authority of the senate prevailed; and, laying aside their private differences, they conducted the affairs of the state in friendship and unanimity. Their provinces were not districts bordering upon each other, as in former years, but quite separate, in the remotest confines of Italy. To one was decreed Bruttium and Lucania, to act against Hannibal; to the other Gaul, to act against Hasdrubal, who, it was reported, was now approaching the Alps; and that he to whose lot Gaul fell should choose whichever he pleased of the two armies, one of which was in Gaul, the other in Etruria, and receive the city legions in addition; and that he to whose lot Bruttium fell, should, after enlisting fresh legions for the city, take the army of whichever of the consuls of the former year he pleased. That Quintus Fulvius, proconsul, should take the army which was left by the consul, and that his command should last for a year. To Caius Hostilius, to whom they had given the province of Tarentum in exchange for Etruria, they gave Capua instead of Tarentum, with one legion which Fulvius had commanded the preceding year. 36. The anxiety respecting the approach of Hasdrubal to Italy increased daily. At first, ambassadors from the Massilians had brought word that he had passed over into Gaul and that the expectations of the Gauls were raised by his coming, as he was reported to have brought a large quantity of gold for the purpose of hiring auxiliaries. Afterwards, Sextus Antistius and Marcus Raecius, who were sent from Rome, together with these persons, as ambassadors, to look into the affair, had brought word back that they had sent persons with Massilian guides, who, through the medium of Gallic chieftains connected with them by hospitality, might bring back all ascertained particulars; that they found that Hasdrubal, who had already collected an immense army, would cross the Alps the ensuing spring; and that the only cause which delayed him there was, that the passage of the Alps was closed by winter. Publius Aelius Paetus was created and inaugurated in the office of augur in the room of Marcus Marcellus and Cneius Cornelius Dolabella was inaugurated king of the sacred rites in the room of Marcus Marcius, who had died two years before. This same year, for the first time since Hannibal came into Italy, the lustrum was closed by the censors Publius Sempronius Tuditanus and Marcus Cornelius Cethegus. The citizens numbered in the census were one hundred and thirty-seven thousand one hundred and eight, a number considerably smaller than before the war. This year it is recorded that the Comitium was covered, and that the Roman games were repeated once by the curule aediles, Quintus Metellus and Caius Servilius; and that the plebeian games were repeated twice by Quintus Mamilius and Marcus Caecilius Metellus, plebeian aediles. The same persons also gave three statues for the temple of Ceres, and there was a feast in honour of Jupiter on occasion of the games.