This letter having been read they decreed, that the consul Aurelius should order the army which he had appointed to assemble on a certain day in Etruria, to attend him on the same day at Ariminum; and should either go in person, if the public business would permit, to suppress the tumult of the Gauls, or write to the praetor Lucius Furius, that, as soon as the legions from Etruria came to him, he should send five thousand of the allies to guard that place in the mean time, and should himself proceed to relieve the colony from the siege. They also determined, that ambassadors should be sent to Carthage, and also into Numidia, to Masinissa: to Carthage, to announce that "their countryman, Hamilcar, having been left in Gaul, (either with a part of the army formerly commanded by Hasdrubal, or with that of Mago--they did not with certainty know which,) was waging war, contrary to the treaty. That he had excited the armies of the Gauls and Ligurians to arms against the Roman people. That, if they wished for peace, they must recall him, and give him up to the Roman people." They were ordered at the same time to tell them, that "all the deserters had not been sent back; that a great part of them were said to appear openly in Carthage, who ought to be sought after, and surrendered according to the treaty." Such was the message to the Carthaginians. To Masinissa they were charged with congratulations, on his "having not only recovered the kingdom of his father, but enlarged it by the acquisition of the most flourishing parts of Syphax's territories." They were ordered also to acquaint him, that "a war had been undertaken against Philip, because he had given aid to the Carthaginians, while, by the injuries which he offered to the allies of the Roman people, he had obliged them to send fleets and armies into Greece, while Italy was blazing with war; and that by thus making them separate their forces, had been the principal cause of their being so late passing over into Africa; and to request him to send to that war supplies of Numidian horsemen." Ample presents were given them to be carried to the king; vases of gold and silver, a purple robe, and a tunic adorned with palms of purple, an ivory sceptre, and a robe of state, with a curule chair. They were also directed to assure him, that if he deemed any thing further requisite to confirm and enlarge his kingdom, the Roman people, in return for his good services, would exert their utmost zeal to effect it. At this time, too, ambassadors from Vermina, son of Syphax, came to the senate apologizing for his mistaken conduct, on account of his youth and want of judgment, and throwing all the blame on the deceitful policy of the Carthaginians: adding, "that as Masinissa had from an enemy become a friend to the Romans, so Vermina would also use his best endeavours that he should not be outdone in offices of friendship to the Roman people either by Masinissa, or by any other; and requesting that he might receive from the senate the title of king, friend, and ally." The answer given to these ambassadors was, that "not only his father Syphax, from a friend and ally, had on a sudden, without any reason, become an enemy to the Roman people, but that he himself had made his first essay of manhood in bearing arms against them. He must, therefore, sue to the Roman people for peace, before he could expect to be acknowledged king, ally, and friend; that it was the practice of that people to bestow the honour of such title, in return for great services performed by kings towards them; that the Roman ambassadors would soon be in Africa, to whom the senate would give instructions to regulate conditions of peace with Vermina, if he would leave the terms of it entirely to the will of the Roman people; and that, if he wished that any thing should be added, left out, or altered, he must make a second application to the senate." The ambassadors sent to Africa on those affairs, were Caius Terentius Varro, Publius Lucretius, and Cneius Octavius, each of whom had a quinquereme assigned him.
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A letter was then read in the senate, from Quintus Minucius, the praetor, who held the province of Bruttium, that "the money had been privately carried off by night out of the treasury of Proserpine at Locri; and that there were no traces to those to whom the charge applied." The senate was highly incensed at finding that the practice of sacrilege continued, and that even the fate of Pleminius, an example so recent and so conspicuous both of the guilt and of the punishment, did not deter men from it. They ordered the consul, Cneius Aurelius, to signify to the praetor in Bruttium, that "it was the pleasure of the senate, that an inquiry be made concerning the robbery of the treasury, according to the method used by Marcus Pomponius, praetor, three years before; that the money which could be discovered should be restored, that what was not found should be made up, and that if he thought proper, atonements should be made for the purpose of expiating the violation of the temple, in the manner formerly prescribed by the pontiffs." At the same time, also, prodigies were announced as having happened in many places. It was said, that in Lucania the sky had been seen in a blaze; that at Privernum, in clear weather, the sun had been of a red colour during a whole day; that at Lanuvium, in the temple of Juno Sospita, a very loud noise had been heard in the night. Besides, monstrous births of animals were related to have occurred in many places: in the country of the Sabines, an infant was born whose sex was doubtful; and another was found, sixteen years old, of doubtful sex. At Frusino a lamb was born with a swine's head; at Sinuessa, a pig with a human head; and in Lucania, in the land belonging to the state, a foal with five feet. All these were considered as horrid and abominable, and as if nature were straying to strange productions. Above all, the people were particularly shocked at the hermaphrodites, which were ordered to be immediately thrown into the sea, as had been lately done with a production of the same monstrous kind, in the consulate of Caius Claudius and Marcus Livius. Notwithstanding they ordered the decemvirs to inspect the books in regard of that prodigy; and the decemvirs, from the books, directed the same religious ceremonies which had been performed on an occasion of the same kind. They ordered, besides, a hymn to be sung through the city by thrice nine virgins, and an offering to be made to imperial Juno. The consul, Caius Aurelius, took care that all these matters were performed according to the direction of the decemvirs. The hymn was composed by Publius Licinius Tegula, as a similar one had been, in the memory of their fathers, by Livius.
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All religious scruples were fully removed by expiations; at Locri, too, the affair of the sacrilege had been thoroughly investigated by Quintus Minucius, and the money replaced in the treasury out of the effects of the guilty. When the consuls wished to set out to their provinces, a number of private persons, to whom the third payment became due that year, of the money which they had lent to the public in the consulate of Marcus Valerius and Marcus Claudius, applied to the senate. The consuls, however, declared that the treasury being scarcely sufficient for the exigencies of a new war, in which a great fleet and great armies must be employed, there were no means of paying them at present. The senate could not stand against them when they complained, that "if the state intended to use, for the purpose of the Macedonian war, the money which had been lent for the Punic war, as one war constantly arose after another, what would be the issue, but that, in return for their generosity, their property would be confiscated as for some crime?" The demands of the private creditors being equitable, and the state being in no capacity of discharging the debt, they decreed a middle course between equity and convenience; resolving that "whereas many of them mentioned that lands were frequently exposed to sale, and that they themselves wished to become purchasers, they should, therefore, have liberty to purchase any belonging to the public, and which lay within fifty miles of the city. That the consuls should make a valuation of these, and impose on each acre one as, as an acknowledgment that the land was the property of the public, in order that, when the people should become able to pay, if any one chose rather to have the money than the land, he might restore it." The private creditors accepted the terms with joy; and that land was called Trientius and Tabulius, because it was given in lieu of the third part of their money.
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