24.
When Caesar, having completely conquered the most
warlike nations, perceived that there was now no state which could make
preparations for war to oppose him, but that some were removing and fleeing from
their country to avoid present subjection, he resolved to detach his army into
different parts of the country. He kept with himself Marcus
Antonius the quaestor, with the eleventh legion; Caius
Fabius was detached with twenty-five cohorts into the remotest part
of Gaul, because it was rumored that some states had risen in arms, and
he did not think that Caius Caninius Rebilus, who had the charge of
that country, was strong enough to protect it with two legions. He ordered
Titus Labienus to attend himself, and sent the twelfth legion
which had been under him in winter quarters, to Hither Gaul, to protect
the Roman colonies, and prevent any loss by the
inroads of barbarians similar to that which had happened the year before to the
Tergestines, who were cut off by a sudden depredation and
attack. He himself marched to depopulate the country of Ambiorix,
whom he had terrified and forced to fly, but despaired of being able to reduce
under his power; but he thought it most consistent with his honor to waste his
country both of inhabitants, cattle, and buildings, so that from the abhorrence
of his countrymen, if fortune suffered any to survive, he might be excluded from
a return to his state for the calamities which he had brought on it.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.