30 A few days
afterwards, Lucius Saenius, a senator, read to the senate a letter, which, he
said, he had received from Faesulae, and in which it was stated that Caius
Manlius, with a large force, had taken the field by the 27th of October. Others
at the same time, as is not uncommon in such a crisis, spread reports of omens
and prodigies; others of meetings being held, of arms being transported, and of
insurrections of the slaves at Capua and in Apulia. In consequence of these rumors, Quintus Marcius
Rex was dispatched, by a decree of the senate, to Faesulae, and Quintus
Metellus Creticus into Apulia and the parts adjacent, both which officers, with
the title of commanders, were waiting near the city, having been prevented from
entering in triumph, by the malice of a cabal, whose custom was to ask a price
for everything, whether honorable or infamous. The praetors, too, Quintus
Pompeius Rufus, and Quintus Metellus Celer, were sent off, the one to Capua, the other to
Picenum, and power was given them to levy a force proportioned to the exigency
and the danger. The senate also decreed, that if any one should give
information of the conspiracy which had been formed against the state, his
reward should be, if a slave, his freedom and a hundred sestertia, if a
freeman, a complete pardon and two hundred sestertia. They further appointed
that the schools of gladiators should be distributed in Capua
and other municipal towns, according to the capacity of each; and that, at Rome, watches should be
posted throughout the city, of which the inferior magistrates should have the
charge.
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