ther it was that all were not possessed with a desire of
destroying the city, or it had been so determined by the leading men of
the Gauls, both that some fires should be presented to their view, [to
see] if the besieged could be forced into a surrender through affection
for their dwellings, and that all the houses should not be burned down,
so that whatever portion should remain of the city, they might hold as
a pledge to work upon the minds of the enemy; the fire by no means
spread either indiscriminately or extensively on the first day, as is
usual in a captured city. The Romans beholding from the citadel the city
filled with the enemy, and their running to and fro through all the
streets, some new calamity presenting itself in every different quarter,
were neither able to preserve their presence of mind, nor even to have
perfect command of their ears and eyes. To whatever direction the shouts
of the enemy, the cries of women and children, the crackling of the
flames, and the crash of falling houses, had called their attention,
thither, terrified at every incident, they turned their thoughts, faces,
and eyes, as if placed by fortune to be spectators of their falling
country, and as if left as protectors of no other of their effects,
except their own persons: so much more to be commiserated than any
others who were ever besieged, because, shut out from their country,
they were besieged, beholding all their effects in the power of the
enemy. Nor was the night, which succeeded so shockingly spent a day,
more tranquil; daylight then followed a restless night; nor was there
any time which failed to produce the sight of some new disaster. Loaded
and overwhelmed by so many evils, they did not at all abate their
determination, [resolved,] though they should see every thing in flames
and levelled to the dust, to defend by their bravery the hill which they
occupied, small and ill provided as it was, being left [as a refuge] for
liberty. And now, as the same events recurred every day, as if
habituated to misfortunes, they abstracted their thoughts from all
feeling of their circumstances, regarding their arms only, and the
swords in their right hands, as the sole remnants of their hopes.

43. The Gauls also, after having for several days waged an ineffectual
war against the buildings of the city, when they saw that among the
fires and ruins of the captured city nothing now remained except armed
enemies, neither terrified by so ma