have employed other commanders, who would fight against you with animosity; but they chose the one who would be most tender of you, who were his own soldiers, and in whom, as your own general, ye could most thoroughly confide. Even those who have conquest in their power wish for peace; what, then, ought to be our wish? Why do we not, renouncing both anger and hope, those fallacious guides, resign ourselves and all our interests to his well-known honour." All declaring their approbation by a shout, Titus Quintius advanced before the standards, and said, that "the soldiers would be governed by the dictator;" he besought them to "undertake the cause of those his unfortunate countrymen, and support it under his patronage, with the same honour which had ever marked his administration of the public affairs. That with regard to his own particular case, he stipulated no terms, he wished not to found a hope on aught but innocence. But provision should be made for the safety of the soldiers, as had been formerly practised by the senate, once, in the case of the commons, and a second time in that of the legions, so that no one should suffer for the secession." The dictator, highly commending Quintius, and desiring the others to hope for the best, rode back with speed to the city, and, with the approbation of the senate, proposed to the people assembled in the Peteline grove, that none of the soldiers should be punished on account of the secession; and even made it his request to them, which he hoped they would approve, that no person, either in jest or earnest, should upbraid any of them with that proceeding. A military law was also passed, sanctioned with a devoting clause, that the name of any soldier, once enrolled, should not be erased without his own consent; and it was included in the law, that no person who had been a tribune of the soldiers should afterwards be a centurion. This demand of the conspirators was pointed against Publius Salonius, who had long been alternately triVOL. II.-U

bune of the soldiers, and first centurion, which they now call primipili. The soldiers were incensed against him, because he had always opposed their licentious proceedings, and, to avoid being concerned therein, had fled from Lautulæ. This was the only proposal with which the senate refused to comply; on which Salonius, earnestly intreating the conscript fathers not to pay greater regard to his promotion, than to the public concord, prevailed on them to let that also pass. There was another requisition, equally unreasonable, that a deduction of one-third should be made from the pay of the cavalry, because they had opposed the conspiracy. They at that time received triple the pay of the foot.

XLII. Besides these regulations, I find in some writers, that Lucius Genucius, plebeian tribune, proposed a law to the people, that no one should lend money at interest. Likewise, that, by other orders of the commons, it was enacted, that no person should hold the same public office a second time within ten years, or enjoy two offices in the same year; and, that it should be lawful to elect both the consuls from among the plebeians. If all these concessions were really made, it is evident that the revolters possessed no small degree of strength. According to the accounts of other historians, Valerius was not nominated dictator, but the whole business was managed by the consuls; nor was it before they came to Rome, but in the city itself, that the conspirators became so desperate as to have recourse to arms. That the attack by night was not at the country-seat of Titus Quintius, but at the house of Caius Manlius, on whom they laid violent hands, and made him their leader; then, marching out as far as the fourth stone, they took possession of a strong post; also, that no mention of a reconciliation was first made by the commanders, but that after the troops had marched out to battle, mutual salutations suddenly took place; and that the soldiers, mixing together, began to shake hands, and em

brace each other with tears; and that the consuls, finding the minds of the soldiers averse from fighting, were obliged to make the proposition to the senate, of admitting the revolters to terms. So that in no circumstance do the ancient writers of the history agree, except in relating that there was a mutiny, and that it was composed. The report of this sedition, and the heavy war, undertaken at the same time against the Samnites, induced several nations to forsake the alliance of the Romans; and besides the Latines, who were known, for a long time past, to be in a disposition to break the treaty, the Privernians also, by a sudden incursion, ravaged Norba and Setia, colonies of the Romans, which lay in their neighbourhood.

THE

HISTORY OF ROME.

BOOK VIII.

The Latines, in conjunction with the Campanians, revolt; send ambassadors to Rome, to propose, as the condition of peace, that one of the consuls shall in future be chosen from among them. Their requisition rejected with disdain. Titus Manlius, the consul, puts his own son to death, for fighting, although successfully, contrary to orders. Decius, the other consul, devotes himself for the army. The Latines surrender. Manlius returning to the city, none of the young men go out to meet him. Minutia, a vestal, condemned for incest. Several matrons convicted of poisoning. Laws then first made against that crime. The Ausonians, Privernians, and Palæpolitans subdued. Quintus Publilius the first instance of a person continuing in command, after the expiration of his of fice, and of a triumph decreed to any person not a consul. Law against confinement for debt. Quintus Fabius, master of the horse, fights the Samnites, with success, contrary to the orders of Lucius Papirius, dictator; and, with difficulty, obtains pardon, through the intercession of the people. Successful expedition against the Samnites.

I. THE new consuls were now in office, Caius Plautius a second time, and Lucius Æmilius Mamercinus,

Y.R.414. when messengers from Setia and Norba brought

B.C.338.

information to Rome of the revolt of the Privernians, with complaints of the damages sustained by those colonies. News also arrived that an army of Volscians, headed by the people of Antium, had taken post at Satricum. Both these wars fell by lot to Plautius, who, marching first to Privernum, came to an immediate engagement. The ene

my, after a slight resistance, were entirely defeated, and their town taken, but this was restored to the inhabitants, being first secured by a strong garrison, while two-thirds of their lands were taken from them. From thence the victorious army was led to Satricum against the Antians: there a furious battle was fought, with a great effusion of blood on both sides. A storm separated the combatants, while there was no evident advantage on either part; the Romans, however, no wise disheartened by the fatigue of an engagement so indecisive, prepared for battle against the next day. But the Volscians, when they had reckoned up their loss, found not in themselves the same degree of resolution for making a second trial, and marched off in the night to Antium, with all the hurry of a defeat, leaving behind their wounded, and part of their baggage. A vast quantity of arms was found, both in the field and in the camp: these the consul declared an offering to Mother Lua*, and, entering the enemy's country, laid it all waste as far as the sea-coast. The other consul, Æmilius, on marching into the Sabellan territory, found neither a camp of the Samnites, nor legions to oppose him; but, while he was wasting their country with fire and sword, ambassadors came to him, suing for peace. He referred them to the senate; where, when they were admitted to an audidence, laying aside their erceness of spirit, they requested of the Romans that peace might be restored between the two nations, and that they might be at liberty to carry on war against the Sidicinians: these requests, they alleged, they were the better entitled to make, as they had united in friendship with the Roman people, at a time when their own affairs were in a flourishing state, not in a season of distress, as the Campanians had done; and, because those, against whom they wished to take arms, were the Sidicinians, who had ever been enemies to them, and never friends to the Ro

• Otherwise called Ops, Rhea, and Terra, the earth.