Ab Urbe Condita, books 8-10 - 13s

THE consul Valerius Laevinus fought a losing engagement with Pyrrhus, the soldiers being greatly terrified by the strange sight of the elephants. this battle, when Pyrrhus was looking at the bodies of the Romans who had fallen, he found that they all faced their enemies, and laying waste the country, advanced towards the city of Rome. Gaius Fabricius, being sent to him by the senate to treat for the ransom of the prisoners, was in vain solicited by the King to forsake his country. The prisoners were released without a price., having been dispatched by Pyrrhus as an envoy to the senate, asked that the King might be received into the City for the purpose of arranging terms of peace. its having been resolved to refer this proposal to a fuller meeting of the senate, Appius Claudius, who by reason of a weakness of the eyes had long abstained from public business, entered the Curia and by his speech prevailed on the senators to deny Pyrrhus his request. Gnaeus Domitius was the first plebeian censor to close the lustrum. The number of the citizens was returned as 287,222. There was a second battle with Pyrrhus, of an indecisive nature. The treaty with the Carthaginians was renewed for the fourth time. a deserter from Pyrrhus promised Gaius Fabricius the consul that he would poison the King, Fabricius sent him back to the King with the story of his guilt. The book contains also successful campaigns against the Lucanians and the Bruttians, the Samnites and the Etruscans.