The third day afterwards the election of praetors was held.

The praetors created were, Lucius Porcius Licinus, Caius Mamilius, Aulus Hostilius Cato, and Caius Hostilius Cato.

The election completed, and the games celebrated, the dictator and master of the horse abdicated their offices.

Caius Terentius Varro was sent as propraetor into Etruria, in order that Caius Hostilius might quit that province and go to Tarentum to that army which Titus Quinctius, the consul, had commanded, and that Lucius Manlius might go as ambassador across the sea, and observe what was going on there; and at the same time, as the games at Olympia, which were attended by the greatest concourse of persons of any solemnity in Greece, were about to take place that summer, that if he could without danger from the enemy, he might go to that assembly, in order that any Sicilians who might be there, having been driven away by the war, or any Tarentine citizens banished by Hannibal, might return to their homes, and be informed that the Roman people would restore to them every thing which they had possessed before the war.

As a year of the most dangerous character seemed to threaten them, and there were no consuls to direct the government, all men fixed their attention on the consuls elect, wishing them to draw lots for their provinces, as soon as possible, and determine beforehand what province and what enemy each should have.