§4.52.1annum modestia tribunorum quietum excepit tribunus plebis L. Icilius Q. Fabio Ambusto, C. Furio Pacilo consulibus.
A year which had been quiet due to the moderation of the tribunes was succeeded, in the consulship of Quintus Fabius Ambustus and Gaius Furius Pacilus, by the tribune of the plebs Lucius Icilius.
§4.52.2is cum principio statim anni, velut pensum nominis familiaeque, seditiones agrariis legibus promulgandis cieret, §4.52.3pestilentia coorta, minacior tamen quam perniciosior, cogitationes hominum a foro certaminibusque publicis ad domum curamque corporum nutriendorum avertit; minusque eam damnosam fuisse, quam seditio futura fuerit, credunt.
When he, immediately at the beginning of the year, as if it were a task imposed by his name and family, was stirring up seditions by proposing agrarian laws, a pestilence arose, more threatening, however, than deadly, which turned away the thoughts of men from the forum and public contests to their homes and the care of nourishing their bodies; and they believe that it was less damaging than the impending sedition would have been.
§4.52.4defuncta civitate plurimorum morbis, perpaucis funeribus, pestilentem annum inopia frugum neglecto cultu agrorum, ut plerumque fit, excepit M. Papirio Atratino, C. Nautio Rutilo consulibus.
When the state had struggled through, with many illnesses but very few deaths, a scarcity of grain, resulting from the neglect of the cultivation of the fields, succeeded the pestilential year, as usually happens, in the consulship of Marcus Papirius Atratinus and Gaius Nautius Rutilus.
§4.52.5iam fames quam pestilentia tristior erat, ni dimissis circa omnes populos legatis, qui Etruscum mare quique Tiberim accolunt, ad frumentum mercandum annonae foret subventum.
Now the famine would have been more grim than the pestilence, had not relief been brought to the corn-market by sending envoys to all the peoples who dwell near the Etruscan sea and the Tiber to purchase grain.
§4.52.6superbe ab Samnitibus, qui Capuam habebant Cumasque, legati prohibiti commercio sunt, contra ea benigne ab Siculorum tyrannis adiuti; maximos commeatus summo Etruriae studio Tiberis devexit.
The envoys were haughtily refused trade by the Samnites, who held Capua and Cumae, but, contrary to this, they were kindly assisted by the tyrants of the Sicilians; and the Tiber carried down very large supplies with the greatest zeal of Etruria.
solitudinem in civitate aegra experti consules sunt, §4.52.7cum in legationes non plus singulis senatoribus invenientes coacti sunt binos equites adicere.
The consuls experienced solitude in the sick state, since, finding no more than one senator for each embassy, they were forced to add two knights.
§4.52.8praeterquam ab morbo annonaque nihil eo biennio intestini externive incommodi fuit.
Except for the disease and the grain supply, there was no internal or external trouble during that two-year period.
at ubi eae sollicitudines decessere, omnia, quibus turbari solita erat civitas, domi discordia, foris bellum exortum.
But when those anxieties departed, all the things by which the state was accustomed to be troubled arose: discord at home, war abroad.