ious avenger for more
important occasions. Accordingly, in order to draw out the pillagers,
he ordered a large body of his men to drive out their cattle the next
day by the Esquiline gate, which was farthest from the enemy, thinking
that they would get intelligence of it, because during the blockade
and scarcity of provisions some of the slaves would turn traitors and
desert. And in fact they did learn by the information of a deserter,
and parties far more numerous than usual crossed the river in the hope
of seizing all the booty at once. Then Publius Valerius commanded
Titus Herminius, with a small force, to lie in ambush at the second
milestone on the road to Gabii, and Spurius Larcius, with a party of
light-armed youths, to post himself at the Colline gate while the
enemy was passing by, and then to throw himself in their way to cut
off their return to the river. The other consul, Titus Lucretius,
marched out of the Naevian gate with some companies of soldiers, while
Valerius himself led some chosen cohorts down from the Colan Mount.
These were the first who were seen by the enemy. Herminius, when he
perceived the alarm, rushed from his ambush and fell upon the rear of
the Etruscans, who had turned against Valerius. The shout was returned
on the right and left, from the Colline gate on the one side and
the Naevian on the other. Thus the plunderers were put to the sword
between both, being neither their match in strength for fighting, and
all the ways being blocked up to prevent escape: this put an end to
the disorderly raids of the Etruscans.

The blockade, however, was carried on none the less, and corn was both
scarce and very dear. Porsina still entertained the hope that, by
continuing the blockade, he would be able to reduce the city, when
Gaius Mucius, a young noble, who considered it a disgrace that the
Roman people, who, even when in a state of slavery, while under the
kings, had never been confined within their walls during any war, or
blockaded by any enemy, should now, when a free people, be blockaded
by these very Etruscans whose armies they had often routed--and
thinking that such disgrace ought to be avenged by some great and
daring deed, at first designed on his own responsibility to make his
way into the enemy's camp. Then, being afraid that, if he went without
the permission of the consuls, and unknown to all, he might perhaps be
seized by the Roman guards and brought back as a deserter, since the
ci