Ab urbe condita

The duty of sentinel was discharged in person by those of the senators whose age and health allowed them to do so; the Aediles of the plebs were responsible for their inspection. On these magistrates had devolved the consular authority and the supreme control of affairs.

The helpless commonwealth, deprived of its head and all its strength, was saved by its guardian deities and the fortune of the City, who made the Volscians and Aequi think more of plunder than of their enemy.

For they had no hope of even approaching the walls of Rome, still less of effecting its capture. The distant view of its houses and its hills, so far from alluring them repelled them.

Everywhere throughout their camp angry remonstrances arose: “Why were they idly wasting their time in a waste and deserted land amid plague stricken beasts and men while they could find places free from infection in the territory of Tusculum with its abundant wealth?” They hastily plucked up their standards,[*](When an army was in camp, these were fixed in the ground, each marking the station of the cohort to which it belonged; when they were taken up it was the signal for breaking up the camp and commencing the march.) and by cross-marches through the fields of Labici they reached the hills of Tusculum. All the violence and storm of war was now turned in this direction. Meantime the Hernici and Latins joined their forces and proceeded to Rome.

They were actuated by a feeling not only of pity but also of the disgrace they would incur if they had offered no opposition to their common foe while he was advancing to attack Rome, or had brought no succour to those who were their allies.