22.14
When
Hannibal had encamped at the Vulturnus and the loveliest part of Italy was
being reduced to ashes and the smoke was rising everywhere from the
burning farms, Fabius continued his march along the Massic range of hills.
For a few days the mutinous discontent amongst the troops had subsided,
because they inferred from the unusually rapid marching that Fabius was
hastening to save Campania from being ravaged and plundered. But when
they reached the western extremity of the range and saw the enemy burning
the farmsteads of the colonists of Sinuessa and those in the Falernian district,
while nothing was said about giving battle, the feeling of exasperation was
again roused, and studiously fanned by Minucius. "Are we come here" he
would ask, "to enjoy the sight of our murdered allies and the smoking ruins
of their homes? Surely, if nothing else appeals to us, ought we not to feel
ashamed of ourselves as we see the sufferings of those whom our fathers
sent as colonists to Sinuessa that this frontier might be protected from the
Samnite foe, whose homes are being burnt not by our neighbours the
Samnites but by a Carthaginian stranger from the ends of the earth who has
been allowed to come thus far simply through our dilatoriness and
supineness? Have we, alas! so far degenerated from our fathers that we
calmly look on while the very country, past which they considered it an
affront for a Carthaginian fleet to cruise, has now been filled with Numidian
and Moorish invaders? We who only the other day in our indignation at the
attack on Saguntum appealed not to men alone, but to treaties and to gods,
now quietly watch Hannibal scaling the walls of a Roman colony! The smoke
from the burning farms and fields is blown into our faces, our ears are
assailed by the cries of our despairing allies who appeal to us for help more
than they do to the gods, and here are we marching an army like a herd of
cattle through summer pastures and mountain paths hidden from view by
woods and clouds! If M. Furius Camillus had chosen this method of
wandering over mountain heights and passes to rescue the City from the
Gauls which has been adopted by this new Camillus, this peerless Dictator
who has been found for us in our troubles, to recover Italy from Hannibal,
Rome would still be in the hands of the Gauls, and I very much fear that if
we go on dawdling in this way the City which our ancestors have so often
saved will only have been saved for Hannibal and the Carthaginians. But on
the day that the message came to Veii that Camillus had been nominated
Dictator by senate and people, though the Janiculum was quite high enough
for him to sit there and watch the enemy, like the man and true Roman that
he was, he came down into the plain. and in the very heart of the City where
the Busta Gallica are now he cut to pieces the legions of the Gauls, and the
next day he did the same beyond Gabii. Why, when years and years ago we
were sent under the yoke by the Samnites at the Caudine Forks, was it, pray,
by exploring the heights of Samnium or by assailing and besieging Luceria
and challenging our victorious foe that L. Papirius Cursor took the yoke off
Roman necks and placed it on the haughty Samnite? What else but rapidity
of action gave C. Lutatius the victory? The day after he first saw the enemy
he surprised their fleet laden with supplies and hampered by its cargo of
stores and equipment. It is mere folly to fancy that the war can be brought to
an end by sitting still or making vows to heaven. Your duty is to take your
arms and go down and meet the enemy man to man. It is by doing and daring
that Rome has increased her dominion not by these counsels of sloth which
cowards call caution." Minucius said all this before a host of Roman tribunes
and knights, as if he were addressing the Assembly, and his daring words
even reached the ears of the soldiery; if they could have voted on the
question, there is no doubt that they would have superseded Fabius for
Minucius.
