pent up, and surrounded; and of the Caudine forks, as a model of their defeat.  “Those people,” they said, “ever greedy after further acquisitions, were now brought into inextricable difficulties, hemmed in, not more effectually by the arms of their enemy, than by the disadvantage of the ground.”  Their joy was even mingled with a degree of envy, because fortune, as they thought, had transferred the glory of finishing the Roman war, from the Samnites to the Etrurians:  they hastened, therefore, with their whole collected force, to crush the consul Caius Marcius; resolving, if he did not give them an opportunity of fighting, to proceed, through the territories of the Marsians and Sabines, into Etruria.  The consul met them, and a battle was fought with great fury on both sides, but without a decisive issue.  Although both parties suffered severely, yet the discredit of defeat fell on the Romans, because several of equestrian rank, some military tribunes, with one lieutenant-general, had fallen; and, what was more remarkable than all, the consul himself was wounded.  On account of this event, exaggerated by report as is usual, the senate became greatly alarmed, so that they resolved on having a dictator nominated.  No one entertained a doubt that the nomination would light on Papirius Cursor, who was then universally deemed to possess the greatest abilities as a commander:  but they could not be certain, either that a message might be conveyed with safety into Samnium, where all was in a state of hostility, or that the consul Marcius was alive.  The other consul, Fabius, was at enmity with Papirius, on his own account; and lest this resentment might prove an obstacle to the public good, the senate voted that deputies of consular rank should be sent to him, who, uniting their own influence to that of government, might prevail on him to drop, for the sake of his country, all remembrance of private animosities.  When the deputies, having come to Fabius, delivered to him the decree of the senate, adding such arguments as were suitable to their instructions, the consul, casting his eyes towards the ground, retired in silence, leaving them in uncertainty what part he intended to act.  Then, in the silent time of the night, according to the established custom, he nominated Lucius Papirius dictator.  When the deputies returned him thanks, for so very meritoriously subduing his passion, he still persevered in obstinate silence, and dismissed them without any answer, or mention of what he had done:  a proof that he felt an extraordinary degree of resentment, which had been suppressed within his breast.  Papirius appointed Caius Junius Bubulcus master of the horse; and, as he was proceeding in an assembly of the Curiae [Footnote:  The comitia curiata, or assemblies of the curiae, alone had the power of conferring military command; no magistrate, therefore, could assume the command without the previous order of their assembly.  In time, this came to be a mere matter of form; yet the practice always