Foiled thus, and with great numbers of his men dying from the fever that
always prevailed in Rome in summer, Brennus thought of retreating, and
offered to leave Rome if the garrison in the Capitol would pay him a
thousand pounds' weight of gold. There was treasure enough in the
temples to do this, and as they could not tell what Camillus was about,
nor if Pontius had reached him safely, and they were on the point of
being starved, they consented. The gold was brought to the place
appointed by the Gauls, and when the weights proved not to be equal to
the amount that the Romans had with them, Brennus resolved to have all,
put his sword into the other scale, saying, "Væ victis"--"Woe to the
conquered." But at that moment there was a noise outside--Camillus was
come. The Gauls were cut down and slain among the ruins, those who fled
were killed by the people in the country as they wandered in the fields,
and not one returned to tell the tale. So the ransom of the Capitol was
rescued, and was laid up by Camillus in the vaults as a reserve for
future danger.

This was the Roman story, but their best historians say that it is made
better for Rome than is quite the truth, for that the Capitol was really
conquered, and the Gauls helped themselves to whatever they chose and
went off with it, though sickness and weariness made them afterwards
disperse, so that they were mostly cut off by the country people.

Every old record had been lost and destroyed, so that, before this,
Roman history can only be hearsay, derived from what the survivors
recollected; and the whole of the buildings, temples, senate-house, and
dwellings lay in ruins. Some of the citizens wished to change the site
of the city to Veii; but Camillus, who was Dictator, was resolved to
hold fast by the hearths of their fathers, and while the debate was