ourt-yard of the house. This is the only free and honourable way to
death. Our very enemies will admire our courage, and Hannibal will
learn that those whom he deserted and betrayed were brave allies."

14. More of those who heard this speech of Virrius approved of the
proposal contained in it, than had strength of mind to execute what
they approved. The greater part of the senate being not without hopes
that the Romans, whose clemency they had frequently had proof of in
many wars, would be exorable by them also, decreed and sent
ambassadors to surrender Capua to the Romans. About twenty-seven
senators, following Vibius Virrius to his home, partook of the banquet
with him; and after having, as far as they could, withdrawn their
minds, by means of wine, from the perception of the impending evil,
all took the poison. They then rose from the banquet, after giving
each other their right hands, and taking a last embrace, mingling
their tears for their own and their country's fate; some of them
remained, that they might be burned upon the same pile, and the rest
retired to their homes. Their veins being filled in consequence of
what they had eaten, and the wine they drank, rendered the poison less
efficacious in expediting death; and accordingly, though the greater
part of them languished the whole of that night and part of the
following day, all of them, however, breathed their last before the
gates were opened to the enemy. The following day the gate of Jupiter,
which faced the Roman camp, was opened by order of the proconsul, when
one legion and two squadrons of allies marched in at it, under the
command of Caius Fulvius, lieutenant-general. When he had taken care
that all the arms and weapons to be found in Capua should be brought
to him; having placed guards at all the gates to prevent any one's
going or being sent out, he seized the Carthaginian garrison, and
ordered the Campanian senators to go into the camp to the Roman
generals. On their arrival they were all immediately thrown into
chains, and ordered to lay before the quaestor an account of all the
gold and silver they had. There were seventy pounds of gold, and three
thousand two hundred of silver. Twenty-five of the senators were sent
to Cales, to be kept in custody, and twenty-eight to Teanum; these
being the persons by whose advice principally it appeared that the
revolt from the Romans had taken place.

15. Fulvius and Claudius were far from being agreed as t