and employing their capital and slaves in its cultivation, had acquired a possessory right to it, to which the greater deference would be shown in antiquity, in proportion as the terms of prescription recognised by law were shorter than in modern times.(145) Even at present, however, the ejectment of encroachers upon a common by the lord of the manor, and of squatters by a colonial government, when conducted on a large scale, is a measure met with great resistance, and involving much difficulty.

§ 27 An account of the burning of nine tribunes is connected with this period, and with Cassius: for P. Mucius, one of the tribunes of the plebs, is said to have inflicted this punishment upon his nine colleagues, who, at the instigation of Sp. Cassius, offered some improper opposition to the subrogation of magistrates.(146) A mutilated passage of Festus, which probably refers to the same event, appears, so far as it can be restored, to describe some military tribunes in the army of Sicinius, the consul of the year 487 B.C., as the subjects of this punishment,

(145) The division of unoccupied public land is distinguished from the resumption of public land wrongfully occupied by patricians, in a note against Vertot in Hooke's History, b. ii. c. 19. Hooke lays it down that the division admitted of no difficulty, and he argues that the length of possession had not been sufficient to render the resumption unjust.

(146) Idem sibi tam licere P. Mucius tribunus plebis quam senatui et populo Romano credidit, qui omnes collegas suos, qui duce Sp. Cassio id egerant, ut, magistratibus non subrogatis, communis libertas in dubium vocaretur, vivos cremavit. Val. Max. vi. 3, 2. Dio Cass. xx. refers to the same transaction: ἐννέα γάρ ποτε δήμαρχοι πυρὶ ὑπὸ τοῦ δήμου ἐδόθησαν. Compare Zon. vii. 17. Niebuhr, vol. ii. p. 416, inclines to the opinion that the passages of Valerius, Dio, and Cassius, all refer to the same event.

The following stipulation, which Diodorus states to have formed part of the compact between the plebeians and patricians, under the decemvirate at the second secession (449 B.C.), appears to be a general expression of the occurrence described by Valerius Maximus: ἐν δὲ ταῖς ὁμολογίαις προσέ κειτο, τοῖς ἄρξασι δημάρχοις τὸν ἐνιαυτὸν ἀντικαθιστάναι πάλιν δημάρχους τοὺς ἴσους, ἢ τοῦτο μὴ πράξαντας, ζῶντας κατακαυθῆναι, xii. 25. This stipulation is probably borrowed from the Duilian law, in Livy, iii. 55: qui plebem sine tribunis reliquisset-tergo ac capite puniretur. Livy states that in the negotiation which took place at the second secession, the plebeians demanded that the decemvirs should be given up, in order that they might be burnt alive. 'De decemvirorum modo supplicio atrox postulatum fuit. Dedi quippe eos æquum censebant, vivosque igni concrematuros minabantur;' iii. 53.

The

and not to connect the occurrence with Cassius.(147) event is not mentioned either by Dionysius or Livy, and we are ignorant on what authority it is reported. Their silence as to so remarkable an incident raises a presumption that it was not mentioned by the historians whose writings they consulted.

§ 28 In the next years there are hostilities against the Veientes, Volscians, and Equians, which are not similarly represented by the two historians. The Volscians, so lately described by Dionysius as reduced to subjection by the Romans, now, according to him, contend with them on equal terms. Livy on the other hand says that they were defeated in a successful battle.(118) The policy of the patricians in fomenting external wars, in order to appease internal discords, is again adverted to.(119) On the other hand, the tribunes exert their influence to prevent the people from enrolling themselves as soldiers, so long as the agrarian decree remains unexecuted. Dionysius mentions a contrivance adopted by the consuls with success on this occasion, for overcoming the resistance of the tribunes. They placed their chairs of state in the plain outside the city, and therefore beyond the limits of the tribunician power, and summoned the

(147) See Festus, p. 174, with Müller's note, p. 389. The restoration of Niebuhr, Hist. vol. ii. p. 127, is considered by Müller to be inadmissible, who proposes a different one. The conjectures of Dr. Arnold may be seen in his History, vol. i. p. 241. He remarks that the whole period between the first institution of the tribuneship, and the death of Cassius, is one of the greatest obscurity.'

