The Romans evidently looked forward to this war with far greater fear than they did to that of Hannibal. Such is human nature! The Apennines north of Tuscany were then quite impassable, and there were only two ways there by which Italy could be invaded: the one was by Fæsulæ, and the other through the territory of Lucca, down by Pisa, where the whole valley at that time was a great marsh. By one of these two roads the Gauls must have passed, probably by the latter; but whilst Hannibal’s march through these swamps has become famous, history is silent with regard to that of the Gauls. They left the Roman consul in his position near Ariminum, and fifty thousand of them burst into Etruria. Probably the army of the Romans was stationed near Florence, so as to block up the road to Rome; and thus one can understand that they were late in knowing of the invasion of the Gauls, and of their march as far as Clusium. Thither the Gauls had arrived, within three days’ march from Rome. The Romans now broke up, that they might either cut off from them the way to Rome, or at least follow after them: the Gauls were apprised of this, and retreated. They marched from Clusium through the Siennese territory to the sea: here we find them in the neighbourhood of Piombino, over-against Elba. Polybius says that they now fell in with the Romans near a place called Φαίσολα. This the commentators preposterously mistook for Fæsulæ above Florence; yet it must have been between Chiusi and the sea-coast, not far from Aquapendente.[12] Here they laid a trap for the Romans. They broke up with their infantry, and withdrew to a good position; the cavalry remained behind, and was to provoke the Romans, and then, slowly falling back, to entice them to the spot whither they wished to bring them. The Romans suffered there a great defeat: a part only of them retreated to a strong height among the Apennines, where they defended themselves against the Gauls. Luckily, the consul Æmilius, who had left his station near Ariminum, had now advanced through the Apennines to reinforce the army; and when he did not find it in its former place, he proceeded by forced marches along the road to Rome, and came up the night after the disastrous battle. He did not know that the Romans were surrounded on the mountains; but the Gauls halted when they saw his watch-fires, and the hard-pressed Romans sent messengers to him, and acquainted him with their situation. The next morning, he now wanted to attack the Gauls; these, however, had chosen to retire. As they had gotten a vast deal of booty during the campaign, they did not wish with such an _agmen impeditum_ to enter into battle, and so they resolved to return home, and advance again afterwards. Such a resolution can only be made by a barbarous people. They marched slowly along the sea-coast, laying everything waste: the consular army followed, to keep them in check, but was afraid of them. The Gauls would thus have returned unhurt, had