affection, the great scarcity of all things which prevailed at the time
being considered, since all subtracted something from their necessary
food to give it to this one man. After this the guards that had been
set to watch the place by which the enemy had climbed up the hill were
summoned to the assembly. Of these, though Sulpicius, tribune of the
soldiers, had affirmed that he would deal with all of them according to
military custom, only one was punished, all agreeing to throw the chief
blame on him, and he, being beyond all doubt guilty in the matter, was
by common consent cast down from the rock. After this the watch was kept
more diligently on both sides, for the Gauls knew that messengers had
gone to and fro between Veii and Rome, and the Romans remembered from
how great a peril they had escaped.

Beyond all other evils of war famine troubled both armies. The Gauls
were vexed with pestilence also, having their camp in low ground that
lay among hills, and was scorched with the burning of the houses. If
there was anything of wind also, this brought with it not dust only
but ashes. All these things and the heat of the year the Gauls, who are
accustomed to wet and cold, were little able to endure, so that they
died, as it were, in herds; so that their fellows, wearied of burying
the dead one by one, made great heaps of their carcases and burned them
with fire. And now a truce was made with the Romans, and conferences
held. In this the Gauls spake much of the famine as being good cause of
surrender; whereupon, it is said, the Romans threw loaves of bread among
their posts, as if to show them that there was no scarcity among them.
Nevertheless their hunger was such that now it could neither be hidden
nor endured. Wherefore, while Camillus levied an army at Ardea, the
garrison of the Capitol, worn out with watching, and yet able to endure
all other ills save hunger only, seeing that the help they looked for
came not, and that when the guards went forth to their watch they could
scarce for weakness stand up under their arms, were resolute that they
should either surrender or ransom themselves on such terms as might be
had. And this they did the more readily because the Gauls had made it
plain that they might be persuaded by no great sum of money to give up
the siege. The Senate, therefore, was called together, and the matter
was entrusted to the tribunes of the soldiers. After this a conference
was held between Sulpicius