errible
fear that Hannibal and his raging followers were about to burst in
through the gates of the city to murder them. The streets of the city,
and especially the Forum, were thronged with vast crowds of men,
women, and children, who filled the air with loud lamentations, and
with cries of terror and despair.

The magistrates were not able to restore order. The senate actually
adjourned, that the members of it might go about the city, and use
their influence and their power to produce silence at least, if they
could not restore composure. The streets were finally cleared. The
women and children were ordered to remain at home. Armed patrols were
put on guard to prevent tumultuous assemblies forming. Men were sent
off on horseback on the road to Canusium and Cannae, to get more
accurate intelligence, and then the senate assembled again, and began
to consider, with as much of calmness as they could command, what was
to be done.

The panic at Rome was, however, in some measure, a false alarm, for
Hannibal, contrary to the expectation of all Italy, did not go to
Rome. His generals urged him very strongly to do so. Nothing could
prevent, they said, his gaining immediate possession of the city. But
Hannibal refused to do this. Rome was strongly fortified, and had an
immense population. His army, too, was much weakened by the battle of
Cannae, and he seems to have thought it most prudent not to attempt
the reduction of Rome until he should have received re-enforcements
from home. It was now so late in the season that he could not expect
such re-enforcements immediately, and he accordingly determined to
select some place more accessible than Rome and make it his
head-quarters for the winter. He decided in favor of Capua, which was
a large and powerful city one or two hundred miles southeast of Rome.

Hannibal, in fact, conceived the design of retaining possession of
Italy and of making Capua the capital of the country, leaving Rome to
itself, to decline, as under such circumstances it inevitably must, to
the rank of a second city. Perhaps he was tired of the fatigues and
hazards of war, and having narrowly escaped ruin before the battle of
Cannae, he now resolved that he would not rashly incur any new dangers.
It was a great question with him whether he should go forward to Rome,
or attempt to build up a new capital of his own at Capua. The question
which of these two he ought to have done was a matter of great debate
then