Marcus Valerius and Spurius Verginius were next elected consuls.  Quiet prevailed at home and abroad.  The people were distressed for provisions on account of the excessive rains.  A law was proposed to make Mount Aventine public property. [39] The same tribunes of the people were re-elected.  In the following year, Titus Romilius and Gaius Veturius being consuls, they strongly recommended the law in all their harangues, declaring that they were ashamed that their number had been increased to no purpose, it that matter should be neglected during their two years in the same manner as it had been during the whole preceding five.  While they were most busily employed in these matters, an alarming message came from Tusculum that the AEquans were in Tusculan territory.  The recent services of that state made them ashamed of delaying relief.  Both the consuls were sent with an army, and found the enemy in their usual post in Algidum.  There a battle was fought:  upward of seven thousand of the enemy were slain, the rest were put to flight:  immense booty was obtained.  This the consuls sold on account of the low state of the treasury.  This proceeding, however, brought them into odium with the army, and also afforded the tribunes material for bringing a charge against the consuls before the commons.  Accordingly, as soon as they went out of office, in the consulship of Spurius Tarpeius and Aulus Aternius, a day of trial was appointed for Romilius by Gaius Calvius Cicero, tribune of the people; for Veturius, by Lucius Alienus plebeian aedile.  They were both condemned, to the great mortification of the patricians:  Romilius to pay ten thousand asses, Veturius fifteen thousand.  Nor did this misfortune of their predecessors render the new consuls more timid.  They said that on the one hand they might be condemned, and that on the other the commons and tribunes could not carry the law.  Then, having abandoned the law, which, by being repeatedly brought forward, had now lost consideration, the tribunes, adopted a milder method of proceeding with the patricians.  Let them, said they, at length put an end to disputes.  If laws drawn up by plebeians displeased them, at least let them allow legislators to be chosen in common, both from the commons and from the patricians, who might propose measures advantageous to both parties, and such as would tend to the establishment of liberty on principles of equality.  The patricians did not disdain to accept the proposal.  They claimed that no one should propose laws, except he were a patrician.  When they agreed with respect to the laws, and differed only in regard to the proposer, ambassadors were sent to Athens, Spurius Postumius Albus, Aulus Manlius, Publius Sulpicius Camerinus, who were ordered to copy out the celebrated laws of Solon, and to make themselves acquainted with the institutions, customs, and laws of the other states of Greece.