of the consul.  Affairs were conducted better in the case of the Volscians.  The enemy were routed in the first engagement, and driven in flight into the city of Antium, a very wealthy place, considering the times:  the consul, not venturing to attack it, took from the people of Antium another town, Caeno,[80] which was by no means so wealthy While the Aequans and Volscians engaged the attention of the Roman armies, the Sabines advanced in their depredations even to the gates of the city:  then they themselves, a few days later, sustained from the two armies heavier losses than they had inflicted, both the consuls having entered their territories under the influence of exasperation.

At the close of the year to some extent there was peace, but, as frequently at other times, a peace disturbed by contests between the patricians and commons.  The exasperated commons refused to attend the consular elections:  Titus Quinctius and Quintus Servilius were elected consuls through the influence of the patricians and their dependents:  the consuls had a year similar to the preceding, disturbed at the beginning, and afterward tranquil by reason of war abroad.  The Sabines crossing the plains of Crustumerium by forced marches, after carrying fire and sword along the banks of the Anio, being repulsed when they had nearly come up to the Colline gate and the walls, drove off, however, great booty of men and cattle:  the consul Servilius, having pursued them with an army bent on attacking them, was unable to overtake the main body itself in the level country:  he, however, extended his devastations over such a wide area, that he left nothing unmolested by war, and returned after having obtained booty many times greater than that carried off by the enemy.  The public cause was also extremely well supported among the Volscians by the exertions both of the general and the soldiers.  First a pitched battle was fought, on level ground, with great slaughter and much bloodshed on both sides:  and the Romans, because their small numbers caused their loss to be more keenly felt, would have given way, had not the consul, by a well-timed fiction, reanimated the army, by crying out that the enemy was in flight on the other wing; having charged, they, by believing themselves victorious, became so.  The consul, fearing lest, by pressing on too far, he might renew the contest, gave the signal for retreat.  A few days intervened, both sides resting as if by tacit suspension of hostilities:  during these days a vast number of persons from all the states of the Volscians and Equans came to the camp, feeling no doubt that the Romans would depart during the night, if they perceived them.  Accordingly, about the third watch [81], they came to attack the camp.  Quinctius having allayed the confusion which the sudden panic had occasioned, and ordered the soldiers to remain quiet in their tents, led out a cohort of the Hernicans for an advance guard:  the trumpeters and horn blowers he mounted on horseback, and commanded