6. After the dictator had arrived at Rome, he sent Cneius Sempronius Blaesus, who had acted under him as lieutenant general at Capua, into the province of Etruria, to take the command of the army there, in the room of the praetor, Caius Calpurnius, whom he had summoned by letter to take the command of Capua and his own army. He fixed the first date he could for the election: which, however, could not be brought to a conclusion, in consequence of a dispute which arose between the tribunes and the dictator. The junior century of the Galerian tribe, to whose lot it fell to give the votes first, had named Quintus Fulvius and Quintus Fabius as consuls; and the other centuries, on being called upon to vote according to their course, would have inclined the same way, had not the plebeian tribunes, Caius and Lucius Arennius interposed. They said, "that it was hardly constitutional that a chief magistrate should be continued in office but that it was a precedent still more shocking, that the very person who held the election should be appointed. Then therefore, if the dictator should allow his own name to appear they would interpose against the election; but if the names of any other persons besides himself were put up, they should not impede it." The dictator defended the election by the authority of the fathers, the order of the commons, and precedents. For, "in the consulate of Cneius Servilius, when the other consul, Caius Flaminius, had fallen at Trasimenus, it was proposed to the people on the authority of the fathers, and the people had ordered, that as long as the war continued in Italy, it should be lawful for the people to elect to the consulship whomsoever they pleased, out of those persons who had been consuls, and as often as they pleased. That he had a precedent of ancient date, which was to the point, in the case of Lucius Posthumius Megellus, who, while he was interrex, had been created consul with Caius Junius Bubulcus, at an election over which he himself presided; and a precedent of recent date, in Quintus Fabius, who certainly would never have allowed himself to be re-elected, had it not been for the good of the state." After the contest had been continued for a long time, by arguments of this kind, at length the tribunes and the dictator came to an agreement, that they should abide by what the senate should decide. The fathers were of opinion, that such was then the condition of the state, that it was necessary that its affairs should be conducted by old and experienced generals, who were skilled in the art of war; and, therefore, that no delay should take place in the election. The tribunes then withdrew their opposition, and the election was held. Quintus Fabius Maximus was declared consul for the fifth time, and Quintus Fulvius Flaccus for the fourth. The praetors were then created; Lucius Veturius Philo, Titus Quintus Crispinus, Caius Hostilius Tubulus, and Caius Aurunculeius. The magistrates for the