popular than the man who thinks of nothing but the
public good. Possibly, you imagine that it is in
your interest that those demagogues who flatter the
plebs and do not suffer you either to take up arms
or live in peace, excite you and make you restless.
They only do so to win notoriety or to make
something out of it, and because they see that when
the two orders are in harmony they are nowhere, they
are willing to be leaders in a bad cause rather than
in none, and get up disturbances and seditions. "If
there is any possibility of your becoming at last
weary of this sort of thing, if you are willing to
resume the character which marked your fathers and
yourselves in old days, instead of these new-fangled
ideas, then there is no punishment I will not submit
to, if I do not in a few days drive these destroyers
of our fields in confusion and flight out of their
camp, and remove from our gates and walls to their
cities this dread aspect of war which now so appals
you."
3.69
Seldom if ever was speech
of popular tribune more favourably received by the
plebeians than that of this stern consul. The men of
military age who in similar emergencies had made
refusal to be enrolled their most effective weapon
against the senate, began now to turn their thoughts
to arms and war. The fugitives from the country
districts, those who had been plundered and wounded
in the fields, reported a more terrible state of
things than what was visible from the walls, and
filled the whole City with a thirst for vengeance.
When the senate met, all eyes fumed to Quinctius as
the one man who could uphold the majesty of Rome.
The leaders of the House declared his speech to be
worthy of the position he held as consul, worthy of
the many consulships he had previously held, worthy
of his whole life, rich as it was in honours, many
actually enjoyed, many more deserved. Other consuls,
they said, had either flattered the plebs by
betraying the authority and privileges of the
patricians, or, by insisting too harshly upon the
rights of their order, had intensified the
opposition of the masses, Titus Quinctius, in his
speech, had kept in view the authority of the
senate, the concord of the two orders, and, above
all, the circumstances of the hour. They begged him
and his colleague to take over the conduct of public
affairs, and appealed to the tribunes to be of one
mind with the consuls in wishing to see the war
rolled back from the walls of the City, and inducing
the plebs, at such a crisis, to yield to the
authority of the senate. Their common fatherland
was, they declared, calling on the tribunes and
imploring their aid now that their fields were
ravaged and the City all but attacked.
By universal consent a levy was decreed and
held. The consuls gave public notice that there was
no time for investigating claims for exemption, and
all the men liable for service were to present
themselves the next day in the Campus Martius. When
the war was over they would give time for inquiry
into the cases of those who had not given in their
names, and those who could not prove justification
would be held to be deserters. All who were liable
to serve appeared on the following day. Each of the
cohorts selected their own centurions, and two
senators were placed in command of each cohort. We
understand that these arrangements were so promptly
carried out that the standards, which had been taken
from the treasury and carried down to the Campus
Martius by the quaestors in the morning, left the
Campus at 10 o'clock that same day, and the army, a
newly-raised one with only a few cohorts of veterans
following as volunteers, halted at the tenth
milestone. The next day brought them within sight of
the enemy, and they entrenched their camp close to
the enemy's camp at Corbio. The Romans were fired by
anger and resentment; the enemy, conscious of their
guilt after so many revolts, despaired of pardon.
There was consequently no delay in bringing matters
to an issue.
3.70
In the Roman army the two
consuls possessed equal authority. Agrippa, however,
voluntarily resigned the supreme command to his
colleague -a very beneficial arrangement where
matters of great importance are concerned -and the
latter, thus preferred by the ungrudging
self-suppression of his colleague, courteously
responded by imparting to him his plans, and
treating him in every way as his equal. When drawn
up in battle order, Quinctius commanded the right
wing, Agrippa the left. The centre was assigned to
Sp. Postumius Albus, lieutenant-general; the other
lieutenant-general, P. Sulpicius, was given charge
of the cavalry. The infantry on the right wing
fought splendidly, but met with stout resistance on
the side of the Volscians. P. Sulpicius with his
cavalry broke the enemy's centre. He could have got
back to the main body before the enemy re-formed
their broken ranks, but he decided to attack from
the rear, and would have scattered the enemy in a
moment, attacked as they were in front and rear, had
not the cavalry of the Volscians and Aequi, adopting
his own tactics, intercepted him and kept him for
some time engaged. He shouted to his men that there
was no time to lose, they would be surrounded and
cut off from their main body if they did not do
their utmost to make a finish of the cavalry fight;
it was not enough simply to put them to flight, they
must dispose of both horses and men, that none might
return to the field or renew the fighting. They
could not resist those before whom a serried line of
infantry had given way.
