Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 29
Frank Gardener Moore, Professor Emeritus in Columbia University, Ed.

17. A hearing in the senate being granted, the eldest of them said: "I know, conscript fathers, that in determining what weight is to be given to our complaints in your presence very much depends upon your being well informed both as to how Locri was betrayed to Hannibal, and how by driving out Hannibal's garrison it was restored to your authority. [2] For if it prove that no guilt for the revolt attaches to our council of state, and if it be at the same time evident that we returned to your authority not by our consent only but also by our effort and our courage, you will be all the more indignant that good and faithful allies are receiving such outrageous treatment from your legatus and his soldiers. [3] But in my opinion enquiry into our revolts should be put off in both cases to another time for two reasons. [4] The first is in order that the hearing may be in the presence of Publius Scipio, who recovered Locri and [p. 271]is our witness for every act, the good and the bad.¹ The second reason is because, whatever our character is, we nevertheless did not deserve to suffer these things that we have suffered. [5] We cannot conceal the truth, conscript fathers, that when we had a Punic garrison in our citadel we suffered many shameful outrages both at the hands of Hamilcar, commandant of the garrison, and from the Numidians and Africans. But what are they in comparison with the things we are suffering today? [6] With kind indulgence, conscript fathers, give ear, I pray, to what I shall reluctantly say. The entire human race is now in suspense as to whether it is to see you, or the Carthaginians, lords of the whole world. [7] If one must judge Roman and Carthaginian rule from what we Locrians either have suffered from them, or are at this very moment suffering from your garrison, no one would fail to prefer them rather than you as his masters. And yet observe how the Locrians are disposed towards you. [8] Although from the Carthaginians we were suffering wrongs so much less serious, we sought refuge with your general. Although from your garrison we are suffering acts worse than those of an enemy, we have brought our complaints nowhere else than to you. [9] Either you will have regard for our ruin, conscript fathers, or else no help remains for us to pray for even from the immortal gods.

[10] "Quintus Pleminius was sent as legatus with a military force to recover Locri from the Carthaginians, and with that same force he was left there. In this legatus of yours —for the depths of misery [p. 273]embolden me to speak freely —there [11] is nothing of a² human being, conscript fathers, except his form and outward appearance, nothing of a Roman citizen except his bearing and garments and the sound of the Latin language. [12] He is a pest-bringing monster, like those of which myths say that, in order to destroy mariners, they once had their abode on this side and that of the strait by which we are separated from Sicily. [13] And if he were content to be the only man to practise his criminal passion and greed upon your allies, we in our long-suffering should still be filling up a single whirlpool however deep. [14] As it is, he has made every centurion and every soldier of yours a Pleminius; so universal has he wished licence and dishonour to be. [15] They all rob, plunder, beat, wound, slay. They defile matrons, maidens and free-born boys, dragged from the embrace of parents. Every day our city is captured, every day it is plundered. [16] Day and night every part of it re-echoes the wailing of women and children who are being seized and carried off. [17] Knowing that, any one would wonder either how we have the patience to endure, or how those who commit such outrages are not yet sated with them. Neither can I retail them all, nor is it worth your while to hear each thing that we have suffered. In a general statement I shall embrace everything.³ [18] I tell you there is not a house at Locri, not a man that has not suffered a wrong. I tell you there remains no kind of crime, lust, avarice that has been overlooked in the case of any possible victim. [19] It is all but impossible to decide [p. 275]which of the two is the more revolting lot for a state⁴ —when the enemy have captured the city in war, or when a death-dealing tyrant has overpowered it by force of arms. [20] All things that captured cities suffer we have suffered and at this very moment are suffering, conscript fathers. All the crimes that the most cruel and despotic tyrants inflict upon their helpless citizens Pleminius has inflicted upon us and our children and our wives.