s nor an expense to the
republic. Tiberius Gracchus also, having led his legions from Cumae to
Luceria in Apulia, sent Marcus Valerius, the praetor, thence to
Brundusium with the troops which he had commanded at Luceria, with
orders to protect the coast of the Sallentine territory, and make
provisions with regard to Philip and the Macedonian war. At the close
of the summer, the events of which I have described, letters arrived
from Publius and Cneius Scipio, stating the magnitude and success of
their operations in Spain, but that the army was in want of money,
clothing, and corn, and that then crews were in want of every thing.
With regard to the pay, they said, that if the treasury was low, they
would adopt some plan by which they might procure it from the
Spaniards, but that the other supplies must certainly be sent from
Rome, for otherwise neither the army could be kept together nor the
province preserved. When the letters were read, all to a man admitted
that the statement was correct, and the request reasonable, but it
occurred to their minds, what great forces they were maintaining by
land and sea, and how large a fleet must soon be equipped if a war
with Macedon should break out, that Sicily and Sardinia, which before
the war had wielded a revenue, were scarcely able to maintain the
troops which protected those provinces, that the expenses were
supplied by a tax, that both the number of the persons who contributed
this tax was diminished by the great havoc made in their armies at the
Trasimenus and Cannae, and the few who survived, if they were
oppressed with multiplied impositions, would perish by a calamity of a
different kind. That, therefore, if the republic could not subsist by
credit, it could not stand by its own resources. It was resolved,
therefore, that Fulvius, the praetor, should present himself to the
public assembly of the people, point out the necessities of the state,
and exhort those persons who had increased their patrimonies by
farming the public revenues, to furnish temporary loans for the
service of that state, from which they had derived their wealth, and
contract to supply what was necessary for the army in Spain, on the
condition of being paid the first when there was money in the
treasury. These things the praetor laid before the assembly, and fixed
a day on which he would let on contract the furnishing the army in
Spain with clothes and corn, and with such other things as were
necessary