the single family of the Fabii offered extraordinary assistance, and carried on a private war against them. But the slaughter that befel them was sufficiently memorable. Three hundred (an army of patricians) were slain at Cremera, and the gate that let them pass, when they were proceeding to battle, was stigmatised with the name of wicked. But that slaughter was expiated by great victories, the enemies' strongest towns being reduced by one general after another, though in various methods. The Falisci surrendered of their own accord; the Fidenates were burned with their own fire; the Vejentes were plundered and utterly destroyed.

During the siege of the Falisci, an instance of honour on the part of the Roman general was regarded as wonderful, and not without justice; for he sent back to them, with his hands bound behind him, a schoolmaster who intended to betray their city, with some boys whom he had brought with him. Being an upright and wise man, he knew that that only was a true victory which was gained with inviolate faith and untainted honour. The people of Fidenæ, not being a match for the Romans with the sword, armed themselves with torches and party-coloured fillets resembling serpents, in order to excite terror in the enemy, and marched out against them like madmen; but their dismal dress was only an omen of their destruction. How great the strength of the Vejentes was, a ten-years' siege proves. It was then that the Roman soldiers first wintered under skins, while the extraordinary winter labour was recompensed with pay, and the soldiers were voluntarily bound by an oath not to return till the city was taken. The spoils of Lars Tolumnius, the king of the Vejentes, were offered to Jupiter Feretrius. The destruction of the city was at lasteffected, not by scaling-ladders, nor by a breach in the walls, but by a mine, and stratagems under ground. The spoil was thought so great, that the tenth was sent to the Pythian Apollo, and the whole Roman people were called out to share in the pillage. Such was Veii at that time; who now remembers that it existed? what relic or vestige is left of it? Even the trustworthiness of our annals can hardly make us believe that Veii ever had a being.

CHAP. XIII. OF THE WAR WITH THE GAULS.

At this point, whether through the envy of the gods, or the appointment of fate, the rapid progress of the advancing empire was stopped, for a short time, by an invasion of the Galli Senones. Whether this period were more hurtful to the Romans by the disasters which it caused them, or more glorious by the proofs which it gave of their valour, I am unable to tell. Such, however, was the violence of the calamity, that I must suppose it inflicted upon them, by divine Providence, for a trial of their spirit, the immortal gods desiring to know whether the conduct of the Romans would merit the empire of the world. The Galli Senones were a nation naturally fierce, and rude in manners; and, from the vastness of their bodies, and the corresponding weight of their arms, so formidable in all respects, that they seemed evidently born for the destruction of men and the depopulation of cities. Coming originally from the remotest parts of the earth, and the ocean that surrounds all, and having wasted everything in their way, they settled between the Alps and the Po; but not content with this position, they wandered up and down Italy, and were now besieging the town of Clusium. The Romans interposed on behalf of their allies and confederates, by sending, according to their custom, ambassadors. But what regard to justice was to be expected from barbarians? They only grew more daring; and hence arose a conflict. After they had broken up from Clusium, and were marching towards Rome, Fabius, the consul, met them at the river Allia with an army. Scarcely ever was there a more disgraceful defeat; and Rome has therefore set a damnatory mark on this day in its calendar. The Roman army being routed, the Gauls approached the city. Garrison there was none; but then, or never, true Roman courage showed itself. In the first place the elder men, who had borne the highest offices, met together in the forum, where, the high-priest performing the ceremony of devotion, they consecrated themselves to the infernal gods; and immediately afterwards returning, each to his own house, they seated themselves, dressed as they were in their long robes and richest ornaments, on their curule chairs, that, when the enemy came, they might die with proper dignity.

The high-priests and flamens1, taking whatever was most sacred in the temples, hid part of it in casks buried in the earth, and carried part away with them in waggons. The virgins of the priesthood of Vesta, at the same time, followed, with their feet bare, their sacred things as they were conveyed from the city. But Lucius Albinus, one of the common people, is said to have assisted them in their flight; for, setting down his wife and children, he took up the virgins into his vehicle; so much, even in their utmost extremity, did regard for the public religion prevail over private affections.

