d at liberty? But why do I ask these questions, when, though I
had gone without leaving any orders, your own judgment ought to have
been regulated according to what you could discover of my intention? Why
do you not answer? Did I not forbid you to act, in any respect, during
my absence? Did I not forbid you to engage the enemy? Yet, in contempt
of these my orders, while the auspices were uncertain, while the omens
were confused, contrary to the practice of war, contrary to the
discipline of our ancestors, and contrary to the authority of the gods,
you dared to enter on the fight. Answer to these questions proposed to
you. On any other matter utter not a word. Lictor, draw near him." To
each of these particulars, Fabius, finding it no easy matter to answer,
at one time remonstrated against the same person acting as accuser and
judge, in a cause which affected his very existence; at another, he
asserted that his life should sooner be forced from him, than the glory
of his past services; clearing himself and accusing the other by turns;
so then Papirius' anger blazing out with fresh fury, he ordered the
master of the horse to be stripped, and the rods and axes to be got
ready. Fabius, imploring the protection of the soldiers, while the
lictors were tearing his garments, betook himself to the quarters of the
veterans, who were already raising a commotion in the assembly: from
them the uproar spread through the whole body; in one place the voice of
supplication was heard; in another, menaces. Those who happened to stand
nearest to the tribunal, because, being under the eyes of the general,
they could easily be known, entreated him to spare the master of the
horse, and not in him to condemn the whole army. The remoter parts of
the assembly, and the crowd collected round Fabius, railed at the
unrelenting spirit of the dictator, and were not far from mutiny; nor
was even the tribunal perfectly quiet. The lieutenants-general standing
round the general's seat besought him to adjourn the business to the
next day, and to allow time to his anger, and room for consideration;
representing that "the indiscretion of Fabius had been sufficiently
rebuked; his victory sufficiently disgraced; and they begged him not to
proceed to the extreme of severity; not to brand with ignominy a youth
of extraordinary merit, or his father, a man of most illustrious
character, together with the whole family of the Fabii." When they made
but little impressi