release the captives for a small ransom,
they would not take them, but refused by a decree of the Senate, and
endured to see some of them put to death, and others sold out of Italy
as slaves. The mass of those who had saved themselves by flight they
sent to Sicily, with orders not to set foot on the soil of Italy until
the war with Hannibal was over. So when Marcellus went to Sicily,
these men came in a body into his presence, and falling on the ground
before him besought him to permit them to serve as honourable
soldiers, promising with cries and tears that they would prove by
their actions that it was more by their bad fortune than their
cowardice that the defeat at Cannae took place. Marcellus was touched
with compassion, and wrote to the Senate asking to be allowed to fill
up from these men the vacancies which would occur in the ranks of his
army. Much discussion followed; and at last the Senate decreed that
Rome did not require the services of cowardly citizens, but, if
Marcellus nevertheless wished to make use of them, they must not
receive any of the crowns and other rewards which are commonly
bestowed by generals as the prizes of valour. This decree vexed
Marcellus, and after the war in Sicily he returned to Rome and blamed
the Senate that, in spite of all that he had done for them, they would
not allow him to relieve so many citizens from such a miserable
position.

XIV. In Sicily, at this time, he had just cause of complaint against
Hippokrates the Syracusan general, who, favouring the Carthaginian
side, and wishing to establish himself as despot, put to death many
Romans at Leontini. Marcellus took Leontini by storm, and did no harm
to the inhabitants, but flogged and executed all the deserters whom he
found. Hippokrates first sent to Syracuse a story that Marcellus was
exterminating the people of Leontini, and when this report had thrown
the city into confusion he fell upon it and made himself master of it.
Marcellus hereupon proceeded to Syracuse with his whole army, and
encamping near the city sent ambassadors to tell them what had really
happened in Leontini. By this, however, he gained nothing, as the
Syracusans would not listen to him (for the party of Hippokrates was
in the ascendant). He now attacked the city both by sea and land,
Appius commanding the land forces, while Marcellus directed a fleet of
sixty quinqueremes[15] full of armed men and missile weapons. He
raised a vast engine upon a raft mad