A band of the youth (which, it is certain, scarcely amounted to a thousand) took their position, under the command of Manlius, in the citadel on the Capitoline mount, intreating Jupiter himself, as if present in the place, that "as they had united to defend his temple, he would support their efforts with his power." The Gauls, meantime, came up, and finding the city open, were at first apprehensive that some stratagem was intended, but soon after, perceiving nobody in it, they rushed in with shouting and impetuosity. They entered the houses, which in all parts stood open, where they worshipped the aged senators, sitting in their robes on their curule chairs, as if they had been gods and genii; but afterwards, when it appeared that they were men (otherwise deigning to answer nothing2), they massacred them with cruelty equal to their former veneration. They then threw burning brands on the houses, and with fire, sword, and the labour of their hands, levelled the city with the ground. But round the single Capitoline mount, the barbarians (who would believe it?) were detained six months, though making every effort, not only by day but by night, to reduce it. At length, as some of them were making an ascent in the nighttime, Manlius, being awakened by the gabbling of a goose, hurled them down from the top of the rock; and, to deprive

1 Flamens] Flamines. A Flamen was a priest appointed to any particular deity; as the flamen of Jupiter, the flamen of Mars, &c. It is a word of uncertain derivation, but probably for plamen or pileamen, from the pileus, or cap,, which they wore. See Dion. Halicarn., ii., 64.

2 Ch. XIII. Otherwise deigning to answer nothing] Alioqui nihil respondere dignantes. The exact signification of the word alioqui, is, as Duker observes, "sufficiently obscure." N. Heinsius, by a happy conjecture, alters it into alloqui which (with the preceding ubi changed into ibi) makes excellent sense.

the enemy of all hope of success, and make a show of confidence on his own part, he threw out some loaves of bread, though he was in great want, from the citadel. On a certain fixed day, too, he sent out Fabius, the high-priest, from the citadel, through the midst of the enemy's guards, to perform a solemn sacrifice on the Quirinal hill. Fabius, under the protection of religion, returned safe through the weapons of the enemy, and reported that "the gods were propitious." At last, when the length of their siege had tired the barbarians, and when they were offering to depart for a thousand pounds of gold, (making that offer, however, in an insolent manner, throwing a sword into the scale with unfair weights, and proudly crying out, "Woe to the conquered!") Camillus, suddenly attacking them in the rear, made such a slaughter of them as to wash out all traces of the fire with an inundation of Gallic blood. But with pleasure may we give thanks to the immortal gods on the very account of this great destruction; for that fire buried the cottages of the shepherds, and that flame hid the poverty of Romulus. What, indeed, was the effect of that conflagration, but that a city, destined for the seat of men and gods, should not seem to have been destroyed or overthrown, but rather cleansed and purified? After being defended, therefore, by Manlius, and restored by Camillus, it rose up again, with still more vigour and spirit, against the neighbouring people. But first of all, not content with having expelled the Gauls from their city, they so closely pursued them under the conduct of Camillus, as they were dragging their broken remains up and down through Italy, that at this day not a trace of the Senones is left in the country. On one occasion, there was a slaughter of them at the river Anio, when Manlius, in a single combat, took from a barbarian, among other spoils, a golden chain; and hence was the name of the Torquati1. On another occasion they were defeated in the Pomptine territory, when Lucius Valerius, in a similar combat, being assisted by a sacred bird sitting upon his helmet, carried off the spoils of his enemy; and hence came the name of the Corvini. At last Dolabella, some years afterwards, cut off all that remained of them at the lake

1 Torquati] From torques, a chain or collar for the neck. Corvini from corvus, a raven.

Vadimo in Etruria, that none of that nation might survive to boast that Rome had been burned by them.

CHAP. XIV. THE LATIN WAR.

In the consulship of Manlius Torquatus and Decius Mus, the Romans turned from the Gauls upon the Latins, a people always ready to attack them from rivalry for empire, and now from contempt for the burnt state of the city. They demanded that the right of citizenship should be granted them, and a participation in the government and public offices; and presumed that they could now do something more than struggle for these privileges. But who will wonder that the enemy should then have yielded, when one of the consuls put his own son to death, for fighting, though successfully, contrary to orders, as if there were more merit in observing command than in gaining a victory; and the other, as if by the admonition of the gods, devoted himself, with his face covered, and in front of the army, to the infernal deities, so that, casting himself into the thickest of the enemy's weapons, he opened a new way to victory by the track of his own blood.

CHAP. XV. THE SABINE WAR.

After the Latins, they attacked the nation of the Sabines, who, unmindful of the alliance contracted under Titus Tatius, had united themselves, by some contagion of war, to the Latins. But the Romans, under Curius Dentatus, their consul, laid waste, with fire and sword, all that tract which the Nar and the springs of Velinus inclose, as far as the Adriatic sea. By which success such a number of people, and such an extent of territory, was brought under their jurisdiction, that even he who had made the conquest could not tell which was of the greater importance.

CHAP. XVI. THE SAMNITE WAR.

Being then moved by the intreaties of Campania, they attacked the Samnites, not on their own account, but, what is more honourable, on that of their allies. A league had indeed been made with both those nations, but the Campanians had made theirs more binding and worthy of regard, by a sur