The price of the -medimnus- (a bushel and a half) had risen to 15 -denarii- (10s.), at least three times the average price in the capital; and many would have died of absolute want, if supplies had not arrived from Egypt, and if, above all, the revival of agriculture in Sicily( 4) had not prevented the distress from coming to the worst.

The effect which such a state of things must have had in ruining the small farmers, in eating away the savings which had been so laboriously acquired, and in converting flourishing villages into nests of beggars and brigands, is illustrated by similar wars of which fuller details have been preserved.
The Allies Still more ominous than this material distress was the increasing aversion of the allies to the Roman war, which consumed their substance and their blood.

In regard to the non-Latin communities, indeed, this was of less consequence.

The war itself showed that they could do nothing, so long as the Latin nation stood by Rome; their greater or less measure of dislike was not of much moment.

Now, however, Latium also began to waver.