History of Rome, books 1-10

in every direction where their onset carried them, they restored the battle, and undoubtedly, if so small a body could have attacked the entire line at once, the enemy would have been routed.

As it was impossible to check them in any direction, the Volscian commander gave a signal for a passage to be opened for this novel cohort of targeteers, until by the impetus of their charge they should be cut off from the main body.

As soon as this happened, they were unable to force their way back in the same directional they had advanced, as the enemy had massed in the greatest force there.

When the consul and the Roman legions no longer saw anywhere the men who had just been the shield of the whole army, they endeavoured at all risks to prevent so many brave fellows from being surrounded and overwhelmed by the enemy.

The Volscians formed two fronts, in one direction they met the attack of the consul and the legions, from the opposite front they pressed upon Tempanius and his troopers. As these latter after repeated attempts found themselves unable to break through to their main body, they took possession of some rising ground, and forming a circle defended themselves, not without inflicting losses on the enemy.

The battle did not terminate till nightfall. The consul too kept the enemy engaged without any slackening

of the fight as long as any light remained. Night at last put an end to the indecisive action, and through ignorance as to the result such a panic seized each of the camps that both armies, thinking themselves defeated, left their wounded behind and the greater part of their baggage and retired to the nearest hills.

The eminence, however, which Tempanius had seized was surrounded till after midnight, when it was announced to the enemy that their camp was abandoned. Looking upon this as a proof that their army was defeated, they fled in all directions wherever their fears carried them in the darkness.

Tempanius, fearing a surprise, kept his men together till daylight. Then he came down with a few of his men to reconnoitre, and after ascertaining from the enemies' wounded that the Volscian camp was abandoned, he joyfully called his men down and made his way to the Roman camp.

Here he found a dreary solitude; everything presented the same miserable spectacle as in the enemies' camp. Before the discovery of their mistake could bring the Volscians back again, he collected all the wounded he could carry with him, and as he did not know what direction the Dictator had taken, proceeded by the most direct road to the City.

Rumours of an unfavourable battle and the abandonment of the camp had already been brought. Most of all was the fate of the cavalry deplored, the whole community felt the loss as keenly as their families.

There was general alarm throughout the City, and the consul Fabius was posting pickets before the gates when cavalry were descried in the distance. Their appearance created alarm, as it was doubtful who they were; presently they were recognised, and the fears gave place to such great joy that the City rang with shouts of congratulation at the cavalry having returned safe and victorious.

People flocked into the streets out of houses which had just before been in mourning and filled with wailings for the dead; anxious mothers and wives, forgetting decorum in their joy, ran to meet the column of horsemen, each embracing her own friends and hardly able

to control mind or body for joy. The tribunes of the plebs had appointed a day for the trial of M. Postumius and T. Quinctius on the ground of their ill-success at Veii, and they thought it a favourable opportunity for reviving the public feeling against them through the odium now incurred

by Sempronius. Accordingly they convened the Assembly, and in excited tones declared that the commonwealth had been betrayed at Veii by their generals, and in consequence of their not having been called to account, the army acting against the Volscians had been betrayed by the consul, their gallant cavalry had been given over to slaughter, and the camp had been disgracefully abandoned. C. Junius, one of the tribunes, ordered Tempanius to be called forward.

He then addressed him as follows: “Sextus Tempanius, I ask you, would you consider that the consul Caius Sempronius commenced the action at the fitting moment, or strengthened his line with supports, or discharged any of the duties of a good consul?

When the Roman legions were worsted, did you on your own authority dismount the cavalry and restore the fight? And when you and the cavalry were cut off from our main body, did the consul render any assistance or send you succour?

Further, did you on the following day receive any reinforcements, or did you and the cohort force your way to the camp by your own bravery? Did you find any consul, any army in the camp, or did you find it abandoned and the wounded soldiers left to their fate?

Your honour and loyalty, which have alone sustained the commonwealth in this war, require you to state these things today. Lastly, where is Caius Sempronius? where are our legions? Were you deserted, or have you deserted the consul and the army? In a word, are we defeated, or have we been victorious?”

The speech which Tempanius made in reply is said to have been unpolished, but marked by soldierly dignity, free from the vanity of self-praise, and showing no pleasure in the inculpation of others.

“It was not,” he said, “a soldier's place to criticise his commander, or judge how much military skill he possessed; that was for the Roman people to do when they elected him consul.

They must not therefore demand of him what tactics a commander should adopt, or what military capacity a consul should display; these were matters which even great minds and intellects would have to weigh very carefully. He could, however, relate what he saw.

