bringing with them some Carthaginians who had crossed over into Spain
for the purpose of hiring auxiliaries, having seized them and the
money they had with them. They laid down in the vestibule of the
senate-house two hundred and fifty pounds' weight of gold, and eight
hundred of silver. After the men had been received and thrown into
prison, and the gold and silver returned, the ambassadors were
thanked, and received, besides, presents and ships to convey them back
into Spain. Some of the older senators then observed, that men were
less powerfully affected by prosperity than adversity. That they
themselves remembered what terror and consternation had been
occasioned by the passage of Hannibal into Italy; what disasters and
what lamentations had followed that event. When the camp of the enemy
was seen from their walls, what vows were poured forth by each and
all! How often, extending their hands to heaven, exclamations were
heard in their assemblies. Oh! will that day ever arrive when we shall
behold Italy cleared of her enemies and enjoying the blessings of
peace! The gods, they said, had at length, in the sixteenth year,
granted that favour and yet there was no one who proposed that thanks
should be returned to them for it. That if men received a present
blessing so ungratefully, they would not be very mindful of it when it
was past. In consequence of this a general shout was raised from every
part of the senate-house, that Publius Aelius the praetor, should
lay the matter before the senate, and a decree was passed, that a
supplication should be performed at all the shrines for the space of
five days, and that a hundred and twenty victims of the larger sort
should be immolated. Laelius and the ambassadors of Masinissa having
been by this time dismissed, and intelligence having arrived that
ambassadors of the Carthaginians, who were coming to the senate to
treat about peace, had been seen at Puteoli, and would proceed thence
by land, it was resolved, that Caius Laelius should be recalled,
that the negotiations respecting the peace might take place in his
presence. Quintus Fulvius Gillo, a lieutenant-general of Scipio,
conducted the Carthaginians to Rome; and as they were forbidden to
enter the city, they were lodged in a country-house belonging to the
state, and admitted to an audience of the senate at the temple of
Bellona.

22. They addressed the senate in nearly the same terms as they
had employed before Scipio;