His words did not fall on deaf ears. In one
shock they routed the whole of the cavalry, hurled a
vast number from their seats, and drove their lances
into the horses. That was the end of the cavalry
fight. Next they made a rear attack on the infantry,
and when their line began to waver they sent a
report to the consuls of what they had done. The
news gave fresh courage to the Romans, who were now
winning, and dismayed the retreating Aequi. Their
defeat began in the centre, where the cavalry charge
had thrown them into disorder. Then the repulse of
the left wing by the consul Quinctius commenced. The
right wing gave more trouble. Here Agrippa, whose
age and strength made him fearless, seeing that
things were going better in all parts of the field
than with him, seized standards from the
standard-bearers and advanced with them himself,
some he even began to throw amongst the masses of
the enemy. Roused at the fear and disgrace of losing
them, his men made a fresh charge on the enemy, and
in all directions the Romans were equally
successful. At this point a message came from
Quinctius that he was victorious, and was now
threatening the enemy's camp, but would not attack
it till he knew that the action on the left wing was
decided. If Agrippa had defeated the enemy he was to
join him, so that the whole army might together take
possession of the spoil. The victorious Agrippa,
amidst mutual congratulations, proceeded to his
colleague and the enemy's camp. The few defenders
were routed in a moment and the entrenchment forced
without any resistance. The army was marched back to
camp after securing immense spoil and recovering
their own property which had been lost in the
ravaging of their lands. I cannot find that a
triumph was either demanded by the consuls or
granted by the senate; nor is any reason recorded
for this honour having been either not expected or
not thought worth asking for. As far as I can
conjecture after such an interval of time, the
reason would appear to be that as a triumph was
refused by the senate to the consuls Valerius and
Horatius, who, apart from the Volscians and Aequi,
had won the distinction of bringing the Sabine war
to a close, the present consuls were ashamed to ask
for a triumph for doing only half as much, lest, if
they did obtain it, it might appear to be out of
consideration for the men more than for their
services.
3.71
This honourable victory
won from an enemy was sullied by a disgraceful
decision of the people respecting the territory of
their allies. The inhabitants of Aricia and Ardea
had frequently gone to war over some disputed land;
tired at last of their many reciprocal defeats, they
referred the matter to the arbitrament of Rome. The
magistrates convened an Assembly on their behalf,
and when they had come to plead their cause, the
debate was conducted with much warmth. When the
evidence was concluded and the time came for the
tribes to be called upon to vote, P. Scaptius, an
aged plebeian, rose and said, "If, consuls, I am
allowed to speak on matters of high policy, I will
not suffer the people to go wrong in this matter."
The consuls refused him a hearing, as being a man of
no credit, and when he loudly exclaimed that the
commonwealth was being betrayed they ordered him to
be removed. He appealed to the tribunes. The
tribunes, who are almost always ruled by the
multitude more than they rule them, finding that the
plebs were anxious to hear him, gave Scaptius
permission to say what he wanted. So he began by
saying that he was now in his eighty-third year and
had seen service in that country which was now in
dispute, not as a young man but as a veteran of
twenty years' standing, when the war was going on
against Corioli. He therefore alleged as a fact,
forgotten through lapse of time, but deeply
imprinted in his own memory, that the disputed land
formed part of the territory of Corioli, and when
that city was taken, became by the right of war part
of the State domain of Rome. The Ardeates and
Aricians had never claimed it while Corioli was
unconquered, and he was wondering how they could
hope to filch it from the people of Rome, whom they
had made arbiters instead of rightful owners. He had
not long to live, but he could not, old as he was,
bring himself to refrain from using the only means
in his power, namely, his voice, in order to assert
the right to that territory which as a soldier he
had done his best to win. He earnestly advised the
people not to pronounce, from a false feeling of
delicacy, against a cause which was really their
own.
3.72
When the consuls saw that
Scaptius was listened to not only in silence but
even with approval, they called gods and men to
witness that a monstrous injustice was being
perpetrated, and sent for the leaders of the senate.
Accompanied by them they went amongst the tribes and
implored them not to commit the worst of crimes and
establish a still worse precedent by perverting
justice to their own advantage. Even supposing it
were permissible for a judge to look after his own
interest, they would certainly never gain by
appropriating the disputed territory as much as they
would lose by estranging the feelings of their
allies through their injustice. The damage done to
their good name and credit would be incalculable.
Were the envoys to carry back this to their home,
was it to go out to the world, was it to reach the
ears of their allies and of their enemies? With what
pain the former would receive it, with what joy the
latter! Did they suppose that the surrounding
nations would fix the responsibility for it on
Scaptius, a mob-orator in his dotage? To him it
might be a patent of nobility, but on the Roman
people it would stamp a character for trickery and
fraud. For what judge has ever dealt with a private
suit so as to adjudge to himself the property in
dispute? Even Scaptius would not do that, although
he has outlived all sense of shame. In spite of
these earnest appeals which the consuls and senators
made, cupidity and Scaptius its instigator
prevailed. The tribes, when called upon to vote,
decided that it was part of the public domain of
Rome. It is not denied that the result would have
been the same had the case gone before other judges,
but as it is, the disgrace attaching to the judgment
is not in the least degree lightened by any justice
in the case, nor did it appear more ugly and
tyrannical to the people of Aricia and Ardea than it
did to the Roman senate. The rest of the year
remained undisturbed both at home and abroad.
End of Book 3