ever passed, but in a large body; these were generally the third division, which had watched on the walls the preceding night.  The cause of their going out was this:  the Spaniards, ignorant of maritime affairs, were fond of trafficking with them, and glad of an opportunity of purchasing, for their own use, the foreign goods, which the others imported in their ships; and, at the same time, of finding a market for the produce of their lands.  The desire of this mutual intercourse caused the Spanish town to be freely open to the Greeks.  They were thus the more protected as being sheltered under the friendship of the Romans, which they cultivated with as much cordial zeal, though not possessed of equal resources, as the Massilians.  On this account they received the consul, and his army, with kindness and cordiality.  Cato staid there a few days, until he could learn what force the enemy had, and where they lay; and, not to be idle during even that short delay, he spent the whole time in exercising his men.  It happened to be the season of the year when the Spaniards had the corn in their barns.  He therefore ordered the purveyors not to purchase any corn, and sent them home to Rome, saying, that the war would maintain itself.  Then, setting out from Emporiae, he laid waste the lands of the enemy with fire and sword, spreading terror and flight through the whole country.

10.  At the same time, as Marcus Helvius was going home from Farther Spain, with an escort of six thousand men, given him by the praetor, Appius Claudius, the Celtiberians, with a very numerous force, met him near the city of Illiturgi.  Valerius says, that they had twenty thousand effective men; that twelve thousand of them were killed, the town of Illiturgi taken, and all the adult males put to the sword.  Helvius, soon after, arrived at the camp of Cato; and as the region was now free from enemies, he sent back the escort to Farther Spain, and proceeded to Rome, where, on account of his successful services, he entered the city with an ovation.  He carried into the treasury, of silver bullion, fourteen thousand pounds’ weight; of coined, seventeen thousand and twenty-three denarii;[1] and Oscan[2] denarii, one hundred and twenty thousand four hundred and thirty-eight.[3] The reason for which the senate refused him a triumph was, because he fought under the auspices, and in the province, of another.  He had returned, moreover, two years after the expiration of his office, because after he had resigned the government of the province to Quintus Minucius, he was detained there during the succeeding year, by a severe and tedious sickness he therefore entered the city in ovation, only two months before his successor, Quintus Minucius, enjoyed a triumph.  The latter also brought into the treasury thirty-four thousand eight hundred pounds’ weight of silver, seventy-eight thousand denarii,[4] and of Oscan denarii two hundred and seventy-eight thousand.[5]

[Footnote 1:  549l. 14s.]