Ab urbe condita

After thus resigning his own magistracy and limiting the other one, he was escorted home amidst the hearty good-will and congratulations of the people. The censors were extremely angry with Mamercus for having limited the power of a Roman magistrate, they struck him out of his tribe, increased his assessment eightfold, and disfranchised him.

It is recorded that he bore this most magnanimously, thinking more of the cause which led to the ignominy being inflicted upon him than of the ignominy itself. The leading men amongst the patricians, though disapproving of the limitation imposed on the censorial jurisdiction, were shocked at this instance of the harsh exercise of its power, for each recognised that he would be subject to the censors more frequently and for a longer time than he would be censor himself.

At all events the people, it is said, felt so indignant that no one but Mamercus possessed sufficient authority to protect the censors from violence.

The[*](Pestilence in Rome —Plebeian Grievances.) tribunes of the plebs held constant meetings of the Assembly with a view to preventing the election of consuls, and after bringing matters almost to the appointment of an interrex, they succeeded in getting consular tribunes

elected. They looked for plebeians to be elected as a reward for their exertions, but not a single one came in; all who were elected were

patricians. Their names were M. Fabius Vibulanus, M. Folius, and L. Sergius Fidenas. The pestilence that year kept everything quiet. The duumvirs did many things prescribed by the sacred books to appease the wrath of the gods and remove the pestilence from the