On the news of Hannibal's victory reaching Rome, the prætor announced the distressing circumstance to a numerous meeting of the people, who, in the absence of the Consul, took upon themselves to appoint a dictator. Q. Fabius Maximus was chosen, and the mastership of the horse was conferred on M. Minucius. Hannibal was expected at Rome, but, like a wise general, he defeated general expectation, and proceeded to Spoletum, a Roman colony, which he hoped would have held out great advantages; but it held out with great spirit against him. Wishing to avoid the inconvenience of a siege, and of sitting down before the city with nothing but a marsh to sit down upon, he marched into Picenum, which contained abundance of everything necessary for the support of his army. His soldiers were afflicted at this time with a cutaneous disease, and, though this annoyance was only skin-deep, he feared a general breaking-out, if he had detained them against their will in an unhealthy country. From Picenum he passed into Apulia; and though he was disappointed in the hope that the inhabitants would join him, they were too weak to resist, and he turned every Italian city into an Italian warehouse for the supply of the comestibles he required. The dictator Fabius followed at a short distance, but always taking the high ground, by hovering about the hills and keeping the upper hand of Hannibal. His intention was to proceed to Casinum, but by some stupid misunderstanding, the general led the way to Casilinum, and the result was, that Fabius got ahead of him. On the mistake being discovered by Hannibal, he got 2000 oxen--but where he got them from does not exactly appear--and, having procured several thousand bundles of wood, he tied them to the horns of the animals. Having set the wood on fire, he turned the oxen out among the Romans, whose quarters soon were thrown into the sort of confusion prevalent in a London thoroughfare on a Smithfield market-day. In order to inflame the oxen, their horns had been covered over with pitch, which gave them an inclination to toss, and the poor creatures were running about in all directions, under the influence of fear and fury. Fabius is said to have mistaken the cattle for the Carthaginians, and to have rushed forwards, sword in hand, resolved on butchery. The Romans were thus drawn out of their favourable position, and Hannibal slipped into it, leaving the bulls to decide by a toss-up, if they pleased, the chances of victory over their aggressors. On the mistake being discovered by Fabius, he backed out as well as he could, and ventured on a few skirmishes, in which he met with some success, but he continued his policy of trying to tire out the enemy.