Kempf, in his edition of Valerius Maximus, has an Excursus on this subject, p. 754-6, in which he discredits the account of Valerius Maximus, and rejects Niebuhr's restoration of Festus, but approves of that adopted by Müller. He remarks justly that the account of nine tribunes being burnt alive by their colleague in the time of Sp. Cassius, who was put to death in 485 B.C. is not consistent with our accounts of the tribunate, which represent the number of tribunes to have been raised to ten, as late as the year 457 B.C. The story of burning the nine tribunes is doubted by Mr. Newman; Class. Mus. vol. vi. p. 212.

(148) Dion. Hal. viii. 82-89. Compare the account of the campaign of Emilius with Livy's words: Uno animo patres ac plebes rebellantes Volscos et quos, duce Emilio, prosperâ pugnâ vicere; ii. 42.

(149) Dion. Hal. viii. 83, enlarges on this topic. Livy, ib., merely says: Bello deinde civiles discordiæ intermissæ. Zonaras has a similar statement with respect to the agrarian law at this period: οἱ γὰρ δυνατοὶ μὴ ἄλλως κατέχειν αὐτοὺς δυνάμενοι, πολέμους ἐκ πολέμων ἐξεπίτηδες ἐκίνουν, ἵν ̓ αὐτοῖς ἀσχολούμενοι μηδὲν περὶ τῆς γῆς πολυπραγμονῶσι, vii. 17.

citizens before them. Those who refused to serve were fined, and the fine was levied on their lands. (150) If this easy mode of evading the resistance of the tribunes could be successfully used in this year, it is difficult to understand why it was not resorted to on other occasions. Livy here describes a source of popular discontent, which often recurs in subsequent years: namely, that the consuls cheated the soldiers of their booty, by selling it for the benefit of the state, instead of dividing it among them.(151) Alarming prodigies became frequent at this time in Rome, and were interpreted to signify that there was some irregularity in the performance of the sacred rites: but they ceased upon the punishment of a vestal virgin, who was immured for unchastity, and her two accomplices were beheaded.(152)

§ 29 We now read of a struggle at the elections between the patricians and plebeians, with respect to the choice of consuls. Although the vote is taken in the comitia centuriata, the patrician influence has not a decisive preponderance:(158) in the year 482 B.C. the disputes lead to an interregnum, and in this and the following year a compromise is effected, by selecting one consul, who though himself necessarily a patrician, entertains moderate opinions, and is well inclined to the plebeian party.(154)

(150) Dion. Hal. viii. 87.

(151) ii. 42. The construction which Niebuhr, Hist. vol. ii. p. 177, puts on this passage is quite arbitrary, and rests on an unproved hypothesis of his own.

(152) Dion. Hal. viii. 89, calls her Opimia; Livy, ii. 42, Oppia. Their accounts of the interpretation of the prodigies, and of their cessation at her death, agree.

(153) Dion. Hal. viii. 90.

(154) Ib. ix. 1. Niebuhr supposes a change in the mode of electing the consuls to have been made in the year of K. Fabius and Æmilius (484 B.C.) by which the election was transferred from the centuries to the Senate and the curiæ, and a mere right of confirmation reserved to the former (Hist. vol. ii. p. 178). He likewise supposes that in a later year a compromise was effected, by which the centuries elected one consul and the Senate the other (ib. 188). These suppositions rest on nothing but forced constructions of passages, by which meanings unknown to their authors are elicited. They are properly rejected by Goettling, Röm. Staatsverf. p. 308; Becker, ii. 2, p. 93, and Newman, Class. Mus. vol. vi. p. 119-126, who has given an excellent exposure of Niebuhr's sophisms. The liberty which Niebuhr assumes of taking duos and populus, for the patricians as opposed to the plebeians, often enables him to extract a meaning the very reverse of that

In 481 B.C. one of the tribunes opposes the levies, on the ground that the agrarian decree is not carried into effect: but his opposition is frustrated by his four colleagues, whom the patricians gain over, at the advice of Appius Claudius. (155) The two consuls are thus able to take the field, one against the Equians, the other against the Veientes;(156) but Kæso Fabius, one of the consuls, had earned so much unpopularity by being the accuser of Cassius, that, although he shows all the excellences of a good captain, and repulses the enemy, his army will not pursue its advantage, and returns speedily to Rome, without waiting for the orders of the general. (157)

