s and the old men who had been consuls, and been
honoured with triumphs, could not bear to leave the city. At the
instance of Fabius, the Pontifex Maximus, they put on their sacred
vestments and robes of state, and after offering prayer to the gods, as
if they were consecrating themselves as victims to be offered on behalf
of their country, they sat down in their ivory chairs in the Forum in
full senatorial costume, and waited what fortune might befal them.

XXII. On the third day after the battle Brennus appeared, leading his
army to attack the city. At first, seeing the gates open and no guards
on the walls, he feared some ambuscade, as he could not believe that the
Romans had so utterly despaired of themselves. When he discovered the
truth, he marched through the Colline Gate, and captured Rome, a little
more than three hundred and sixty years after its foundation, if we can
believe that any accurate record has been kept of those periods whose
confusion has produced such difficulties in the chronology of later
times. However, an indistinct rumour of the fall of Rome seems at once
to have reached Greece: for Herakleides of Pontus, who lived about that
time, speaks in his book 'On the Spirit,' of a rumour from the west that
an army had come from the Hyperboreans and had sacked a Greek colony
called Rome, which stood somewhere in that direction, near the great
ocean. Now, as Herakleides was fond of strange legends, I should not be
surprised if he adorned the original true tale of the capture of the
city with these accessories of "the Hyperboreans" and "the great ocean."
Aristotle, the philosopher, had evidently heard quite accurately that
the city was taken by the Gauls, but he says that it was saved by one
Lucius: now Camillus's name was Marcus, not Lucius. All this, however,
was pure conjecture.

Brennus, after taking possession of Rome, posted a force to watch the
Capitol, and himself went down to the Forum, and wondered at the men who
sat there silent, with all their ornaments, how they neither rose from
their seats at the approach of the enemy, nor changed colour, but sat
leaning on their staffs with fearless confidence, quietly looking at one
another. The Gauls were astonished at so strange a sight, and for a long
time they forbore to approach and touch them, as if they were superior
beings. But when one of them ventured to draw near to Marcus Papirius
and gently stroke his long beard, Papirius struck him on the h