Ab urbe condita

If

I am to be of any use, I shall be none the less so in a private capacity.”

Ten military tribunes, accordingly, were appointed. The army acting against the Sabines did not remain passive. There, too, at the instigation of Icilius and Numitorius, a revolt against the decemvirs took place. The feelings of the soldiery were roused by the recollection of the murdered Siccius no less than by the fresh story of the maiden whom it had been sought to make a victim of foul lust.

When Icilius heard that tribunes of the soldiers had been elected on the Aventine, he anticipated from what he knew of the plebs that

when they came to elect their tribunes they would follow the lead of the army and choose those who were already elected as military tribunes.

As he was looking to a tribuneship himself, he took care to get the same number appointed and invested with similar powers by his own men, before they entered the City. They made their entry through the Colline gate in military order, with standards displayed, and proceeded through the heart of the City to the Aventine.

There the two armies united, and the twenty military tribunes were requested to appoint two of their number to take the supreme direction of affairs. They appointed. M. Oppius and. Sex. Manlius.

Alarmed at the direction affairs were taking, the senate held daily meetings, but the time was spent in mutual reproaches rather than in deliberation. The decemvirs were openly charged with the murder of Siccius, the profligacy of Appius, and the disgrace incurred in the field. It was proposed that Valerius and Horatius should go to the Aventine, but they refused to go unless the decemvirs gave up the insignia of an office which had expired the previous year.

The decemvirs protested against this attempt to coerce them, and said that they would not lay down their authority until the laws which they were appointed to draw up were duly enacted.

M. Duillius, a former tribune, informed the plebs that, owing to incessant wranglings, no business was being transacted in the senate.

He did not believe that the senators would trouble about them till they saw the City deserted; the Sacred Hill would remind them of the firm determination once shown by the plebs, and they would learn that unless the tribunitian power was restored there could be no concord in the State.