the Allia, in which the Romans suffered defeat
and were forced to the right bank of the Tiber, leaving the city of
Rome defenseless. Abandoned by the citizens, the city was taken,
plundered, and burned by {256} the Gauls. Senators were slaughtered,
though the capitol was not taken. Finally, surprised and overcome by a
contingent of the Roman army, the enemy was forced to retire and the
inhabitants again returned. But no sooner had they returned than the
peaceful struggle of the plebeians against the patricians began again.

First, there were the poor, indebted plebeians, who sought the reform
of the laws relating to debtor and creditor and desired a share in the
public lands. Second, the whole body of the plebeians were engaged in
an attempt to open the consulate to their ranks. In 367 B.C. the
Licinian laws were passed, which gave relief to the debtors by
deducting the interest already accrued from the principal, and allowing
the rest to be paid in three annual instalments; and a second law
forbade that any one should possess more than 500 jugera of the public
lands. This was to prevent the wealthy patricians from holding lands
in large tracts and keeping them from the plebeians. This law also
abolished the military tribuneship and insisted that one at least of
the two consuls should be chosen from the plebeians--giving a
possibility of two. The patricians, in order to counteract undue
influence in this respect, established the praetorship, the praetor
having jurisdiction and vicegerence of the consuls during their absence.

There also sprang up about this time the new nobility (_optimates_),
composed of the plebeians and patricians who had held office for a long
time, and representing the aristocracy of the community. From this
time on all the Roman citizens tended to go into two classes, the
_optimates_ and, exclusive of these, the great Roman populace. In the
former all the wealth and power were combined; in the latter the
poverty, wretchedness, and dependence. Various other changes in the
constitution succeeded, until the great wars of the Samnites and those
of the Carthaginians directed the attention of the people to foreign
conquest. After the close of these great wars and the firm
establishment of the universal power of Rome abroad, there sprang up a
great civil war, induced largely by the disturbance {257} of the
Gracchi, who sought to carry out the will of the people in regard to
popular democra