Before he was cut off from the main body he saw the consul fighting in the front line, encouraging his men, going to and fro between the Roman standards and the missiles of the enemy.

After he, the speaker, was carried out of sight of his comrades, he knew from the noise and shouting that the combat was kept up till night; and he did not believe that a way could have been made to the eminence which he had occupied, owing to the numbers of the enemy.

Where the army was he knew not; he thought that as he found protection for himself and his men at a moment of extreme peril in the nature of the ground, so the consul had selected a stronger position for his camp, to save his army.

He did not believe that the Volscians were in any better plight than the Romans; the varying fortunes of the fight and the fall of night had led to all sorts of mistakes on both sides.”

He then begged them not to keep him any longer, as he was exhausted with his exertions and his wounds, and thereupon was dismissed amidst loud praises of his modesty no less than his courage. Whilst this was going on the consul had reached the Labican road and was at the chapel of Quies.

Wagons and draught-cattle were despatched thither from the City for the conveyance of the army, who were worn out by the battle and night march. Shortly afterwards the consul entered the City, quite as anxious to give Tempanius the praise he so

well deserved as to remove the blame from his own shoulders. Whilst the citizens were mourning over their reverses and angry with their generals, M. Postumius, who as consular tribune had commanded at Veii, was brought before them for trial.

He was sentenced to a fine of 10,000 “ ases.” His colleague, T. Quinctius, who had been successful against the Volscians under the auspices of the Dictator Postumius Tubertus, and at Fidenae as second in command under the other Dictator, Mam. Aemilius, threw all the blame for the disaster at Veii on his colleague who had been previously sentenced. He was acquitted by the unanimous vote of the tribes.

It is said that the memory of his venerated father, Cincinnatus, stood him in good stead, as also did the now aged Capitolinus Quinctius, who earnestly entreated them not to allow him, with so brief a span of life left to him, to be the bearer of such sad tidings to Cincinnatus.

The plebs elected as their tribunes, in their absence, Sex. Tempanius, A. Sellius, Sextus Antistius, and Sp. Icilius, all of whom had, on the advice of Tempanius, been selected by the cavalry to act as centurions.

The exasperation against Sempronius made the very name of consul offensive, the senate therefore ordered consular tribunes to be elected.

Their names were L. Manlius Capitolinus, Q. Antonius Merenda, and L. Papirius Mugilanus. At the very beginning of the year, L. Hortensius, a tribune of the plebs, appointed a day for the trial of C. Sempronius, the consul of the previous year. His four colleagues begged him, publicly, in full view of the Roman people, not to prosecute their unoffending commander, against whom nothing but ill-luck could be alleged.

Hortensius was angry, for he looked upon this as an attempt to test his resolution, he regarded the entreaties of the tribunes as meant simply to save appearances, and

he was convinced that it was not to these the consul was trusting, but to their interposing their veto. Turning to Sempronius he asked: “Where is your patrician spirit, and the courage which is supported by the consciousness of innocence?

An ex-consul actually sheltering under the wing of the tribunes!” Then he addressed his colleagues: “You, what will you do, if I carry the prosecution through?

Are you going to deprive the people of their jurisdiction and subvert the power of the tribunes?” They replied that the authority of the people was supreme over Sempronius and over everybody else;

they had neither the will nor the power to do away with the people's right to judge, but if their entreaties on behalf of their commander, who was a second father to them, proved unavailing, they would appear by his side in suppliant garb.

Then Hortensius replied: “The Roman plebs shall not see its tribunes in mourning; I drop all proceedings against C. Sempronius, since he has succeeded, during his command, in becoming so dear to his soldiers.”

Both plebeians and patricians were pleased with the loyal affection of the four tribunes, and quite as much so with the way in which Hortensius had yielded to their just remonstrances.

The consuls for the next year were Numerius Fabius Vibulanus and T. Quinctius Capitolinus, the son of Capitolinus. The Aequi had claimed the doubtful victory of the Volscians as their own, but fortune no longer favoured them.

The campaign against them fell to Fabius, but nothing worth mention took place. Their dispirited army had but shown itself when it was routed and put to a disgraceful flight, without the consul gaining much glory from it.

