36.  While these transactions passed in Greece, Macedonia, and Asia, a conspiracy among the slaves had well nigh made Etruria an hostile province.  To examine into and suppress this, Manius Acilius the praetor, whose province was the administration of justice between natives and foreigners, was sent at the head of one of the two city legions.  A number of them, who were by this time formed in a body, he reduced by force of arms, killing and taking many.  Some, who had been the ringleaders of the conspiracy, he scourged with rods and then crucified; some he returned to their masters.  The consuls repaired to their provinces.  Just as Marcellus entered the frontiers of the Boians, and while his men were fatigued with marching the whole length of the day, and as he was pitching his camp on a rising ground, Corolam, a chieftain of the Boians, attacked him with a very numerous force, and slew three thousand of his men:  several persons of distinction fell in that tumultuary engagement; amongst others, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus and Marcus Junius Silanus, praefects of the allies; and Aulus Ogulnius and Publius Claudius, military tribunes in the second legion.  The Romans, not withstanding, had courage enough to finish the fortification of their camp, and to defend it, in spite of an assault made on it by the enemy, elated by their success in the field.  Marcellus remained for some time in the same post, until he could tend the wounded, and revive the spirits of his men after such a disheartening blow.  The Boians, a nation remarkably impatient of delay, and quickly disgusted at a state of inaction, separated, and withdrew to their several forts and villages.  Marcellus then, suddenly crossing the Po, led his legions into the territory of Comum, where the Insubrians, after rousing the people of the country to arms, lay encamped.  The fierce Boian Gauls attacked him on his march, and they first onset was so vigorous, as to make a considerable impression on his van.  On perceiving which, and fearing lest, if his men once gave way, they would be dislodged, he brought up a cohort of Marsians against the enemy, and ordered every troop of the Latin cavalry to charge them.  The first and second charges of these having checked the enemy in their furious attack, the other troops in the Roman line, resuming courage, advanced briskly on the foe.  The Gauls no longer maintained the contest, but turned their backs and fled in confusion.  Valerius Antias relates, that in that battle above forty thousand men were killed, five hundred and seven military standards taken, with four hundred and thirty-two chariots, and a great number of gold chains, one of which, of great weight, Claudius says, was deposited as an offering to Jupiter, in his temple in the Capitol.  The camp of the Gauls was taken and plundered the same day; and the town of Comum was reduced in a few days after.  In a little time, twenty-eight forts came over to the consul.  There is a doubt among writers, whether the consul led his legions first against the Boians, or against the Insubrians; so as to determine, whether the successful battle obliterated the disgrace of the defeat, or whether the victory obtained at Comum was tarnished by the disaster incurred among the Boii.