24.9
T.
Otacilius was in a state of great excitement, loudly exclaiming that Fabius
wanted to have his consulship prolonged, and as he persisted in creating a
disturbance the consul ordered the lictors to approach him and warned him
that as he had marched straight to the Campus without entering the City, the
axes were still bound up in the fasces. The voting had in the meantime
recommenced, and the first was given in favour of Q. Fabius Maximus as
consul for the fourth time and M. Marcellus for the third. All the other
centuries voted without exception for the same men. One praetor was
re-elected, Q Fulvius Flaccus, the others were fresh appointments; T.
Otacilius Crassus, now praetor for the second time; Q. Fabius, a son of the
consul and curule aedile at the time of his election; and P. Cornelius
Lentulus. When the election of the praetors was finished the senate passed a
resolution that Quintus Fulvius should have the City as his special province,
and when the consuls had gone to the war he should command at home.
There were two great floods this year; the Tiber inundated the fields, causing
widespread destruction of farm-buildings and stock and much loss of life. It
was in the fifth year of the second Punic war that Q. Fabius Maximus
assumed the consulship for the fourth time and M. Claudius Marcellus for
the third time. Their election excited an unusual amount of interest amongst
the citizens, for it was many years since there had been such a pair of
consuls. Old men remembered that Maximus Rullus had been similarly
elected with P. Decius in view of the Gaulish war, and in the same way
afterwards Papirius and Carvilius had been chosen consuls to act against the
Samnites and Bruttians and also against the Lucanians and Tarentines.
Marcellus was elected in his absence whilst he was with the army. Fabius
was re-elected when he was on the spot and actually conducting the election.
Irregular as this was, the circumstances at the time, the exigencies of the
war, the critical position of the State prevented any one from inquiring into
precedents or suspecting the consul of love of power. On the contrary, they
praised his greatness of soul, because when he knew that the republic needed
its greatest general, and that he was unquestionably himself the one, he
thought less of any personal odium which he might incur than of the interest
of the republic.
