disease; and when the tribunes of
the people endeavoured to impede his funeral panegyric,[102] the commons
would not allow that the last day of so great a man should be defrauded
of the usual honours; and they listened to the panegyric of him when
dead with as patient ears, as they had listened to the charges brought
against him when living, and attended his funeral in vast numbers.

[Footnote 99: Niebuhr, ii. p. 231, thinks that it was in this year the
Icilian law was passed, according to which, any person interrupting the
proceedings of the tribunes, rendered himself liable to capital
punishment.--_Twiss._]

[Footnote 100: Several charges were brought against Appius, according to
Dion. ix. 54, who also states that he did not die of any disease, but
that he laid violent hands on himself.--_Ruperti._]

[Footnote 101: The original has _plenus suarum_--_irarum_,--that is, the
anger not of Appius against the commons, but of the commons against
him.]

[Footnote 102: Conf. Nieb. ii. n. 754. It may be well to mention that
Niebuhr considered that this account regarding the death of Appius was
all fictitious. The Greek writers, scil. Dion. ix. 54, Zonar. vii. 17,
state that he laid violent hands on himself.]

62. In the same year the consul Valerius, having marched an army against
the AEquans, when he could not entice the enemy to an engagement, set
about assaulting their camp. A violent storm sent down from heaven with
thunder and hail prevented him. Then, on a signal for a retreat being
given, their surprise was excited by the return of such fair weather,
that they felt a scruple a second time to attack a camp which was
defended as it were by some divine power; all the rage of war was turned
on the devastation of the land. The other consul, AEmilius, conducted the
war against the Sabines. There also, because the enemy confined
themselves within their walls, the lands were laid waste. Then, by the
burning not only of the country-houses, but of the villages also, which
were thickly inhabited, the Sabines being aroused, after they met the
depredators, on retreating from an engagement left undecided, on the
following day removed their camp into a safer situation. This seemed a
sufficient reason to the consul why he should leave the enemy as
conquered, departing thence the war being still unfinished.

63. During these wars, whilst dissensions still continued at home, Titus
Numicius Priscus, Aulus Virginius, were elected con