Celts who had swept over the northern half
of Italy, almost within reach of Rome.

Cato was of the age for military service about the time of the battle of
Lake Trasimenus, and entered the army then as a common soldier.[32] The
first expedition in which he is definitely said to have taken part is that
of Q. Fabius Maximus Cunctator against Hannibal in Campania, in 214.[33]
This Roman commander was a man entirely after Cato's heart, and became one
of his models in public life.

Before and during the early years of his soldier's life, Cato succeeded in
winning some reputation as an orator, having practised first in the
provincial courts near his home, and afterwards at Rome.[34] This
reputation as well as his great force of character procured for him a
powerful life-long friend and patron, M. Valerius Flaccus, a statesman of
the old Roman conservative-democratic school of politics, the leader of
which was Fabius Cunctator. Through the influence of Flaccus, possibly with
the aid of Fabius, Cato became military tribune, and served with that rank
under Marcellus in Sicily, under Fabius again at the capture of Tarentum in
209,[35] and under C. Claudius Nero at the battle of the Metaurus, where he
contributed materially to that great victory.

In 204 Cato began his political career with the quaestorship.[36] As he was
a _novus homo_ and a man of small private means, it was no small
distinction that he had forced his way to office in his thirtieth year. The
lot assigned him as quaestor to Scipio, then in Sicily and about to cross
over into Africa. The chance was most unfortunate, if for no other reason,
because Cato was intimately connected with the party in the senate opposed
to Scipio, which had been attempting to bring him to trial for the
atrocities committed by the Roman army in southern Italy. But in addition
the two men were so utterly different that there was no possibility of the
quaestor standing in that filial relation to his consul, which old Roman
custom required. As financial officer, Cato complained of the luxury and
extravagance which Scipio allowed not only to himself but to his army. Yet
the complaint was made not so much on economic as on moral grounds; it
seemed to Cato that the old Roman discipline and power to endure hardships
were being swept away. The dispute was ended by Scipio allowing Cato to
return to Rome, some authorities say from Sicily, others from Africa.
According to one writer,[37] he came ho