A triumph was in consequence refused him, but as he had removed the disgrace of Sempronius' defeat he was allowed to enjoy an ovation. As, contrary to expectation, the war had been brought to a close with less fighting than had been feared, so in the City the calm was broken by unlooked-for and serious disturbances between the plebs and the

patricians. It began with the doubling of the number of quaestors. It was proposed to create in addition to the two City quaestors two others to assist the consuls in the various duties arising from a state of war. When this proposal was laid by the consuls before the senate and had received the warm support of that body, the tribunes of the plebs insisted that half the number should be taken from the plebeians; up to that time only patricians had been

chosen. This demand was at first opposed most resolutely by the consuls and the senate; afterwards they yielded so far as to allow the same freedom of choice in the election of quaestors as the people already enjoyed in that of consular tribunes. As they gained nothing by this, they dropped the proposal to augment the number

altogether. The tribunes took it up, and many revolutionary proposals, including the Agrarian Law, were set on foot in quick succession. In consequence of these commotions the senate wanted consuls to be elected rather than tribunes, but owing to the veto of the tribunes a formal resolution could not be carried, and

on the expiry of the consuls' year of office an interregnum followed, and even this did not happen without a tremendous struggle, for the tribunes vetoed any meeting of the

patricians. The greater part of the following year was wasted in contests between the new tribunes of the plebs and some of the interreges. At one time the tribunes would intervene to prevent the patricians from meeting together to appoint an interrex, at another they would interrupt the interrex and prevent him from obtaining a decree for the election of

consuls. At last L. Papirius Mugilanus, who had been made interrex, sternly rebuked the senate and the tribunes, and reminded them that upon the truce with Veii and the dilatoriness of the Aequi, and upon these alone, depended the safety of the commonwealth, which was deserted and forgotten by men, but protected by the providential care of the

gods. Should any alarm of war sound from that quarter, was it their wish that the State should be taken by surprise while without any patrician magistrate; that there should be no army, no general to enrol

one? Were they going to repel a foreign war by a civil one? If both these should come together, the destruction of Rome could hardly be averted even with the help of the

gods. Let them rather try to establish concord by making concessions on both sides-the patricians by allowing military tribunes to be elected instead of consuls; the tribunes of the plebs by not interfering with the liberty of the people to elect the four quaestors from patricians or plebeians indiscriminately.

The election of consular tribunes was the first to be held. They were all patricians; L. Quinctius Cincinnatus, for the third time, L. Furius Medullinus, for the second, M. Manlius, and A. Sempronius Atratinus.

The last-named conducted the election of the quaestors. Amongst other plebeian candidates were the son of Antistius, tribune of the plebs, and a brother of Sextus Pompilius, another tribune. Their authority and interest were not, however, strong enough to prevent the voters from preferring on the ground of their high birth those whose fathers and grandfathers they had seen in the consul's chair.

All the tribunes of the plebs were furious, Pompilius and Antistius, more especially, were incensed at the defeat of their relations.

“What,” they angrily exclaimed, “is the meaning of all this? In spite of our good offices, in spite of the wrongs done by the patricians, with all the freedom you now enjoy of exercising powers you did not possess before, not a single member of the plebs has been raised to the quaestorship, to say nothing of the consular tribuneship!

The appeals of a father on behalf of a son, of a brother on behalf of a brother, have been unavailing, though they are tribunes, invested with an inviolable authority to protect your liberties. There has certainly been dishonesty somewhere; A. Sempronius has shown more adroitness than straightforwardness.”

They accused him of having kept their men out of office by illegal means. As they could not attack him directly, protected as he was by his innocence and his official position, they turned their resentment against Caius Sempronius, the uncle of Atratinus, and having obtained the support of their colleague, M. Canuleius,

they impeached him upon the ground of the disgrace incurred in the Volscian war. These same tribunes frequently mooted the question in the senate of a distribution of the public domain, a proposal which C. Sempronius always stoutly resisted.

They thought, and rightly as the event proved, that when the day of trial came, he would either abandon his opposition and so lose influence with the patricians, or by persisting in it give offence to the plebeians.

He chose the latter, and preferred to incur the odium of his opponents and injure his own cause than prove false to the cause of the State. He insisted that “there should be no grants of land, which would only increase the influence of the three tribunes; what they wanted now was not land for the plebs, but to wreak their spite upon him.

He, like others, would meet the storm with a stout heart; neither he nor any other citizen ought to stand so high with the senate that any leniency shown to an individual might be disastrous to the commonwealth.”

When the day of trial came there was no lowering of his tone, he undertook his own defence, and though the patricians tried every means to soften the plebeians, he was condemned to pay a fine of 15,000 “ ases.” In this same year Postumia, a Vestal virgin, had to answer a charge of unchastity.

