27.4
The
summer was now drawing to a close, and the date of the consular elections
was near at hand. Marcellus wrote to say that it would be against the
interests of the republic to lose touch with Hannibal, as he was being pressed
steadily back, and avoided anything like a battle. The senate were reluctant
to recall him just when he was most effectively employed; at the same time
they were anxious lest there should be no consuls for the coming year. They
decided that the best course would be to recall the consul Valerius from
Sicily, though he was outside the borders of Italy. The senate instructed L.
Manlius the City praetor to write to him to that effect, and at the same time
to send on the despatch from M. Marcellus that he might understand the
reason for the senate recalling him rather than his colleague from his
province. It was about this time that envoys from King Syphax came to
Rome. They enumerated the successful battles which the king had fought
against the Carthaginians, and declared that there was no people to whom he
was a more uncompromising foe than the people of Carthage, and none
towards whom he felt more friendly than the people of Rome. He had
already sent envoys to the two Scipios in Spain, now he wished to ask for
the friendship of Rome from the fountain-head. The senate not only gave the
envoys a gracious reply, but they in their turn sent envoys and presents to
the king -the men selected for the mission being L. Genucius, P. Poetelius,
and P. Popillius. The presents they took with them were a purple toga and a
purple tunic, an ivory chair and a golden bowl weighing five pounds. After
their visit to Syphax they were commissioned to visit other petty kings in
Africa and carry as a present to each of them a toga praetexta and a golden
bowl, three pounds in weight. M. Atilius and Manlius Acilius were also
despatched to Alexandria, to Ptolemy and Cleopatra, to remind them of the
alliance already existing, and to renew the friendly relations with Rome. The
presents they carried to the king were a purple toga and a purple tunic and
an ivory chair; to the queen they gave an embroidered palla and a purple
cloak. During the summer in which these incidents occurred numerous
portents were reported from the neighbouring cities and country districts. A
lamb is said to have been yeaned at Tusculum with its udder full of milk; the
summit of the temple of Jupiter was struck by lightning and nearly the whole
of the roof stripped off; the ground in front of the gate of Anagnia was
similarly struck almost at the same time and continued burning for a day and
a night without anything to feed the fire; at Anagnia Compitum the birds had
deserted their nests in the grove of Diana; at Tarracina snakes of an
extraordinary size leaped out of the sea like sporting fishes close to the
harbour; at Tarquinii a pig had been farrowed with the face of a man; in the
district of Capena four statues near the Grove of Feronia had sweated blood
for a day and a night. The pontiffs decreed that these portents should be
expiated by the sacrifice of oxen; a day was appointed for solemn
intercessions to be offered up at all the shrines in Rome, and on the
following day similar intercessions were to be offered in Campania, at the
grove of Feronia.