Fabius Maximus

Accordingly, without the man’s knowledge, Fabius sent and arrested the girl and hid her in his own tent. Then he called the Lucanian to him privately and said: It is well known that, contrary to Roman custom and law, you often pass the night away from camp; but it is also well known that you have done good service in the past. Your transgressions shall therefore be atoned for by your deeds of valour, but for the future I shall put another person in charge over you.

Then, to the soldier’s amazement, he led the girl forth and put her in his hands, saying: This person pledges herself that you will hereafter remain in camp with us, and you will now show plainly whether or not you left us for some other and base purpose, making this maid and your love for her a mere pretext. Such is the story which is told about this matter.

The city of Tarentum, which had been lost to the Romans by treachery,[*](212 B.C.) Fabius recovered in the following manner.[*](209 B.C.) There was a young man of Tarentum in his army, and he had a sister who was very faithfully and affectionately disposed towards him. With this woman the commander of the forces set by Hannibal to guard the city, a Bruttian, was deeply enamoured, and the circumstance led her brother to hope that he could accomplish something by means of it. He therefore joined his sister in Tarentum, ostensibly as a deserter from the Romans, though he was really sent into the city by Fabius, who was privy to his scheme.

Some days passed, accordingly, during which the Bruttian remained at home, since the woman thought that her amour was unknown to her brother. Then her brother had the following words with her: I would have you know that a story was very current out there in the Roman camp that you have interviews with a man high in authority. Who is this man? For if he is, as they say, a man of repute, and illustrious for his valour, war, that confounder of all things, makes very little account of race. Nothing is disgraceful if it is done under compulsion, nay, we may count it rare good fortune, at a time when right is weak, to find might very gentle with us.

Thereupon the woman sent for her Bruttian and made her brother acquainted with him. The Barbarian’s confidence was soon gained, since the brother fostered his passion and plainly induced the sister to be more complacent and submissive to him than before, so that it was not difficult, the man being a lover and a mercenary as well, to change his allegiance, in anticipation of the large gifts which it was promised that he should receive from Fabius.

This is the way the story is usually told.[*](So, substantially, by Livy, xxvii. 15. ) But some writers say that the woman by whom the Bruttian was won over, was not a Tarentine, but a Bruttian, and a concubine of Fabius, and that when she learned that the commander of the Bruttian garrison was a fellow-countryman and an acquaintance of hers, she told Fabius, held a conference with the man beneath the walls of the city, and won him completely over.