Though innocent, she had given grounds for suspicion through her gay attire and unmaidenly freedom of manner. After she had been remanded and finally acquitted, the Pontifex Maximus, in the name of the whole college of priests, ordered her to abstain from

frivolity and to study sanctity rather than smartness in her appearance. In the same year, Cumae, at that time held by the Greeks, was captured by the Campanians.

The following year had as consular tribunes Agrippa Menenius Lanatus, P. Lucretius Tricipitinus, and Spurius Nautius Rutilus. Thanks to the good fortune of Rome, the year was marked by serious danger more than by actual disaster.

The slaves had formed a plot to fire the City in various spots, and whilst the people were everywhere intent on saving their houses, to take armed possession of the Capitol. Jupiter frustrated their nefarious project; two of their number gave information, and the actual culprits were arrested and punished.

The informers received a reward of 10,000 “ ases ” —a large sum in those days —from the public treasury, and their freedom. After this the Aequi began to prepare for a renewal of hostilities, and it was reported on good authority at Rome that a new enemy, the Labicans, were forming a coalition with their old foes.

The commonwealth had come to look upon hostilities with the Aequi as almost an annual occurrence. Envoys were sent to Labici. The reply they brought back was evasive; it was evident that whilst there were no immediate preparations for war, peace would not last long.

The Tusculans were requested to be on the watch for any fresh movement on the part of the Labicans. The consular tribunes for the following year were Lucius Sergius Fidenas, M. Papirius Mugilanus, and C. Servilius, the son of the Priscus in whose dictatorship Fidenae had been taken.

At the very beginning of their term of office, envoys came from Tusculum and reported that the Labicans had taken up arms and in conjunction with the Aequi had, after ravaging the Tusculan territory, fixed their camp on Algidus.

War was thereupon proclaimed and the senate decreed that two tribunes should leave for the war, and one remain in charge of the City. This at once led to a quarrel amongst the tribunes. Each urged his superior claims to command in the war and looked down upon the charge of the City as distasteful and inglorious.

Whilst the senators were watching with astonishment this unseemly strife amongst colleagues, Q. Servilius said, “Since no respect is shown either to this House or to the State, the authority of a father shall put an end to this altercation. My son, without having recourse to lots, shall take charge of the City. I trust that those who are so anxious for the command in the war will conduct it in a more considerate and amicable spirit than they have shown in their eagerness to obtain it.”

It was decided that the levy should not be raised from the whole population indiscriminately; ten tribes were drawn by lot; from these the two tribunes enlisted the men of military age and led them to the war.

The quarrels which had begun in the City became much more heated in the camp through the same eagerness to secure the command. They agreed on no single point, they fought for their own opinions, each wanted his own plans and orders carried out exclusively, they felt mutual contempt for each other.

At length, through the remonstrances and reproofs of the lieutenants-general, matters were so far arranged that they agreed to hold the command in chief on alternate days.

When this state of things was reported at Rome it is said that Q. Servilius, taught by years and experience, offered up a solemn prayer that the disagreement of the tribunes might not prove more hurtful to the State than it had been at Veii; then, as though disaster were undoubtedly impending, he urged his son to enrol troops and prepare arms.

He was not a false prophet. It happened to be the turn of L. Sergius to hold command, and the enemy by a pretended flight had drawn his troops on to unfavourable ground close to their camp, in the vain hope of storming it. Then the Aequi made a sudden charge and drove them down a steep valley where numbers were overtaken and killed in what was not so much a flight as a tumbling over each other.

It was with difficulty that they held their camp that day; the next day, after the enemy had surrounded a considerable part of it, they evacuated it in a disgraceful flight through the rear gate.

The commanders and lieutenants-general and as much of the army as remained with the standards made for Tusculum, the others, straggling in all directions through the fields, hurried on to Rome and spread the news of a more serious defeat than had been actually incurred.

There was less consternation felt because the result was what every one had feared and the reinforcements which they could look to in the hour of danger had been got ready beforehand by the consular tribune.

By his orders, after the excitement had been allayed by the inferior magistrates, scouting parties were promptly sent out to reconnoitre, and they reported that the generals and the army were at Tusculum, and that the enemy had not shifted his camp.

What did most to restore confidence was the nomination, by a senatorial decree, of Q. Servilius Priscus as Dictator. The citizens had had previous experience of his political foresight in many stormy crises, and the issue of this war afforded a fresh proof, for he alone suspected danger from the differences of the tribunes before the disaster occurred.