The next consuls, M. Fabius and Cn. Manlius, are again impeded in their levies, on account of the neglect of the agrarian law, by Pontificius the tribune. (158) He is however opposed by his colleagues, and an army is enrolled, with which the consuls march against the Veientes. According to Dionysius they entrench themselves in two camps, near each other, and remain inactive, because they distrust the willingness of their soldiers to fight, and fear a repetition of the proceeding of the previous year. Here a prodigy occurred: the tent of the consul Manlius

intended. He likewise draws a distinction between greater and lesser gentes in this part of his history; which, so far as it has any foundation, is founded on a figurative interpretation of the older and younger senators. (See vol. ii. p. 384.) These expressions are, however, used by the ancient historians in a perfectly literal sense. See Livy, ii. 28; Dion. Hal. vi. 39, 43, 65, 66; vii. 21, 25. In vi. 66, the consuls threaten to fix a minimum of age in order to exclude the young patricians from the Senate.

(155) Dionysius calls this tribune Sp. Sicilius: Livy, Sp. Licinius. Appius is described by Dionysius as insisting on the maxim of Divide et impera. Livy places his advice under the following year; ii. 44. Dion. Hal. viii. 91, says that the decree had remained unexecuted for five years in the year of Julius and Q. Fabius.

(156) Dion. Hal. ix. 2, sends Furius against the Equians, and K. Fabius against the Veientes. Livy reverses the provinces: so that the battle in which the Roman army refuses to pursue, is according to Dionysius against the Veientes, according to Livy against the Equians. Zonaras agrees with Dionysius. Livy, ii. 44, represents a reference made to this battle with the Equians in the Etruscan counsels.

(157) Dion. Hal. ix. 3-4; Livy, ii. 43; Zon. vii. 17. Valerius Maximus, ix. 3, 5, has carelessly followed Livy.

(158) Niebuhr speaks of the name of Tiberius Pontificius as having been preserved in the ancient annals;' Lect. vol. i. p. 161. Does he conceive these ancient annals to have been contemporary ?

was struck by lightning, which overturned the altar, damaged his arms, and killed a warhorse, and some of his slaves. The diviners declared that this event portended the capture of the camp, and the death of the most distinguished men: whereupon Manlius abandoned his camp at midnight, and joined his colleague. As soon as the Etruscan soothsayers, who claimed a peculiar skill in the interpretation of lightning,(159) were informed of the circumstances, they recommended an immediate attack on the Romans, for the following reasons:-'If (they said) the consul had remained in the place where the thunderbolt fell, and had not transferred his standards to the other camp, the offended deity would have satisfied his anger with the capture of one camp, and the destruction of one army: but since, thinking to outwit the gods, they have removed to the other camp, leaving the spot struck by lightning unoccupied-as if the divine displeasure was signified to places, not to persons—both those who left their camp, and those who received them, will be visited by a common punishment from the deity.'(160) Livy knows, or at least says nothing of the prodigy and the double camp. He represents the union of camps to have subsisted from the beginning. In the other circumstances of this campaign however in the Romans being at last roused to action by the taunts of the Etruscans, in the battle marked by the deaths of Manlius the consul, a brother of the other consul, and by the temporary loss of the Roman camp-and in the consul's refusal of his triumph-he and Dionysius agree.(161) Dionysius indeed states that the only superiority of the Romans consisted in the departure of the Veientes on the day after the battle:

(159) See Müller's Etrusker, vol. ii. p. 162-78. Agesipolis, king of Sparta, retreated from his expedition against Argos in 389 B.C., in consequence of a thunderbolt falling in his camp, followed by unfavourable sacrifices; Xen. Hell. iv. 7, §7; Pausan. iii. 5, § 9.

(160) Dion. Hal. ix. 5-6.

(161) Livy and Dionysius are very minute in relating the events of the war; and Livy, believing all to be true, is very pleasing in his narrative. It may be regarded as authentic, that there was a long and difficult war against Veii. The detail in Livy contains nothing that is improbable; the account of the manner in which Cn. Manlius fell, and of the useless attempt