Ab urbe condita

Everything resounded with the confused noise of terrifying threats and shrieks of despairing anguish blended with the wailing of women and children.

In a very short time the defenders were driven from the walls and the city gates flung open.

Some rushed in in close order, others scaled the deserted walls; the city was filled with Romans; fighting went on everywhere. At length, after great carnage, the fighting slackened, and the Dictator ordered the heralds to proclaim that the unarmed were to be spared.

That put a stop to the bloodshed, those who were unarmed began to surrender, and the soldiers dispersed with the Dictator's permission in quest of booty.

This far surpassed all expectation both in its amount and its value, and when the Dictator saw it before him he is reported to have raised his hands to heaven and prayed that if any of the gods deemed the good fortune which had befallen him and the Romans to be too great, the jealousy which it caused might be allayed by such a calamity as would be least injurious to him and to Rome.

The tradition runs that whilst he was turning round during this devotion he stumbled and fell. To those who judged after the event it appeared as if that omen pointed to Camillus' own condemnation and the subsequent capture of Rome which occurred a few years

later. That day was spent in the massacre of the enemy and the sack of the city with its enormous wealth.

The following day the Dictator sold all freemen who had been spared, as slaves. The money so realised was the only amount paid into the public treasury, but even that proceeding roused the ire of the plebs.

As for the spoil they brought home with them, they did not acknowledge themselves under any obligation for it either to their general, who, they thought, had referred a matter within his own competence to the senate in the hope of getting their authority for his niggardliness, nor did they feel any gratitude to the senate.

It was the Licinian family to whom they gave the credit, for it was the father who had advocated the popular measure and the son who had taken the opinion of the senate upon it. When all that belonged to man had been carried away from Veii, they began to remove from the temples the votive gifts that had been made to the gods, and then the gods themselves;