Silver was not impressed with a mark until the year of the City 485, the year of the consulship of Ogulnius and Fabius, five years before the First Punic War; at which time it was ordained that the value of the denarius should be ten asses of copper. The weight, however, of the libra of copper was diminished during the First Punic War, the republic not having means to meet its expenditure: in consequence of which, an ordinance was made that the as should in future be struck of two ounces weight. By this contrivance a saving of five-sixths was effected, and the public debt was liquidated. The impression upon these copper coins was a two-faced Janus on one side, and the beak of a ship of war on the other. At a later period, when Hannibal was pressing hard upon Rome, in the dictatorship of Q. Fabius Maximus, asses of one ounce weight were struck, and it was ordained that the value of the denarius should be sixteen asses, by which last reduction of the weight of the as the republic made a clear gain of one half. Still, however, so far as the pay of the soldiers is concerned, one denarius has always been given for every ten asses. The impressions upon the coins of silver were two-horse and four-horse chariots, and hence it is that they received the names of “bigati” and “quadrigati.” The first golden coin was struck sixty-two years after that of silver. But the invention of money opened a new field to human avarice, by giving rise to the practice of lending money at interest, while the owner passes a life of idleness: and it was with no slow advances that, not merely avarice, but a perfect hunger for gold became inflamed with a sort of rage for acquiring. Septimuleius, the familiar friend of Caius Gracchus, not only cut off the latter’s head, upon which a price had been set of its weight in gold, but, before bringing it to Opimius, poured molten lead into the mouth, and so not only was guilty of the crime of parricide, but added to his criminality by cheating the state. And the Roman name was rendered infamous by avarice, when King Mithridates caused molten gold to be poured into the mouth of Aquilius, the Roman general, whom he had taken prisoner. One cannot but feel ashamed, on looking at those new-fangled names which are invented every now and then, from the Greek language, by which to designate vessels of silver, filagreed or inlaid with gold, and the various other practices by which such articles of luxury, when only gilded, are made to sell at a higher price than they would have done if made of solid gold. Spartacus forbade any one of his followers to introduce either gold or silver into the camp—so much more nobleness of mind was there in those days, even in runaway slaves.