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1The following year, in which Marcus Marcellus and Lucius Arruntius were consuls, the city was again submerged by the overflowing of the river, and many objects were struck by thunderbolts, especially the statues in the Pantheon, so that the spear even fell from the hand of Augustus. 2The pestilence raged throughout all Italy so that no one tilled the land, and I suppose that the same was the case in foreign parts. The Romans, therefore, reduced to dire straits by the disease and by the consequent famine, believed that these woes had come upon them for no other reason than that they did not have Augustus for consul at this time also. 3They accordingly wished to elect him dictator, and shutting the senators up in their meeting-place, they forced them to vote this measure by threatening to burn down the building over their heads. Next they took the twenty-four rods and approached Augustus, begging him to consent both to being named dictator and to becoming commissioner of the grain supply, as Pompey had once done. 4He accepted the latter duty under compulsion, and ordered that two men should be chosen annually, from among those who had served as praetors not less than five years previously in every case, to attend to the distribution of the grain. As for the dictatorship, however, he did not accept the office, but went so far as to rend his garments when he found himself unable to restrain the people in any other way, either by argument or by entreaty; 5for, since he was superior to the dictators in the power and honour he already possessed, he properly guarded against the jealousy and hatred which the title would arouse.
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