History of Rome

​However, the soldiers transported to Sicily—and they were for the most part of the Latin name and allies—were nearly the cause of a great rebellion; so much do the turning points of great things often depend on small things.

​For a murmur arose among the Latins and allies in their councils, that for the tenth year they were exhausted by levies and taxes;

​that almost every year they fought with great disaster; that some were killed in battle, others consumed by disease; that a citizen chosen as a soldier by a Roman was more completely lost to them than one captured by a Carthaginian, since by the enemy they were sent back to their country without ransom, whereas by the Romans they were banished outside Italy into what was more truly exile than military service;

​that the soldier of Cannae was now growing old there for the eighth year, and would die before the enemy should depart from Italy, especially since the enemy was now in the very prime of his strength;

​that if the old soldiers did not return to their country and new ones were enrolled, in a short time no one would survive. Therefore, what the reality itself would soon refuse, they must refuse to the Roman people before they arrived at ultimate desolation and destitution;

​that if the Romans should see the allies agreeing in this, they would surely think about making peace with the Carthaginians; otherwise, while Hannibal was alive, Italy would never be without war.

​These things were discussed in the councils. There were then thirty colonies of the Roman people; of these, twelve, when the embassies of all were in Rome, denied to the consuls that they had any means from which to give soldiers and money. These were Ardea, Nepete, Sutrium, Alba, Carseoli, Sora, Suessa, Circei, Setia, Cales, Narnia, Interamna.

​The consuls, struck by this unprecedented matter, since they wished to deter them from so detestable a plan, thinking that they would accomplish more by chastising and rebuking than by acting gently, said that those envoys had dared to say to the consuls ​what the consuls could not bring themselves to announce in the senate; for that was not a refusal of military duties, but an open defection from the Roman people.

​Let them therefore return quickly to their colonies and, as if the matter were still untouched—having spoken of rather than actually dared so great an impiety—deliberate with their own people. Let them remind them that they were not Campanians nor Tarentines, but Romans, sprung from there, ​and sent from there into colonies and into land captured in war for the sake of increasing their stock. What children owed to parents, that they owed to the Romans, if there were any filial piety, if there were any memory of their ancient fatherland.

​Let them therefore deliberate anew; for indeed what they had rashly agitated then amounted to betraying the Roman empire and handing over victory to Hannibal.

​When the consuls had urged these things for a long time alternately, the envoys, not at all moved, said neither that they had anything to report back home, nor did their own senate have anything that it could deliberate anew, since there was neither a soldier to be enrolled, nor money to be given for pay.

​When the consuls saw them obstinate, they reported the matter to the senate, where so great a panic was struck into the minds of men that a great part said it was all over with the empire: that the other colonies would do the same, and the allies the same; and that all had conspired to betray the Roman city to Hannibal.