wounded, might have fled; but, hoping that the friendship which had formerly bound him to Caesar would procure his pardon, he repaired to the proconsul, without having sent a herald to ask for peace, and appeared suddenly in his presence as Caesar was seated upon his tribunal. His appearance inspired fear; for he was of tall stature, and had a very imposing aspect under arms. There was

a deep silence. The Gaulish chieftain fell at Caesar's feet, and implored him by pressing his hands without uttering a word. Caesar, on the contrary, upbraided him with the recollections upon which he hoped for his safety. He compared his recent struggle with the friendship of which he reminded him, and by that means pointed out more vividly the odiousness of his conduct. And thus, far from being touched with his misfortunes at that moment, he threw him at once in fetters, and afterwards ordered him to be put to death, after having exhibited him in his triumph" (six years later).

On the news of this great success, the Roman Senate decreed that thanks should be rendered to the gods of Rome by twenty days of solemn festivals. Caesar dared not, however, winter on the Italian side of the Alps: he took up his quarters at Bibracte, in the midst of his legions. He had given up to his soldiers the captives taken at Alesia; so that every legionary had a Gallic slave to sell or keep.1 For himself he reserved twenty thousand Aedui and Arverni, whom he set at liberty in the hope of winning over those two nations, who did, in fact, give in their submission.

VIII. — EIGHTH CAMPAIGN: SUBJECTION OF THE BELLOVACI AND CADURCI (51 B.C.).

THE war was not yet ended, however. The Gauls of the north and west, with the exception of the Nervii, Veneti, and Eburones, had not yet experienced any bloody defeats. In the preceding campaign their contingents had been small, and the

1 The sale of slaves was very profitable. After the capture of Pindenissum, a small town in Cilicia, Cicero sold them to the amount of twelve million sesterces in the space of three days, and the sale was not then ended (Ad Att. v. 20).

Their

losses had fallen principally upon the Arverni and Aedui. strength, therefore, as well as their courage, was still unbroken; and experience had taught them what kind of warfare they must wage against the legions, surprises, partial attacks, but no more

of those battles in which Roman tactics destroyed vast armies in a day. The activity of Caesar disconcerted this new plan.2 In the middle of the winter he fell upon the Bituriges before they had completed their preparations, and made many thousand prisoners.

1 Combatant, without either helmet or cuirass, who appears to be opposing his enemy's spear, or rather is preparing to hurl the stones which he carries in his cloak. Statue in the Uffizi Gallery at Florence.

2 For the winter he had divided his eleven legions in the following manner: two among the Sequani, the same number among the Remi, one among each of the following tribes, - the Boii, Bituriges, and Ruteni, one again at Mâcon and Chalon; and he kept two with him at

He did not, however, lay waste the country at all, and held out liberal conditions of peace, which were gladly accepted. Having rewarded the two legions which had just made this expedition in intensely cold weather, by giving every soldier two hundred sesterces, and every centurion two thousand, he sent them back to their winter-quarters, and himself returned to Bibracte, after an absence of forty days.

GALLIC SOLDIER (?).1

The centre of Gaul seemed to be definitely pacified, as the Romans said. But at this moment the north broke out, and first of all the Carnutes, who invaded the territory of the Bituriges, laying it waste with fire and sword. Caesar had not rested more than eighteen days at Bibracte, when news was brought him of the movement among the Carnutes: he at once set out again, took up his position with two legions among the ruins of Cenabum, and thence sent out his cavalry and auxiliaries to scour the country.

1 This statue, and the one on p. 353, seated on scrolls, must have been ornaments to some villa, and probably represent Gauls (Clarac, Musée de sculpture, pl. 854A, Nos. 2155A and 2155B).

It was a war of devastation and pillage; and the soldiers threw themselves into it with an eager desire for gain and a love of murder. A considerable portion of the Carnutian population perished of cold and want in the depths of the woods.

This execution was not yet ended, when a general rising of the nations of the north-east obliged him to hasten with four legions to the help of the Remi, who were seriously menaced.

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GALLIC SOLDIER (?).

Ambiorix, at length hearing the rumor of war in Belgica, had issued from the forests of Germany, where he lay hidden; and this time the Bellovaci had risen in mass, supported by the nations of the valleys of the Somme and the Scheldt and by those of the Lower Seine. The proconsul marched towards their country: he found it a desert; and when he met them upon Mount Saint Marc(?), in the forest of Compiègne, their position, protected by marshes, was so strong that he dared not attack them. He was himself obliged to think of providing against surprises by constructing in the enemy's neighborhood a veritable fortress for his four legions, a camp with a rampart twelve feet high, and sur

VOL. III.

23

mounted by towers of three stories, connected by galleries, in which the soldiers could fight under cover; two trenches, each fifteen feet wide, were made in front of it. Several days passed in skirmishes between the foragers. Caesar dared not attempt a direct attack, which would oblige him to cross a marshy ground, and then climb heights bristling with defences. He resolved to resort to his great resource, - investment. Three more legions were called up, and the works began. At the sight of the lines so rapidly pushed on by vigorous workers, the Bellovaci remembered Alesia with terror; and one night they sent out of the camp the women, children, and old men, and the numerous carts conveying their baggage. Daylight having overtaken them in that operation, Caesar took advantage of the disorder to approach nearer, in order to find an opportunity of striking some decisive blow. He threw wicker-work bridges over the marshes, and reached a hill adjoining that occupied by the Gauls. The latter lighted great fires along the front of their camp; and behind this curtain of smoke and flames, which the Romans dared not cross for fear of falling into some ambuscade, they escaped. Being overtaken in the neighborhood of the Aisne, they lost the best of their infantry, all their horse, and their chief, Correus, who refused to yield.' This reverse

discouraged them; they implored mercy of the victor; all the cities of the north-east likewise gave hostages. Caesar scoured Belgica, drove Ambiorix, who had entered the territory of his tribe with a few hundred fugitives, back across the Rhine once more, and then returned towards the Loire; for all the cities south of that river had also revolted.

COIN OF DURATIUS.2

Duratius, a friend of the Romans, had put down the insurrection among the Pictones by seizing their capital. The war in

1 These encounters are placed by M. de Sauley (Campagnes de Jules César en Gaule, p. 394 sqq.) and by Napoleon III. in the forest of Compiègne, on the north of that town. Caesar's first camp must have been at Mount Saint Pierre in Châtres, the second at Mount Collet, the Gauls upon Mount Saint Marc. M. Peigné-Delacourt, who discovered a Roman wooden bridge beneath half a yard of peat in the marsh of Breuil-le-Sec, below Clermont (Oise), places the Roman camp on the hill which commands that town.

2 Head of Diana: DVRAT. On the reverse, free horse galloping; above, an aedicula or monogram; in the exergue, IVLIOS. Cf. p. 337, the explanation of this name on the coin of Votomapatis; De Sauley, Numismatique, etc., No. 46.