39.5
But it
was the speech of his colleague, Tiberius Gracchus, that produced the
greatest effect. He said that for a man to use his official position as the
instrument of his own personal animosities was in any case setting a bad
precedent, but for a tribune of the plebs to become the agent of another
man's vindictiveness was a disgraceful proceeding quite unworthy of the
power and inviolability of the college of tribunes. Each man ought to judge
for himself whom to love and whom to hate, what actions to approve of and
what to disapprove of; he must not wait upon another man's look or nod, nor
must he be driven hither and thither by the motives which sway another
man's mind. A tribune who becomes the tool of an angry consul and is
careful to remember what M. Aemilius entrusted to him privately, forgets
that the tribuneship was entrusted to him publicly by the people of Rome,
and entrusted to him for the protection and liberty of private citizens, not for
the defence of an autocratic consul. Albutius does not see that it will go
down to posterity that of two members of the same college of tribunes one
subordinated his private quarrels to the interests of the State, the other took
up a quarrel which was not even a private one, but was entrusted to him by
some one else. Smarting under this castigation the tribune left the
senate-house, and on the proposal of Ser. Sulpicius a triumph was decreed
to M. Fulvius. He thanked the senators and went on to tell them that on the
day he took Ambracia he had vowed to exhibit the Great Games in honour
of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, and that a hundred pounds of gold had been
contributed by the cities for this purpose. Out of the money which he was
going to place in the treasury after it had been borne in the triumph, he
requested the senate to order that this hundred pounds of gold should be set
apart. The senate ordered the question to be referred to the college of
pontiffs whether it was necessary that all that gold should be spent on the
Games. They replied that no question of religion arose as to what amount
should be spent on the Games, and the senate consequently allowed Fulvius
to spend what he liked on the Games as long as it did not exceed 80,000
sesterces.
Fulvius had fixed the date of his triumph in January but, on learning
that M. Aemilius had received a letter from Albutius stating that he had
withdrawn his opposition and had himself at once started for Rome to stop
the triumph, but was detained on his journey by sickness, he fixed an earlier
date, for he was afraid there might be more serious conflicts over the
triumph than during the war. It was on December 23 that he celebrated his
triumph over the Aetolians and the Cephallenians. Before his chariot were
carried golden crowns weighing in all 112 pounds, 1083 pounds of silver,
243 pounds of gold, 118,000 Attic tetrachmas and 12,422 "philippei"; 780
brazen statues and 230 marble statues. There was a large quantity of armour,
weapons and all other spoil taken from the enemy, as well as catapults,
ballistae, and every kind of artillery. The generals led in the procession -Aetolian, Caphallenian and those of Antiochus left behind in Aetolia -numbered seven and twenty. Before he actually entered the City, Fulvius
bestowed rewards on many of the military tribunes, prefects, cavalrymen and
centurions, both those in the Roman army and in the allied contingents. Out
of the booty he gave to each private soldier 25 denarii, double the amount to
each centurion, and three times as much to each cavalryman.
