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The fathers having repaired, as far as human counsels could effect it, the other losses from a continued series of unfortunate events, at length turned their attention on themselves, on the emptiness of the senate-house, and the paucity of those who assembled for public deliberation. For the senate-roll had not been reviewed since the censorship of Lucius Aemilius and C. Flaminius, though unfortunate battles, during a period of five years, as well as the private casualties of each, had carried off so many senators. Manius Pomponius, the praetor, as the dictator was now gone to the army after the loss of Casilinum, at the earnest request of all, brought in a bill upon the subject. When Spurius Carvilius, after having lamented in a long speech not only the scantiness of the senate, but the fewness of citizens who were eligible into that body, with the design of making up the numbers of the senate and uniting more closely the Romans and the Latin confederacy, declared that he strongly advised that the freedom of the state should be conferred upon two senators from each of the Latin states, if the Roman fathers thought proper, who might be chosen into the senate to supply the places of the deceased senators. This proposition the fathers listened to with no more equanimity than formerly to the request when made by the Latins themselves. A loud and violent expression of disapprobation ran through the whole senate-house. In particular, Manlius reminded them that there was still existing a man of that stock, from which that consul was descended who formerly threatened in the Capitol that he would with his own hand put to death any Latin senator he saw in that house. Upon which Quintus Fabius Maximus said, "that never was any subject introduced into the senate at a juncture more unseasonable than the present, when a question had been touched upon which would still further irritate the minds of the allies, who were already hesitating and wavering in their allegiance. That that rash suggestion of one individual ought to be annihilated by the silence of the whole body; and that if there ever was a declaration in that house which ought to be buried in profound and inviolable silence, surely that above all others was one which deserved to be covered and consigned to darkness and oblivion, and looked upon as if it had never been made." This put a stop to the mention of the subject. They determined that a dictator should be created for the purpose of reviewing the senate, and that he should be one who had been a censor, and was the oldest living of those who had held that office. They likewise gave orders that Caius Terentius, the consul, should be called home to nominate a dictator; who, leaving his troops in Apulia, returned to Rome with great expedition; and, according to custom, on the following night nominated Marcus Fabius Buteo dictator, for six months, without a master of the horse, in pursuance of the decree of the senate.
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He having mounted the rostrum attended by the lictors, declared, that he neither approved of there being two dictators at one time, which had never been done before, nor of his being appointed dictator without a master of the horse; nor of the censorian authority being committed to one person, and to the same person a second time; nor that command should be given to a dictator for six months, unless he was created for active operations. That he would himself restrain within proper bounds those irregularities which chance, the exigencies of the times, and necessity had occasioned. For he would not remove any of those whom the censors Flaminius and Aemilius had elected into the senate; but would merely order that their names should be transcribed and read over, that one man might not exercise the power of deciding and determining on the character and morals of a senator; and would so elect in place of deceased members, that one rank should appear to be preferred to another, and not man to man. The old senate-roll having been read, he chose as successors to the deceased, first those who had filled a curule office since the censorship of Flaminius and Aemilius, but had not yet been elected into the senate, as each had been earliest created. He next chose those who had been aediles, plebeian tribunes, or quaestors; then of those who had never filled the office of magistrate, he selected such as had spoils taken from an enemy fixed up at their homes, or had received a civic crown. Having thus elected one hundred and seventy-seven senators, with the entire approbation of his countrymen, he instantly abdicated his office, and, bidding the lictors depart, he descended from the rostrum as a private citizen, and mingled with the crowd of persons who were engaged in their private affairs, designedly wearing away this time, lest he should draw off the people from the forum for the purpose of escorting him home. Their zeal, however, did not subside by the delay, for they escorted him to his house in great numbers. The consul returned to the army the ensuing night, without acquainting the senate, lest he should be detained in the city on account of the elections.
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The next day, on the proposition of Manius Pomponius the praetor, the senate decreed that a letter should be written to the dictator, to the effect, that if he thought it for the interest of the state, he should come, together with the master of the horse and the praetor, Marcus Marcellus, to hold the election for the succeeding consuls, in order that the fathers might learn from them in person in what condition the state was, and take measures according to circumstances. All who were summoned came, leaving lieutenant-generals to hold command of the legions. The dictator, speaking briefly and modestly of himself, attributed much of the glory Of the campaign to the master of the horse, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus. He then gave out the day for the comitia, at which the consuls created were Lucius Posthumius in his absence, being then employed in the government of the province of Gaul, for the third time, and Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, who was then master of the horse and curule aedile. Marcus Valerius Laevinus, Appius Claudius Pulcher, Quintus Fulvius Flaccus, and Quintus Mucius Scaevola, were then created praetors. After the election of the magistrates, the dictator returned to his army, which was in winter quarters at Teanum, leaving his master of the horse at Rome, to take the sense of the fathers relative to the armies to be enlisted and embodied for the service of the year, as he was about to enter upon the magistracy after a few days. While busily occupied with these matters, intelligence arrived of a fresh disaster--fortune crowding into this year one calamity after another--that Lucius Posthumius, consul elect, himself with all his army was destroyed in Gaul. He was to march his troops through a vast wood, which the Gauls called Litana. On the right and left of his route, the natives had sawed the trees in such a manner that they continued standing upright, but would fall when impelled by a slight force. Posthumius had with him two Roman legions, and besides had levied so great a number of allies along the Adriatic Sea, that he led into the enemy's country twenty-five thousand men. As soon as this army entered the wood, the Gauls, who were posted around its extreme skirts, pushed down the outermost of the sawn trees, which falling on those next them, and these again on others which of themselves stood tottering and scarcely maintained their position, crushed arms, men, and horses in an indiscriminate manner, so that scarcely ten men escaped. For, most of them being killed by the trunks and broken boughs of trees, the Gauls, who beset the wood on all sides in arms killed the rest, panic-struck by so unexpected a disaster. A very small number, who attempted to escape by a bridge, were taken prisoners, being intercepted by the enemy who had taken possession of it before them. Here Posthumius fell, fighting with all his might to prevent his being taken. The Boii having cut off his head, carried it and the spoils they stole off his body, in triumph into the most sacred temple they had. Afterwards they cleansed the head according to their custom, and having covered the skull with chased gold, used it as a cup for libations in their solemn festivals, and a drinking cup for their high priests and other ministers of the temple. The spoils taken by the Gauls were not less than the victory. For though great numbers of the beasts were crushed by the falling trees, yet as nothing was scattered by flight, every thing else was found strewed along the whole line of the prostrate band.
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